Why single-provider enrichment fails
One data provider finds emails for 60-70% of your list. The other 30-40% come back empty. You either accept the gaps or pay for a second provider and build your own fallback logic.
Waterfall enrichment fixes this. It tries providers in sequence, cheapest first, and stops when it finds a verified email. You pay for one hit, not multiple misses.
How it works
Step 1: Prepare your list
Create a CSV with the contacts you need emails for:
first_name,last_name,company,domain
Jane,Smith,Acme Corp,acme.com
John,Doe,Widget Inc,widget.io
A Sales Navigator export or CRM segment also works. Deepline reads whatever columns you have.
Step 2: Run a pilot (2 rows)
Claude Code reads your Deepline skills and runs:
deepline enrich --input leads.csv --with-waterfall email --rows 0:1
Step 3: Review the output
Each row shows:
- The verified email (or "no result" if all providers missed)
- Which provider found it
- Credits used
Step 4: Run the full list
Claude Code continues with the full enrichment:
deepline enrich --input leads.csv --with-waterfall email
Step 5: Push to your sequencer
Claude Code runs:
deepline enrich --input output.csv --with instantly_add_to_campaign --payload '{"campaign_id":"abc123"}'
Works with Instantly, Smartlead, Lemlist, and HeyReach.
Adding phone numbers
Same waterfall approach. Deepline routes through Lusha, AI ARK, ContactOut, and Forager in cost order.
Providers in the waterfall
You only pay for the provider that finds each contact:
| Category | Providers |
|---|---|
| Apollo, Hunter, People Data Labs, Prospeo, RocketReach, ContactOut, LeadMagic, Dropleads, Lusha, Icypeas, BetterContact, FullEnrich, Forager | |
| Phone | Lusha, AI ARK, ContactOut, Forager, RocketReach, Apollo |
| Firmographics | Apollo, People Data Labs, Crustdata, AI ARK, BuiltWith, TheirStack, Exa |
| Validation | IPQualityScore, Hunter Verifier, LeadMagic |
Cost breakdown
| List size | Credits | Managed mode cost |
|---|---|---|
| 10 contacts | 3-4 | ~$0.30-0.40 |
| 100 contacts | 30-40 | ~$3-4 |
| 1,000 contacts | 300-400 | ~$30-40 |
BYOK mode: $0 platform fee. You pay providers directly at your contract rates.
Who uses this
- SDRs building prospect lists
- RevOps leads cleaning CRM imports
- Agencies running enrichment across client accounts
Deploy as a recurring workflow
Once the one-off works, schedule it:
Deepline wraps the prompt as a scheduled workflow. Run history and billing in the dashboard.
Common questions
Frequently Asked Questions
1What if no provider finds an email?+
The row stays in the output with an empty email field and a note saying which providers were tried. You are not charged.
2Can I customize the provider order?+
Yes. Override with --waterfall-order to specify your preferred sequence (e.g., Apollo, Hunter, People Data Labs).
3What match rate should I expect?+
Waterfall typically hits 80-90%. Single provider is 60-70%.
Try this yourself
Install the CLI and run this use case in under 5 minutes.