Hunter.io And Apollo.io For Finding Candidate Contact Info - Because LinkedIn InMail Is Expensive And Ineffective
Let's talk about LinkedIn InMail for a second. LinkedIn Recruiter Lite costs $140/month and gives you 30 InMails. Full LinkedIn Recruiter costs $835+/month. Average InMail response rate is 10-25% depending on industry and how good your messaging is.
So you're paying $4.67-$27.83 per response. And that's if your messaging is good.
There's a better way: find candidates' actual email addresses and contact them directly.
Hunter.io and Apollo.io are contact-finding tools that let you discover email addresses, phone numbers, and direct contact information for passive candidates. Hunter costs $49/month. Apollo costs $49-$99/month. User reviews report 15-35% response rates on cold emails to sourced candidates—often better than InMail.
Both tools have limitations and ethical considerations, but for recruiters who want to reach passive candidates without paying LinkedIn's ridiculous prices, these tools are game-changers.
Hunter.io: The Email Finder That Actually Works
How it works:
You provide a person's name and their company domain (e.g., "Sarah Johnson" at "microsoft.com"). Hunter searches its database of indexed email addresses from public sources, identifies the company's email pattern (firstname.lastname@company.com, first.last@company.com, etc.), and returns the likely email address.
Key features:
Email Finder: Find individual email addresses by entering name + company. Works best for companies with standard email patterns and people who have public digital presence.
Domain Search: Find all public email addresses associated with a company domain. Useful for discovering who works at target companies and building prospect lists.
Email Verifier: Verify if an email address is valid before sending. Helps reduce bounce rates and protect sender reputation. User reviews note this feature is critical for maintaining email deliverability.
Bulk tasks: Upload lists of names/companies and find emails in bulk. Chrome extension: Find emails while browsing LinkedIn, company websites, or anywhere on the web.
Campaigns (Cold Email): Hunter includes basic cold email functionality—send sequences, track opens/clicks, schedule follow-ups. Not as robust as dedicated cold email tools like Lemlist or Instantly, but convenient if you want all-in-one functionality.
Pricing:
Free plan: 25 searches/month, email verification included. Good for testing or very light recruiting use.
Starter plan: $49/month (annual) or $59/month (monthly). 500 searches/month, bulk tasks, Chrome extension, API access. Sweet spot for most individual recruiters.
Accuracy and limitations:
Hunter's accuracy depends on data availability—works better for people at large companies with public email patterns than small companies or people with minimal digital footprint. User reviews report 60-80% accuracy when confidence score is 90%+, and 40-60% accuracy for lower confidence scores.
It's not magic—if someone's email has never appeared publicly and their company doesn't use standard patterns, Hunter can't find it. But for most corporate candidates, it works well enough.
Apollo.io: The All-In-One Sales Tool Recruiters Are Stealing
Apollo combines contact database, email finder, phone number finder, engagement tracking, and outreach automation in one platform.
How it works:
Apollo has a database of 275+ million contacts and 73+ million companies. You search for people by title, company, location, skills, industry, etc., and Apollo returns contact information including email addresses, phone numbers, social profiles, and company data.
Unlike Hunter (which finds emails from public sources), Apollo has a proprietary database built from data partnerships, public records, and user contributions.
Key features:
People Search: Search Apollo's database by job title, seniority, company, location, skills, and 50+ other filters. This is the main recruiting use case—finding passive candidates who match your criteria.
Contact Data: Get email addresses (often multiple—personal and work), direct phone numbers, LinkedIn URLs, and company information. User reviews note Apollo often provides more complete contact data than Hunter, including phone numbers.
Email Sequences: Set up automated email sequences with personalization, A/B testing, and follow-up logic. Schedule calls, track responses, manage your entire outreach workflow.
Chrome Extension: Find contact info while browsing LinkedIn, company websites, or anywhere online. Many recruiters use this to enrich LinkedIn profiles with emails and phone numbers.
Intent Data and Signals: Apollo tracks company hiring signals, funding announcements, job postings, and other data. While designed for sales, recruiters use this to identify companies actively hiring and prioritize outreach.
Integrations: Syncs with Gmail, Outlook, Salesforce, HubSpot, and most CRMs. Also integrates with recruiting tools through Zapier.
Pricing:
Free plan: 10,000 email credits/year (unlimited searches but limited exports), 120 mobile phone credits/year, email sequences included. Surprisingly generous for free—you can test Apollo substantially without paying.
Basic plan: $49/user/month (annual) or $59/month (monthly). 12,000 email credits/year, 1,200 mobile credits/year, sequences, advanced filters. Good for individual recruiters with moderate sourcing volume.
Professional plan: $99/user/month (annual) or $119/month (monthly). 24,000 email credits/year, 2,400 mobile credits/year, A/B testing, call recording, advanced analytics. Recommended for recruiters doing heavy outbound sourcing.
Accuracy and data quality:
Apollo's data accuracy varies—user reviews report 70-85% accuracy for email addresses and 60-75% accuracy for phone numbers. Accuracy is higher for people at large companies and lower for startups/small companies.
Apollo includes email verification built-in, so you can verify before sending. User reviews suggest always verifying emails before outreach to avoid bounces.
Hunter vs Apollo: Which One Should You Use?
Both tools have recruiting use cases, but they're different:
Use Hunter.io if:
- You already know who you want to contact (found candidates on LinkedIn) and just need their email addresses
- You prefer to source candidates elsewhere and use Hunter just for email finding
- You want the simplest, cheapest tool focused specifically on email discovery
- You're sourcing primarily from LinkedIn and need to enrich profiles with emails
Use Apollo.io if:
- You want an all-in-one tool for searching candidates AND getting contact information
- You need phone numbers in addition to email addresses
- You want built-in email sequencing and outreach automation
- You value having a searchable database of candidates with filters by title, skills, company, etc.
- You're comfortable with a more complex tool that has a learning curve
Cost comparison:
- Hunter Starter: $49/month for 500 email finds
- Apollo Basic: $49/month for 12,000 email credits/year (1,000/month) PLUS phone numbers PLUS database search
Many recruiters use both: Hunter Chrome extension for quick LinkedIn-to-email enrichment, and Apollo for database searching and bulk sourcing.
The Ethical And Legal Considerations You Need To Know
Using contact-finding tools for recruiting raises privacy and compliance questions:
GDPR and privacy laws: If you're recruiting in Europe or contacting EU citizens, GDPR restricts unsolicited outreach using scraped or third-party contact data. You need "legitimate interest" to contact people, and they have the right to object. Some recruiters argue recruiting outreach qualifies as legitimate interest, but it's legally gray.
California (CCPA) and other U.S. state privacy laws also restrict use of personal data without consent. B2B contact data (work emails) generally has more flexibility than personal data, but check with legal counsel.
CAN-SPAM compliance: In the U.S., recruiting emails must comply with CAN-SPAM—include your physical address, accurate subject lines, and unsubscribe links. Hunter and Apollo include unsubscribe functionality if you use their campaign features.
Candidate experience and opt-in: Just because you can find someone's email doesn't mean they want recruiting messages. User reviews report that personalized, relevant recruiting emails get decent responses, but generic spray-and-pray outreach gets complaints and spam reports.
Company policies: Some companies prohibit recruiters from contacting employees using personal/unapproved channels. If a candidate's company has an anti-solicitation policy, you could create legal issues. Use good judgment.
What Response Rates Actually Look Like
Personalized, relevant recruiting emails: 15-35% response rates depending on role scarcity, seniority, and message quality. User reviews note that passive candidates in high-demand roles (engineering, data science) respond better than saturated roles (project management, marketing).
Generic, templated recruiting emails: 3-8% response rates. User reviews report these often get ignored or marked as spam.
Cold emails vs LinkedIn InMail comparison: Well-crafted cold emails to verified addresses perform comparably or better than LinkedIn InMail. LinkedIn InMail averages 10-25% response rate. Cold email to sourced addresses averages 15-35% if personalized, 3-8% if generic.
Keys to higher response rates:
- Personalize the first line with something specific about their background
- Be clear about the role and why you're reaching out
- Keep it short—3-5 sentences max
- Include a clear call-to-action (schedule a call, reply with interest, etc.)
- Don't attach anything—links are fine but attachments trigger spam filters
The Bottom Line
Hunter.io costs $49/month and finds email addresses for candidates you've already sourced elsewhere. Apollo.io costs $49-$99/month and gives you searchable candidate database, emails, phone numbers, and outreach automation all in one.
Both tools are massively cheaper than LinkedIn Recruiter ($140-$835/month) and often produce equal or better response rates if you personalize your outreach.
User reviews rate Hunter 4.4/5 stars and Apollo 4.7/5 stars for recruiting use cases.
There are ethical and legal considerations—especially around GDPR, privacy laws, and candidate experience. Use these tools responsibly: personalize messages, respect opt-outs, and only contact candidates whose background genuinely matches your role.
If you're tired of paying LinkedIn's absurd fees or want to reach passive candidates who aren't active on LinkedIn, try Hunter or Apollo. Start with free plans to test, then upgrade if they work for your sourcing workflow.
Just don't be the recruiter who spam-blasts 500 people with generic templates. Nobody likes that person.
Hunter.io
- Pricing: Free plan (25 searches/month). Paid plans start at $49/month.
- Best for: Email finding for candidates sourced from LinkedIn or other sources
- User rating: 4.4/5 stars (G2, recruiting use case)
- Try it: hunter.io
Apollo.io
- Pricing: Free plan (10K emails/year). Paid plans $49-$99/month for recruiters.
- Best for: All-in-one candidate sourcing, contact finding, and outreach
- User rating: 4.7/5 stars (G2, recruiting use case)
- Try it: apollo.io
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