Issue No. 13: ZoomInfo v. Apollo v. Clay

Categories are like stars. One day, a new one appears. The next, it’s headed toward the grave. The drama happens in the middle. 

In this issue, we’ll look at a category that’s quickly evolving — sales intelligence software. Will the current leader hang on? Will they lose relevance and get replaced by a fresh face? Or will the category itself get reshaped by a radically new approach? The winner, in part, will be determined by which player convinces the market that it has the right solution for the future. (That, my friends, is where the strategic narrative comes in).

To help you win your own category, we’re going to look at three players in this space — ZoomInfo, Apollo, and Clay – and evaluate how well each is doing on this front. 

I have a partner for this issue, too. Not only does Julien Sauvage speak French better than me (maybe because he’s French), but he also looks much better in a cowboy hat (the photo below proves it). Julien also led marketing at Clari and Gong, which puts him on my shortlist for the Flag & Frontier Marketing Hall Of Fame.

Why We Picked Sales Intelligence 

Sales intelligence software helps sales teams find information about target customers. Here’s why we picked this category:

• It’s old enough to be ripe for change, but young enough to remain relevant. Kind of like Harrison Ford. Basically, every modern sales team uses a tool like this.

• There are a TON of players competing for market share and relatively low barriers to entry (no one’s building a plutonium refinery here). This forces everyone to stay on their toes.

• Investment is still happening and AI adoption is still in the early stages. Things could get interesting, quickly.

While there are hundreds of tools in this category, here’s why we picked ZoomInfo, Apollo, and Clay. 

• ZoomInfo is arguably the category leader. They’re an OG player that was founded way back in 2007. Plenty of people don’t like ZoomInfo because they’re crazy expensive.

• Apollo is the most direct challenger to ZoomInfo, and there are numerous similarities between the two. They have a big share of the market but aren’t the go-to, especially among enterprise customers.

• Clay is the dark horse. As you’ll soon find out, they have a drastically different take on sales intelligence that could blow up the category. That would be fun to see. 

How This Evaluation Works

Our goal is to find out how well each of these brands is using the right narrative to support their category strategy. There are two caveats we should tell you about our approach:  

• We don’t know how leadership at each company has defined their category strategy — we can only surmise what the strategy should be by looking at the company from the outside. 

• We don’t have access to each brand’s strategic narrative. They may not even have one at all. What we can do is use things like website messaging and advertisements as a proxy.

Like Sherlock, we’re relying heavily on abductive reasoning for this analysis. (BTW, if you didn’t have to google the definition of abductive reasoning, we should talk.)

Here’s the process:

1. First, we’ll come up with a hypothesis of what each brand's category strategy should be.

2. We’ll then evaluate each brand’s messaging to see how well this strategy is being executed.

3. To conclude, we’ll share some commentary on what each brand might to do improve its odds of becoming the only obvious choice.

We could be 100% wrong in our take. Or we could be pretty damn close. The point here isn’t to come up with some perfect, nitpicky evaluation, but to show you how we think about creating the right idea in the minds of your buyers. 

Let’s get to it. 

We’ll Recommend One of These 6 Category Strategies for Each Brand

A category strategy is the plan you’ve developed for becoming the only obvious choice. There are 6 Category Strategies:

1. Create a new category

2. Win an emerging category

3. Own a category niche

4. Grow category leadership

5. Consolidate categories

6. Re-imagine a category

You can find an in-depth overview of each here. Having a Category Strategy matters because it informs the “job” your narrative needs to get done. For example, if you’re creating a new category, you need to tell the market a different story than if you were growing your leadership of an existing category.

Here’s what we think the category strategy for each brand should be: 

ZoomInfo: Consolidate Categories or Sustain Category Leadership

The ZoomInfo of 2007 probably wouldn’t recognize its current self. It started off as a database of sorts – a tool that helped you find the email addresses and phone numbers for people in your target market so you could fill up spam folders faster than your competitors. But ZoomInfo has been adding products left and right. 

More on that soon. 

Today, ZoomInfo is a company in distress. Its stock is currently trading at 87% below its peak ($9.50 from the time of this writing, down from a high of $77). It’s valued at a mere $3.45B (not much for a public company). And it’s even the subject of a class-action lawsuit for securities fraud, where it’s charged with being manipulative and coercive in the way in handled auto-renewals.

All signs point to a company in desperate need of growth. But if your core product has plateaued (my hunch is that this happened a long time ago), then where else can you go besides new products? 

Today, ZoomInfo offers dozens of tools for sales, marketing, talent acquisition, and operations. It plays in multiple categories and appears to be building an all-in-one meta category. There’s a clear challenge with this play, though – you must convince the market why your consolidated solution is preferable to multiple point solutions. In the eval below, we’ll see if they did that. 

In the meantime, ZoomInfo should be trying to show the market why it’s still the best in its legacy category. We’ll look at that, too.

Apollo: Consolidate Categories or Own a Category Niche

Apollo almost mirrors ZoomInfo’s product suite, so based on what we can see from the outside, it could be playing the same Category Consolidation game. It’s also looking for an exit, as it’s raised $251M in venture funding (including a $100M Series D round in 2023). Apollo can’t be content to remain a me-too offering in a crowded category; it has to play big. 

If we were Apollo, here’s the scenario we’d be hoping for to help us win big:

1. ZoomInfo bungles its category consolidation play and becomes a money-losing dinosaur that fades into irrelevance.

2. The market still believes that a new, consolidated category of sales and marketing tools is needed.

3. Apollo convinces buyers that its all-in-one platform is the go-to choice and comes out on top.

4. Apollo shows strong growth and retention and goes public or gets acquired in 2025 or 2026. 

Possible, but not sure how likely that is. The market is full of companies that added products to suit their growth needs instead of solving customer problems. Later, they had to back into a message about why their “all-in-one” solution is so valuable. That rarely works well. We’ll be looking to see if Apollo makes a better case for an all-in-one offering than ZoomInfo. 

The other option would be to niche down and own the SMB space. After all, Apollo is supposed to be less expensive than ZoomInfo. Let’s see if they call that out. 

Clay: Re-imagine a Stagnant Category or Create a New Category 

We gave Clay an unfair advantage for this piece: John interviewed someone on their team and asked them to give me the inside scoop on what Clay was really up to. Sorry, ZoomInfo and Apollo — Clay just seemed more interesting to talk to. 

So we have it on good authority that Clay isn’t just another “sales intelligence” startup. Instead, they have spotted the emergence of a new discipline called the “GTM Engineer,” and they’re building the software that this new role needs and wants. 

I don’t want to use up too much of this article explaining the ins and outs of how Clay works. All you need to know is that Clay provides a much more flexible, customizable way of connecting lead intelligence with sales motions. 

It’s not a “better” version of ZoomInfo, it’s categorically different. We’re curious to see if this comes across in its messaging yet. 

Here’s How We Scored Each Brand

Here are the criteria we use to rate each brand:

1. Point of View. Is there a unique take on the problem or solution?

2. Clarity. Is it obvious who the solution is for and what it does?

3. Strategic Alignment. Does the narrative get the right job done?

4. Memorability. Is it easy to remember what the brand stands for?

5. Distinctness. Are the claims made different from competitors?

We give each brand a score between 1-10 on each metric, for a maximum total of 50 points. 

ZoomInfo 

Point of View 

Products in established categories may not need to emphasize the problem as much if buyers already know what products in that category are for. But we still like to see brands have a unique take on what they do — it helps carve out a space in the minds of your buyers. ZoomInfo doesn’t really communicate a POV, though. They hint at the idea that slow sales outreach is an issue when they say, “Find and close your next customer before your competitors do.” But it’s not something they go deep on. 

John’s Score: 2/10
Julien’s Score: 4/10

Clarity

It’s always harder to communicate a product suite than a point solution. But it’s not too difficult to understand what ZoomInfo does. Sometimes the functionality is buried below generic-sounding headlines (would you know that “Engage accounts most likely to be in the market” is just a fancy way of describing a display advertising tool?) What ZoomInfo doesn’t make clear is how all its pieces work together. 

John’s Score: 6/10
Julien’s Score: 6/10

Strategic Alignment

If ZoomInfo’s job is to show buyers why a consolidated, all-in-one platform solves problems that point solutions can’t, then that message doesn’t come across strongly. That was how John evaluated the narrative. While we liked how ZoomInfo points to a “single source of truth” as something point solutions might struggle with, the consequences of that problem aren’t made clear. All in all, it’s not a strong argument. 

But Julien looked at ZoomInfo from a different perspective. He felt they are simply trying to show buyers that they’re “the best.” If that’s the play, they are doing a bit better. They make pretty explicit claims about having the largest database, the most accurate data, and the most expansive feature set. But they never address why buyers should care about all these best-in-class features. 

John’s Score: 4/10
Julien’s Score: 8/10

Memorability

Is it easy to remember what ZoomInfo stands for? No. We found little that stuck in our minds. Julien in particular found it hard to navigate all the inconsistencies in lingo. Is it customers or buyers? Sales or GTM? A platform on an OS? Too much messaging soup.

John’s Score: 1/10
Julien’s Score: 1/10

Distinctness

ZoomInfo’s message about its AI capabilities (called Copilot) stood out. In the overview video, they talk about how adding AI on top of scattered, inaccurate data isn’t a viable approach. Their take is that ZoomInfo, as a consolidated platform, can legitimately use AI to speed up sales teams. We can buy the claim, and we didn’t see competitors say anything similar. But why isn’t this brought to the surface? They also make some claims about improvements to marketing ROI, ad spend, and productivity, but so does everyone else. 

John’s Score: 6/10
Julien’s Score: 8/10

Apollo 

Point of View 

Apollo hints at how having a “disconnected” sales process could be an issue. They never state the problem outright, but it’s implied through statements like “One platform to close them all,” “The only end-to-end sales platform” and “Replaces: ZoomInfo, Clearbit, Lusha, Cognism, Seamless.” But the only thing they state explicitly is the cost associated with using all these platforms: “We basically went from paying $35,000 for two tools to $12,000 for one. We cut our costs in half.” Surely, there’s more to Apollo than cost savings. We would have liked to see more, but it’s an improvement over ZoomInfo.

John’s Score: 6/10
Julien’s Score: 4/10

Clarity

We liked how Apollo focuses on sales. It’s much easier to understand who the platform is for and what it’s designed to do. There’s less jargon and more plain English to describe the various tools and functions that its platform provides. But they sometimes veer off into describing themselves as a GTM tool instead of a sales tool. Picking a lane would be stronger. 

John’s Score: 7/10
Julien’s Score: 8/10

Strategic Alignment

If Apollo is really trying to build a “meta” category of sales tools, we think it has a decent start. Instead of saying outright that it’s better than different point solutions, Apollo talks about “replacing them.” Lines like “Integrate your whole go-to-market stack” get this point across well, too. Apollo also provides decent social proof of their market presence: “7,377 reviews… 500,000 companies… over 1,000,000 people joined Apollo last year.” If ZoomInfo and Apollo are playing the same category consolidation game, Apollo makes a clearer argument. 

But here’s what’s missing. Apollo doesn’t name a problem associated with a “non-integrated” approach beyond cost savings. They should be able to make a stronger case than that. Nor do they provide clear language for what this new consolidated category should be. That makes this strategy harder for buyers to grok – and easier to write off Apollo as a “cheaper version of ZoomInfo.” 

John’s Score: 5/10
Julien’s Score: 6/10

Memorability

Julien says he remembered the headline “Find and close your next deal” long after we reviewed Apollo together, so we’ll give them some bonus points for that. Another piece of owned language we found was the “Living Data Network.” It seems like an attempt to level up its data quality above ZoomInfo. We can’t tell how much meat there is to this claim, but we like how the term sticks. Beyond that, there’s not much that is easy to remember.

John’s Score: 5/10
Julien’s Score: 6/10

Distinctness

We found some of the same claims here as ZoomInfo: you’ll get this many more leads, this increase in open rate, this improvement in ACV, etc. Those don’t mean much to us. But they say something bolder, too: “(We are) the fastest growing and most loved sales technology on the planet.” It’s accompanied by a G2 chart that positions Apollio.io in the top spot. The thing is, ZoomInfo and Apollo seem to have swapped spots since that screenshot was taken. That’s the danger in claiming a leadership position when you lead by a very slim margin. It’s a fragile claim. Apollo would be able to defend its claims better by speaking to something it can do that others cannot.

John’s Score: 4/10
Julien’s Score: 6/10

Clay

Point of View 

Julien especially liked this question from Clay: “Why use one contact database when you can use them all?” There’s another similar line: “Build the best lead lists using any data source you can imagine.” These statements suggest there’s a problem with single-sourcing your lead data, but the problem doesn’t feel especially thorny. Is there more that could be unpacked? 

But the biggest disconnect we see is between what Clay shared with us directly and what’s presented externally. According to our source, Clay is building tools for a new type of role: the GTM Engineer. A GTM Engineer needs a more flexible, hands-on way of working with lead data that tools like ZoomInfo and Apollo can’t provide. If true, this represents a core, fundamental shift in the market. It also means Clay could address a bigger problem or opportunity than less-meaty outcomes like time savings, data quality, or ease of use. However, none of this shows up in Clay’s messaging. 

There’s one last gripe we have with Clay. There’s no good case for why buyers should start using Clay now. That’s a must for radically different products.

We didn’t think Clay’s messaging is bad per se; it’s just short of what it could be. Kind of like seeing a top high-school pitcher being selected for the All-Star team instead of being drafted into MLB.

John’s Score: 3/10
Julien’s Score: 5/10

Clarity

The lack of POV has a negative downstream effect on clarity. While Clay might be built for a new role (the GTM Engineer), this is never made clear externally. Instead, at various points Clay’s website speaks to sales, RevOps, inbound, outbound, and GTM teams. Which is it? 

We also had to spend a lot of mental effort just understanding what exactly Clay does. The voices in our head would say things like, “OK, Clay helps with automated inbound, that means it must be for marketers, right? Oh… wait a second, it’s a contract data provider, so that means it’s really designed for SDRs. Or perhaps it’s AEs? Actually,had it wrong, all these data integrations point to this being a tool for ops.don’t know,give up.”

It’s the same challenge the no/low-code tools like Notion and Airtable have run into: because they are so flexible and extensible, it’s easy to get bogged down in features and use cases and lose sight of the big picture. Clay might be able to get away with this for now, as this lack of clarity won’t keep the early adopters away. But it could cause issues once the brand scales. 

John’s Score: 3/10
Julien’s Score: 1/10

Strategic Alignment

Again, our hypothesis is that Clay should claim a new category. (If it doesn’t, it needs to convince the market that it’s better than ZoomInfo or Apollo, a game it’s unlikely to win.)

We don’t see this happening yet, so we have no choice but to provide a low ranking here. But we aren’t necessarily faulting Clay for this, either. Early-stage startups usually wait to claim a category until they have clarity on who their customers are, what problem they’re solving, and what the solution should look like. Claiming a category before you have this data in hand isn’t going to end well.

Clay only raised its Series B a few months ago — which is right around the time you see brands ready to make this move. Perhaps we’ll evaluate this in another year and be able to provide a better score :).

John’s Score: 2/10
Julien’s Score: 6/10

Memorability

We love the fact that Clay owns words like “shape” and “mold.” Now, not moldy bread. As is “molding your campaigns.” It’s not only a word you’d never see competitors use, but it’s also a great verb to describe how the product works – and it goes perfectly with the brand name.

John’s Score: 9/10
Julien’s Score: 6/10

Distinctness

The only claim we could find (without scouring every inch of the website) was the idea that Clay is a multi-source data provider. Instead of sourcing its own data (like ZoomInfo) Clay lets you plug into several data sources. Other than that, Clay makes many of the same claims as ZoomInfo and Apollo: better data, save time, improved outreach, and so on.

John’s Score: 6/10
Julien’s Score: 6/10

Overall Scores

🥉 ZoomInfo: 23/50
🥇 Apollo: 28.5/50
🥈 Clay: 23.5/50

None of these are terrible, but there’s plenty of opportunity for someone to take the lead. We’ll be watching 🍿.

Here’s What We Learned 

Competitors in the same category aren’t always playing the same game. 

Legacy players like ZoomInfo may lead their category for the moment. That’s a great position to start with, but to stay there, category leaders have to avoid two pitfalls. First, they must avoid irrelevance by continuing to move the category forward. Second, as their offerings expand, they must remain crystal clear on what their brand stands for. This is the same game that companies like Salesforce, Nike, Apple, and Starbucks are playing in their respective categories. It’s extremely hard to do well. 

As the #2 player, Apollo is waiting in the wings for its chance to overtake ZoomInfo as the category leader. But the risk is that ZoomInfo may not cede this position as quickly as they would like. (This is why Apollo is likely hoping for ZoomInfo to slip up). But the other risk is more existential: if legacy sales intelligence tools get superseded by a newer, more modern category, then that could leave Apollo with little upside. Remember, Pepsi tried for years to unseat Coke. It never did. And cola is no longer the growing category it used to be.

That leaves us with Clay. As a newcomer, Clay has the chance to reshape this space or even build a new category to replace it. And the timing could be right, too – since sales intelligence is roughly two decades old, it might be time for a fresh take. The main hurdle Clay faces, then, is less about competing with ZoomInfo and Apollo, and more about getting the market to adopt its new approach aimed at GTM Engineers. If ZoomInfo and Apollo are Chevy and Ford, then Clay is Tesla trying to evangelize a new way of doing things. 

Should you pay attention to competitors? Yes, because you must understand the variety of choices present in buyers’ minds. But should you try to beat them by playing the same game, but better? We don’t think so.

P.S. Special thanks to Ashley Artrip, GTM Engineer at Clay, for contributing to this issue. 

Thanks for reading.

If we haven’t met before,own a consultancy called Flag & Frontier.

CMOs and CEOs hire me to align their executive teams around the right category strategy and strategic narrative.

If you’re curious to learn more, just reply to this email and I’ll share more details on howcan help.

Cheers ✌️

John Rougeux
Founder, Flag & Frontier
[email protected]
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