Finding the right prospects to sell to can take a lot out of a sales rep. From vetting the lead lists to keeping prospects engaged, sales reps are under massive pressure to deliver results.

However, AI has emerged as a beacon of hope for reps struggling to automate sales prospecting so much so that 66% of sales reps say AI helps them understand customers better and provide personalization. 

The positive impact of AI in the sales industry is bringing AI sales prospecting into the limelight. 

In this guide, we will understand how adding an AI layer can ease prospecting for your sales reps and examine a list of AI sales prospecting tools they can use to improve conversions. 

Top AI sales prospecting tools in 2024

Now, let’s understand the solutions we have in the market today to solve the above problems and dive deep into a feature-wise comparison of the top 10 tools for AI sales prospecting. 

1. Happysales 

Happysales is one of the most complete AI sales prospecting software that saves hours for your team by giving them unmatched insights into your buyers and eliminating the guesswork out of their research. It relies on AI-generated prospect & account intelligence and helps with a 360° view of every prospect & customer.

Features

• AI-generated prospect intelligence
• DISC personality assessment 
• AI role plays to practice sales pitches
• Prospect role-specific messaging
• AI recommended conversation starters 
• Prospect LinkedIn summaries  
• Customer call evaluation

Pros 

• Generative AI for writing emails and messages 
• Native AI features for more customization options

Pricing 

Happysales has 2 plans— essentials for $35/month and premium for $45/month. They also have a forever-free plan to get started without paying a penny. 

2. People.ai

People.ai is an AI-powered revenue intelligence platform that helps sales teams win more revenue. People.ai is a good example of Gen AI in sales and has a fully integrated generative AI functionality that automates manual tasks, examines accounts, and deal-health. It further uses AI in sales enablement and gives your reps coaching recommendations to win opportunities.

Features

• AI insights & Intelligence with next steps
• Deal summaries 
• AI-powered assistant for everyday tasks
• Recommendations for high-risk deals 
• Buyer group insights 

Pros 

• Seamless integration with Salesforce

Cons

• Limited data-capturing ability
• Interface can be difficult to navigate at times

Pricing 

Pricing plans are not displayed on their website. You’ll have to contact their team to get a quote.

3. Gong.io 

Gong is next on our list. It is a sales intelligence platform that employs AI to analyze customer interactions and provide critical insights for sales teams. Its AI can be customized to your business, allowing for more flexibility and better results. 

Features

• Customizable AI model 
• Generative AI for critical customer insights 
• Custom AI learning models 
• Multi-language transcription feature
• Full pipeline visibility 

Pros 

• Ability to build call libraries 
• Search filters for words used in the call

Cons

• It can be expensive if you want more seats  
• Transcriptions need some improvement in terms of accuracy 

Pricing 

Gong has custom pricing depending on the size of your business. 

4. Drift 

Drift is an AI powered B2B sales prospecting platform that makes it easier for your sales team to build a quality pipeline. Its features are designed to offer convenience to your visitors and prospects. Bionic chatbots keep customers engaged with human-like conversations. 

Features

• AI-powered customer insights 
• Personalized omnichannel outreach
• Real-time engagement notifications 
• Integrations with 50+ tools 
• Real-time translations powered by ChatGPT

Pros 

• Chrome extensions to quickly record videos 
• The support team resolves problems quickly 

Cons

• Frequent bugs with new feature releases 
• Onboarding takes a lot of effort 

Pricing 

Drift starts at $2,500/month billed annually. 

5. Apollo

Apollo’s sales intelligence and engagement platform allows your team to discover customers in the market, connect with contacts, and establish a modern go-to-market strategy. Apollo's B2B database offers over 220M contacts and 30M companies to build your prospect list and move conversations forward. 

Features

• B2B database of 275+ million contacts with 65+ filters 
• Lead scoring for prospect prioritization 
• Apollo Chrome extension for prospect research 
• Salesforce & Hubspot integration 
• Rich prospect data in the calendar for future meetings

Pros 

• Easy to use and intuitive platform 
• The free plan offers a lot of features like unlimited email credits, AI-assisted email writing

Cons

• Reporting features are basic 
• Customer support can be improved

Pricing 

Apollo starts at $49 per month/per user and goes up to $119. It also offers a free plan. 

6. OneShot.ai

OneShot.ai is an AI sales prospecting platform that lets you narrow down ICP leads in buying mode. You can conduct in-depth prospect and account research and instantly generate highly relevant and personalized messaging for them.

Features

• Intelligent email delivery system 
• Track high-value contacts
• AI-powered personalized messaging
• Comprehensive data for target prospects 
• AI-powered analytics to refine the approach 

Pros 

• Chrome extension is helpful for lead research 

Cons

• Limited features compared to other platforms 

Pricing 

Premium plan starts at a whopping $995 per month and there’s a custom quote for their enterprise plan.

7. Reply.io

Reply.io is a popular AI-powered sales engagement platform that helps sales teams find new prospects, automate manual tasks, and personalize multichannel interactions throughout the sales process. While these are just a few examples of AI in sales, the platform can help your reps do much more. 

Features

• AI-powered personalization 
• Automated multichannel sequences 
• AI-based response handling 
• Ability to ingest product details 
• Filters to define ICP

Pros 

• Reliable customer support 
• You can have multiple sending domains per user

Cons

• Integration with limited email service providers
• Lack of LinkedIn automation

Pricing 

Reply has three pricing plans starting from $49/per month/user. You can also use their free plan before switching to paid plans. 

8. Seamless.ai

Seamless.ai is a sales engagement platform powered by AI. It helps your team build a sales pipeline and find potential clients with high buying intent. Its real-time search engine uncovers and validates prospect emails and phone numbers for effective outreach. 

Features

• AI recommendation to find prospects 
• Real-time data verification via AI
• AI-powered prospect list-building 
• Quick view of job changes 
• AI writer for messaging and sales scripts 

Pros 

• Good breadth of the data available
• You can connect to popular CRMs such as HubSpot, Salesforce, etc

Cons

• There are certain issues with contact export and import 
• Accuracy level of emails is lower 

Pricing 

The pricing plans are not available on their website. You need to contact their sales team. 

9. Cognism 

Cognism is a premium AI sales intelligence platform that gives your sales team a more efficient way to prospect. Its native AI helps to enrich CRM records, bring leads into the funnel, surface opportunities, and identify customer trends.

Features

• AI-powered and instant CRM enrichment 
• Chrome extension for individual prospecting 
• Advanced sales intelligence including firmographics, buyer intent signals, etc
• Outreach prioritization and personalization 
• Multiple filters to find high-quality & phone-verified mobile numbers

Pros 

• Easy to use and implement 
• Rich filters for targeted outreach

Cons

• Sometimes the contact details are incorrect 

Pricing

Cognism also offers custom pricing, and their team will contact you once you fill out the form on their website.  

10. Outreach

Outreach is a sales engagement platform that puts your prospecting on auto-pilot and lets you have personalized conversations with prospects at every point of their buying journey. The platform syncs engagement data across different channels and helps you scale your outreach with AI-driven customized insights.

Features

• AI-identified call topics and reactions
• AI-powered deal scoring
• AI live coaching cards 
• Action item detection & follow-up
• Automated meeting summaries

Pros 

• Sequences are helpful
• Integration with Zoom, Gmail, and Google Calendar 

Cons

• Analytics and reporting are basic 
• UI is clunky 

Pricing 

Outreach has different pricing plans, but the costs are not revealed on its website.  

What are AI sales prospecting tools?

80% of customers are more likely to make a purchase when brands offer personalized experiences. 

With these growing customer expectations and exponentially multiplying data, manual prospecting methods fail to deliver personalized, efficient, and scalable solutions.

AI sales prospecting tools are designed to address the pain points of manual prospecting activities, including data entry, lead qualification, lead research, and outreach, which consume hours of your team’s efforts. 

They use advanced algorithms, data, predictive analytics, and automation to facilitate highly targeted outreach, deep personalization at scale, and full-funnel visibility. These tools optimize manual processes and allow sales teams to focus on strategic and value-adding tasks. 

Why do you need an AI sales prospecting tool?

According to Hubspot, sales pros find that AI tools reduce the time taken to do manual tasks and increase time spent on personalization, improve relationships with prospects, and spend more time preparing for meetings.
However, for companies that haven’t adopted AI tools, the current state of prospecting and the outbound sales motion is tech-savvy, overwhelming, and time-consuming. Major challenges that most sales teams today encounter include:

1. Consistently missed sales quotas 

The fact that 75% of sales reps consistently miss their quotas is a clear sign that traditional prospecting methods are no longer cutting it. 

Sales teams are chasing low-quality leads, using generic outreach methods, and ultimately struggling to convert enough leads to hit their targets. Prospects now expect a personalized experience  – something most sellers simply can't deliver at scale with manual efforts.

2. Bulky and inefficient tech stack 

On average, sales reps juggle 10 or more different tools for prospecting activities like data collection, list building, outreach cadence, and more. 

This scattered tech creates inconsistent workflows, varying data sets, and a lack of unified visibility into the full prospect journey. Reps end up wasting precious selling time switching between apps, duplicating efforts, and missing follow-ups, ultimately leading to low conversions. 

3. Declining buyer trust due to spam-filled inboxes

Only 3% of buyers actually trust salespeople. Unwanted and low-quality outreach has led to a distrust of potential customers in sales reps.

It is hard to understand the needs of every prospect and then initiate personalized conversations which is why companies stick with the same old generic and promotional messaging. This actively damages their brand image and makes them less credible right from the start. 

4. Poor outreach conversion rates 

The harsh reality is that only about 2% of sales emails and cold calls actually convert into booked calls. This means that the majority of your team’s efforts are going to waste. Generic, one-size-fits-all messaging simply doesn't resonate with modern B2B buyers who expect brands to understand their needs proactively emphasising the need for a b2b sales prospecting tool

Things to consider while choosing an AI sales prospecting tool

With many different options in the market, each claiming to transform your sales process, choosing the most reliable and effective AI sales prospecting software is difficult. You can use the following factors to weigh all your options and narrow your search. 

1. Depth of data sources

Evaluate the breadth of data providers/sources the tool integrates with - company websites, news feeds, social media, databases, etc. Assess the quality, accuracy, and freshness of this third-party data powering the AI features.

Determine if the tool can ingest your own first-party data, such as CRM, marketing metrics, product usage, etc. Lastly, it should give you a unified, 360-degree view of prospect companies and contacts.

2. DISC personality assessment

DISC models analyze communication styles, behaviors, and driving forces of prospects. Look for tools to determine personality traits from digital interactions like emails, social posts, etc. 

The AI should also be able to customize cold emails/messages based on personality traits to save you precious time. This human-centric AI increases the relevance of your prospecting outreach.

3. Personalized emails and icebreakers

The tools you choose should analyze all available data - company, role, interests, recent events/triggers, etc. Based on this context, it should build customized prospecting hooks, messages, and value props. Look for natural language generation abilities to craft conversational messaging.

4. Custom AI workflows

Top tools for AI sales prospecting provide workflow builders with the ability to customize end-to-end prospecting cadences. Ensure you can define your own criteria for lead scoring, sequencing, etc. The tool should be able to align with existing sales playbooks and processes. Next, look for the ability to run A/B tests and optimize AI based on performance data.

5. Flexibility to add human judgment to AI 

While the AI automates data collection and many other tasks, your team should be able to validate outputs using your chosen tool. It should allow for easy ways to accept/reject/modify suggested prospects, messaging, etc, and incorporate human feedback to improve and retrain the AI processes over time.

Let Happysales AI be your prospecting superpower 

Happysales stands out with its unique and native AI capabilities and features. It has all that your team needs, from research to outreach. The contextual role-plays, DISC personality assessments, AI-email writing, and more set your reps up for more conversions and, ultimately, sales success. 

Think Happysales can be a right fit for your team? Sign up to get early access to the platform and turn the tables for your sales team by adding AI in sales prospecting.