| Functionality | 4 <p>LinkedIn Sales Navigator is not your typical lead generation tool. Instead its best viewed as a <span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">way to leverage LinkedIn's vast network to identify leads and the best path to reach them via you and your team's connections. As such, its database does not provide emails or phone numbers, meaning you'll still need to find these on a different platform. </span></p><p><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">However, it does excel in a number of areas such as LinkedIn messaging, the granularity of its data and filtering options as well as its relationship/network mapping features. The ability to know the 'best path in' to contact a lead is something unique to Sales Navigator that can only be done using LinkedIn's vast network.</span></p> | 7 <p>ZoomInfo is not a rounded lead generation tool. Instead its best viewed as a very powerful lead generation platform - its contact database is one of the largest and most accurate on the market and its intent data, filtering granularity and data richness is second to none. However, it lacks any kind of email sequencing functionality meaning you'll still need to pay separately for a dedicated CRM/engagement platform. It's worth noting, though, that you can still make phone calls directly from the platform.</p> |
| Ease of Use | 8 <p>Much like their consumer facing product, LinkedIn Sales Navigator's web app is simple and intuitive to use. Its search interfaces are familiar and well presented. Additionally, its company profiles, though detail rich, are easy to navigate and use. It would take an average SMB employee less than 30 minutes to master the platform.</p> | 4 <p>ZoomInfo does not provide any kind of self-serve onboarding. Instead, it makes you jump through a series of video calls with sales agents just to trial the platform. Despite this, its search interfaces are familiar and intuitive to use. Additionally, profiles and company pages are well laid out, managing a vast amount of information well.</p><p>However, given the depth of functionality, some features were still not as intuitive as we'd like e.g. using its workflows automation feature. It would take an average SMB employee a full day to master the platforms use.</p> |
| Look and feel | 7 <p>Sales Navigator's design aesthetic closely mirrors that of its consumer counterpart (LinkedIn). When tested, we find its interfaces well laid out and able to display complex information in a way that still easily digestible. Additionally, we find that searches and page loads are generally fast to load (<2s).</p> | 4 <p>ZoomInfo has recently given many of its interfaces a facelift (most notably its core prospecting views). It's design aesthetic is modern, well laid out and intuitive. When tested, we also find its searches were very fast to load (often <2s).</p><p>However, as a result of its depth of features, some screens remain clunky with features hidden in confusing places. Additionally, the 'home screen' is extremely cluttered and overwhelming.</p> |
| Customisability | 5 <p>Sales Navigator only offers a handful of avenues for customisation. Beyond the ability to simply create targeted lists, you're also able to create custom org charts to match buyers and champions within organisations. Additionally, you're able to create custom buying personas to more easily run complex searches. However, we noted the lack of some more enterprise friendly features, such as the ability to assign/manage territories to specific teammates.</p> | 8 <p>ZoomInfo being an enterprise focused tool, is one of the most customisable products that we've tested in the sector. You can customise the layout of core screens such as the contacts and company tabs. You can also customise what columns are shown in search results when prospecting. Additionally, you're able to customise lead scoring algorithms, ICPs and much more to really tailor the setup to your needs.</p> |
| Ease of Setup | 6 <p>Customers are able to get started with Sales Navigator self-serve via their website. However, whether or not you get a free trial depends on your LinkedIn plan status e.g. premium, free etc. If you already have a LinkedIn account though, inital setup is extremely simple <5 mins.</p><p>However, there are a number of things which you might want to customize that can take some time. For example, you are able to create buying heirarchy maps manually within the platform, something that can take several days to get the most out of.</p> | 1 <p>ZoomInfo is particularly difficult to get set up with. Frustratingly, they do not offer a self-serve option to try out the platform. Instead, you’ll need to trudge through two sales demos before you are able to access their trial and even a end of trial feedback call! Once access was granted, we found the platform simple to set up initially, however, there are a lot of details you’ll want to customise (such as personas etc.) let alone integrations with external platforms that can take a week to fully configure.</p> |
| Customer Support | 8 <p>The primary channel for support in LinkedIn Sales Navigator is via a chat widget inside their web app. The initial chat will be with an AI chatbot instead of a real agent. When tested, we find this AI chatbot to be one of the most helpful on the market, being able to answer most questions we had. When it failed, it readily handed off to a real agent in less than 5 minutes who was able to handle more complex queries via email.</p> | 3 <p>When tested, ZoomInfo's primary method of support is via an account executive or sales agent. These agents, though helpful, often take over a day to respond and responses were often geared towards commercial goals rather than explicitly providing support. We were disappointed to see a lack of any kind of live chat widget embedded inside the web app. Additionally, ZoomInfo's help centre is one of the most overwhelming and hard to consume on the market.</p> |
| Integratability | 3 <p>Though Sales Navigator does provide integrations with some CRMs (Salesforce, Hubspot) and email engagement platforms (Salesloft, Outreach), you'll need to be on their highest pricing tier to take advantage of them. Additionally, the lack of a readily available API or integration with automation platforms such as Zapier makes Sales Navigator one of the more closed off platforms that we've tested.</p> | 9 <p>ZoomInfo offers one of the largest array of native integrations of any product we've tested in the sector. The range covers almost everything you can imagine from popular CRMs (Salesforce, HubSpot) to sales engagement platforms (Salesloft, Outreach) to automation platforms (Zapier). It also offers an API to enterprise customers who need to interact with their database directly.</p> |
| Ease of Migration | 2 <p>Due to privacy restrictions, the ability to export accounts, leads or lists from Sales Navigator is omitted entirely. Additionally, though an API exists, it is not readily available to developers and requires approval from LinkedIn to use.</p> | 7 <p>ZoomInfo provides self-serve export functionality directly within its web app which covers all relevant lists and data. It also lets you configure which pieces of data you'd like to export if choosing the CSV option. Additionally, it <span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 0);">also offers an API to enterprise customers who need to interact with their database directly.</span></p> |
