CordanisGuide
How do I find the executives at a target account I haven't met yet?
Write down the roles you need to know, then fill them from three places: the people your company already knows there, what the company publishes about its own leaders, and LinkedIn Sales Navigator or a contact data provider. Verify every email address, and ask for an introduction wherever you can.
Map the buying group by role before you search for names
In an enterprise sale, the executive you most need is often not the first one you find. Before searching for names, write down the roles that will decide, shape or block a purchase like yours.
A useful starting list has six roles: the executive who owns the budget, the executive who owns the problem (often a different person), the leaders whose teams would use what you sell every day, the technical and security reviewers, procurement and legal, and a champion. The champion is someone inside who wants the change and will tell you how decisions are really made.
Write the roles as rows, then fill in a name, how you'd reach the person, and a status: met, known by someone on your team, or not yet known. The rows marked not yet known near the top of the list are the executives you haven't met, and they're where to spend your time first.
The roles change with what you sell. A security product brings in the chief information security officer, and a finance product brings in the controller and the chief financial officer. Ask a colleague who has closed a similar deal which roles turned out to matter, because the role that stalled the last deal is the one most easily left off the list.
Start with who your company already knows, and ask for introductions
The fastest route to an executive is someone who already knows them, so check what your own company knows before any outside search. At the top of an account, two more routes work well: ask one of your own executives to write to theirs, peer to peer, and treat the executive's assistant as someone to know, not someone to get past.
Search your CRM for every contact at the company's email domain, not only those on the account record, and look at past opportunities for the people involved. For an existing customer, the people who signed the contract, ran the implementation or open support tickets are all on record somewhere. Ask your sales engineer, customer success manager and the account's previous owner whom they've met. If your team's email and calendar history is searchable, search it for the company's domain to see who has met whom.
Then look outward. LinkedIn shows your own connections at the company, and a former colleague who now works there may be one introduction away. A partner that works at the account, such as a systems integrator or reseller, may know its leaders.
When someone can introduce you, make it easy for them. Ask for one specific person, and say in a sentence why that person and why now. Write the note they'll forward, two or three sentences on the executive's business and what you'd like to discuss. Ask your champion directly who else should hear what you've been discussing, and offer to prepare what they'd share.
Read what the company publishes about its own leaders
The leadership page on the company's website usually lists the executive team. Press releases name the executive behind each announcement and often quote them, which tells you who owns which initiative.
For a U.S. public company, the filings are precise. The SEC's guide to reading a 10-K says Item 10 of the annual report covers the background and experience of the company's directors and executive officers, and that most companies provide it in the proxy statement, which is typically filed a month or two after the 10-K. Under the SEC's Form 8-K rules, a company must also report the appointment of a new chief executive, president, chief financial officer or chief operating officer, with the person's background, generally within four business days. Many companies also list their executive officers, with short biographies, in Part I of the 10-K itself. All of these filings can be searched on the SEC's EDGAR site. Earnings call transcripts show which executives speak for the company and what each one owns.
Below the executive team, job postings help. A posting often names the role it reports to, such as a vice president of supply chain, which tells you the role exists and roughly what it owns. Conference speaker lists, podcasts and industry awards name leaders who don't appear on the website.
For a private company, the leadership page, press releases, funding announcements and job postings carry most of this. Note where each name came from and when, because the next step is checking that the person still holds the role.
Search LinkedIn Sales Navigator and a contact data provider
LinkedIn Sales Navigator is the most direct way to see who holds a role today. LinkedIn's page for the product lists more than 50 search filters, including function, seniority level and years at the company, so you can find every vice president of operations at one account and save them as leads. LinkedIn's help center lists its Relationship Map, a view of the decision-makers tied to an account, on all three plans: Core, Advanced and Advanced Plus. TeamLink, which shows shared connections across your sales team, is listed on Advanced and Advanced Plus only. Saved leads produce alerts when someone changes jobs or roles, which tells you when your map has gone out of date.
To email an executive rather than message them on LinkedIn, you still need a working email address. LinkedIn's plan comparison lists 50 InMail credits a month per user on each plan, which suits a few chosen messages more than a whole buying group.
For email addresses and phone numbers, sales teams use contact data providers such as Apollo and ZoomInfo. Apollo's site says it covers 240 million professionals across more than 30 million businesses, and that all emails go through verification before they're returned. ZoomInfo's site says it holds data on more than 500 million contacts, checked by more than 300 human researchers, with org charts for key accounts. Both offer a limited free plan, and their paid plans add more. Before you buy either, test it on a sample of accounts you already know well.
The sources, compared
| Source | What it gives you | Its limits |
|---|---|---|
| Your CRM | Contacts, past opportunities and who on your team worked them | Only what someone logged, and contacts go stale when people leave |
| Your team's mail and calendar | Who has actually met whom, and when | Often not searchable across a team |
| Colleagues, partners and your champion | Introductions, and how decisions are really made | Depends on asking well and on goodwill you shouldn't overuse |
| Leadership page, press releases and job postings | The executive team, who owns which initiative, roles one level down | Updated when the company chooses, and thin below the top team |
| 10-K, proxy statement and 8-K | Backgrounds of executive officers and new appointments | Only U.S. public companies, and only the top officers |
| LinkedIn Sales Navigator | Who holds a role today, search by function and seniority, alerts on moves | Profiles are self-reported and as current as the person keeps them |
| Apollo or ZoomInfo | Business email addresses and phone numbers, with verification | Free plans are limited, coverage varies by account, and any record can be out of date |
No single source in this table is complete, so use them in order: the warmest and cheapest first, the paid ones for what's left. Before you write to anyone, check that the person still holds the role, on their current LinkedIn profile or the company's latest announcement, and that the email address is verified. A contact record can be months old, and an email address that bounces hurts the reputation of the mailbox you send from.
Where Cordanis fits
If you research a few accounts a quarter, the sources in this guide, worked in order, are enough. Sales Navigator and a contact data provider are the right tools for the search itself.
Cordanis is the workbench for account executives, built for doing this across a whole book. It keeps a record of each account from your team's mail, meetings and CRM, and its Book uses that record to show where no one at the top of an account knows you.
Cordanis finds the executives at an account you haven't met, and proposes them for you to approve. It looks them up through its own people data, or through Apollo when your team has connected it. It looks for new executives in the background through the day.
Once you approve someone, one ask writes the pursuit from the account's thesis: what matters to them, where the business is going and why your company can help. Each step waits for you, written in full, and sends only when you approve it, from your own Gmail or Outlook mailbox. A reply stops the rest of the sequence, and you approve the answer and any invite.
The account's record is shared with its team, so the next person to work the account sees who has been met and what was said. Your CRM stays the system of record.
Questions
How do I find an executive's email address?
Check your CRM and your colleagues first. Otherwise, use a contact data provider such as Apollo or ZoomInfo, and send only to an email address it has verified. Apollo's email finder page says that without an exact match it may propose a likely email address from the company's email format, so treat that as a guess.
How many people should I know at a target account?
There is no single right number, because it depends on how many roles a purchase like yours involves. Know at least one person in each role that can decide or block it, and at least two senior people at your most important accounts.
Do I need LinkedIn Sales Navigator?
It isn't required, but it's the most direct way to see who holds a role today. LinkedIn's help center lists TeamLink, which shows your sales team's connections, on the Advanced and Advanced Plus plans only. For a handful of accounts, free LinkedIn and company filings may be enough.
Does Cordanis have its own contact data?
Cordanis looks people up through its own people data, or through Apollo when your team has connected it. You don't browse a database or build lists. It finds the executives at an account you haven't met and proposes them for you to approve.
Cordanis is the workbench for account executives. It keeps each account's record from your mail, meetings and CRM, and drafts the next move for you to approve. What Cordanis is · Trust
