What Is Waterfall Enrichment | Benefits, Challenges & Use Cases

Missing or outdated contact data can slow down your sales and waste your team’s time. Waterfall enrichment is a method that fixes this by using several data providers one after another. If the first provider can’t find the missing info, the next one tries, and so on. This helps you get accurate emails, phone numbers, job titles, and company details.

This guide covers what waterfall enrichment is, how it works, when to use it, its key benefits, common challenges, and how to set it up the right way.

What is Waterfall Enrichment?

Waterfall enrichment is a layered approach to improving contact or company data. It is a step-by-step way to improve data. It sends contact or company info through a list of data vendors, one by one. Each vendor tries to add missing details like email, phone number, job title, or company name.

If the first vendor can’t find the data, it moves to the next. This continues until the gaps are filled or all vendors are used. This helps you get more complete data without wasting time or money.

Unlike using just one data source, this method uses many. Each vendor may be strong in different areas—like certain industries or countries. That means better results.

You also only pay when the vendor finds the right data. This saves money and keeps your team focused on the best leads.

Waterfall enrichment helps sales and marketing teams work with clean, accurate, and complete data.

How Waterfall Enrichment Works: Step-by-Step

Waterfall enrichment follows a smart, multi-step process to improve your contact or company data. It uses several data providers in a specific order to fill in missing details like emails, phone numbers, job titles, or firmographics.

Here’s how it works:

1) Identify Your Data Needs

Start by choosing what data fields you want to enrich. This could include:

• Email addresses
• Phone numbers
• Job titles
• Company names ‍
• Firmographics (like company size or industry) ‍
• Technographics (tools or software used)

Knowing what you need helps you pick the right vendors for the job.

2) Select and Rank Your Vendors

Not all data providers are the same. Some are great at verifying email addresses. Others are better at providing direct phone numbers or company data.

Choose several vendors based on their strengths. Then, set a clear order for them to work in—starting with the one most likely to give you the right data at the best price.

3) Set Up the Enrichment Workflow

Build a system where your data flows from one vendor to the next. If the first vendor can’t find the missing info, it passes the data to the second. This continues until a vendor fills the gap or all vendors are used.

This step-by-step flow avoids double charges and saves time. You only pay when a vendor adds new or updated data.

4) Connect to Your CRM or Tools

Link the enrichment process to your CRM, sales platform, or marketing tools using APIs or integration tools. This automation keeps your records fresh and accurate without manual work.

It also helps your team act fast using the latest data.

5) Monitor, Learn, and Improve

Keep an eye on how well each data vendor performs. Track success rates and update your vendor order based on real results.

By testing and tweaking the workflow, you improve both data quality and cost savings over time.

Benefits of Waterfall Enrichment

Waterfall enrichment is a smart way to clean and improve your business data. Instead of relying on one vendor, it uses many in a set order. Each vendor gets a chance to fill missing data fields like email, phone number, job title, or company name.

This method helps companies build better contact lists, improve sales outreach, and boost lead generation efforts. Here’s a full look at why waterfall enrichment is so useful for B2B teams:

1. Increased Data Accuracy and Completeness

One of the biggest problems in sales and marketing is bad or missing data. If you only use one data provider, you may end up with gaps in your records. But with waterfall enrichment, if the first vendor can’t fill in the data, the next one tries.

This way, you improve the chances of filling all data fields. For example, one vendor may give you a verified email, while another provides a working mobile number or job title. Over time, this builds rich and complete prospect profiles.

Accurate data helps your team reach the right people with the right message. It also reduces bounce rates and failed outreach attempts.

2. Expanded Prospect Reach

Different vendors collect and focus on different kinds of data. Some are strong in North America, while others are better in Europe or Asia. Some focus on large companies, while others offer data on small and mid-sized firms.

By combining these sources, waterfall enrichment gives you a wider view of the market. You can discover new prospects that a single vendor might miss. This means more potential customers, better segmentation, and a stronger chance to enter new regions or industries.

It helps you build a larger, more targeted prospect list without sacrificing data quality.

3. Cost-Effective Enrichment Process

Waterfall enrichment runs on a pay-for-success model. You only pay a vendor if they successfully enrich a data field. If they don’t find anything useful, you don’t pay.

This reduces wasted spend and protects your budget. Instead of paying upfront or for bulk records you don’t use, you invest only in data that works. It’s a smart, results-driven way to manage your data enrichment costs.

Over time, this also helps you track which vendors give the best return on investment.

4. Better Lead Scoring and Personalization

To run targeted campaigns, you need detailed and updated data. Waterfall enrichment gives you that. You can see firmographic details like company size, location, and revenue, as well as contact-level info like seniority and department.

This helps your team rank leads better. You can focus on high-value accounts, segment by buyer roles, or trigger workflows based on job title or industry.

With accurate data in hand, you can also write more personalized emails. This increases reply rates and drives more meetings and conversions.

5. Global and Industry-Specific Data Coverage

No single vendor has perfect coverage everywhere. One might specialize in tech companies, while another serves finance or healthcare. Some collect data mostly in English-speaking regions, others in Latin America, Europe, or APAC.

Waterfall enrichment brings them all together. This way, your data gets global coverage across industries and company types. You never miss out on opportunities just because one vendor lacked access to a certain market.

Whether you’re targeting startups in Canada or enterprises in Germany, waterfall enrichment has you covered.

6. Reduced Data Decay and Cleaner CRM

Contact data changes fast. People change jobs. Companies get acquired or go out of business. Emails become inactive, and phone numbers stop working. This is called data decay and it happens whether you use the data or not.

Waterfall enrichment helps fix this. By running regular enrichment cycles, your CRM stays fresh. You can update old contacts, replace dead emails, and find current job roles.

This keeps your CRM clean and ready to use. It also prevents your team from wasting time on leads that no longer exist or are not reachable.

When to Use Waterfall Enrichment

Waterfall enrichment is not something you use once and forget. It’s a flexible strategy that supports many parts of your sales and marketing process. Whether you’re fixing old data or preparing for a new campaign, this method helps you improve data quality at every stage.

Here are the key times when waterfall enrichment brings the most value:

1. Enriching Cold or Incomplete Outbound Lists

Before running any outbound campaign, your contact list needs to be complete and verified. Missing email addresses, job titles, or phone numbers can lead to failed outreach and low reply rates.

Waterfall enrichment solves this by filling in gaps using multiple trusted vendors. It gives you clean, usable data so your sales team can reach real decision-makers. This boosts open rates, call success, and booked meetings.

It’s a must-have for any team doing cold outreach or running targeted B2B campaigns.

2. Updating and Cleaning CRM Data

Over time, your CRM gets messy. People leave jobs. Phone numbers stop working. Emails bounce. This makes your data outdated and unreliable.

With waterfall enrichment, you can refresh your database regularly. Vendors validate old records and add missing fields. The result is a cleaner, more accurate CRM that saves time and increases productivity.

Sales reps waste less time chasing dead leads and more time talking to the right people.

3. Pre-Campaign Lead Cleaning

Before you launch a big email or ad campaign, it’s important to verify your lead lists. If your data is bad, your campaign will fail. You’ll see high bounce rates, low engagement, and poor ROI.

Waterfall enrichment helps you fix this. It checks each record through multiple sources and ensures the information is correct and complete.

This way, your marketing team can confidently send messages to active, valid contacts—and get better results.

4. Expanding Market Reach

Trying to break into a new market? Whether it’s a new country, industry, or vertical, you need the right contact data to start.

The problem is, no single data provider has complete coverage everywhere. That’s where waterfall enrichment comes in. By using multiple vendors, you get access to global and industry-specific data that’s otherwise hard to find.

This helps you scale your campaigns faster and target the right people in new regions or sectors.

Challenges and Considerations

Waterfall enrichment can boost your data quality, but it's not always smooth sailing. Like any advanced system, it comes with its own set of challenges. Knowing these upfront will help you plan better and avoid common mistakes.

1) Complex Setup and Integration

Waterfall enrichment tools like Clay help automate workflows across multiple data vendors. But setting them up still requires effort.

Each vendor may have different formats, APIs, and update cycles. You need a smart system that can pass records from one vendor to the next based on what data is missing. Without the right setup, you may waste time or money.

Having a clear workflow is key to making enrichment smooth and effective.

2) Data Privacy and Compliance Risks

When you're working with third-party vendors, privacy becomes a big concern. Passing lead or customer data through multiple providers can increase risk.

You must follow data protection rules like GDPR, CCPA, and other regional laws. This means every vendor must be compliant and handle data securely.

Failing to meet compliance can lead to legal trouble, penalties, and damage to your brand’s trust.

3) Time-Consuming Vendor Management

Using five different vendors means managing five separate systems. Each may have its own billing model, API limits, and usage rules.

You’ll need to monitor things like API downtime, rate limits, and contract renewals. If not tracked well, this can become a burden on your team.

Automation helps, but vendor management still needs time and focus.

4) Inconsistent Data Quality Over Time

Vendor performance can change. A provider that gave great results last quarter might be less accurate now.

If your system uses a fixed order, it might send requests to a weak vendor first and waste cycles. This slows down enrichment and reduces accuracy.

A better approach is dynamic vendor sequencing—where the order changes based on real-time success rates. Most platforms don’t offer this yet, but it’s the future of smart enrichment.

5) Unpredictable Costs

While waterfall enrichment is often “pay-for-success,” costs can still rise fast. You may not always know which vendor will return the data, and some charge more than others.

If you don’t track enrichment attempts and results carefully, you may overspend without realizing it.

Setting cost rules and usage caps can help you stay within budget.

Do You Need a Full Waterfall When You Have SMARTe?

Many teams juggle multiple vendors just to fill out a few missing fields. SMARTe changes that. With its vast global database and real-time enrichment, SMARTe often covers 90–95% of your needs out of the box. Here’s how to think about it:

SMARTe as Your Core Data Engine

SMARTe delivers:

• Real-time data enrichment for contacts and companies ‍
• Up to 70% mobile availability in North America and strong global coverage ‍
• 250 M+ B2B contacts and 64 M+ profiles to fill most gaps ‍
• Job-change alerts so you never miss a champion’s move

Start every record here. If SMARTe finds the data, you save time and cost. No extra calls to other vendors.

Integrate with Clay for Waterfall Depth

For those rare records SMARTe can’t fill, you can add a light waterfall layer. SMARTe integrates seamlessly with Clay, a platform built for multi-vendor enrichment. With one integration you get:

1. SMARTe first, for fast, accurate fills
2. Clay’s waterfall logic, to pass any misses to your preferred secondary vendors

This hybrid setup gives you nearly full coverage without complex custom code.

Simplify Your Data Workflow

By putting SMARTe at the front, you:

• Cut down on extra API calls
• Keep your CRM clean with one primary source
• Only engage Clay’s waterfall when needed

This balance reduces overhead and keeps your team focused on selling, not data fixes.

Use SMARTe as your go-to enrichment tool. Connect it to Clay for edge-case coverage. This strategy gives you the speed of one best-in-class platform with the completeness of a waterfall approach—without the usual complexity.

Ready to streamline your B2B data enrichment? Get in touch to see SMARTe in action.