Master Apollo Filters to Build Quality B2B Leads

Building a laser-targeted B2B lead list is the foundation of every successful outbound sales strategy. Whether you’re scaling cold email campaigns or planning multi-channel outreach via platforms like LinkedIn, efficient lead sourcing is the first critical step. A well-built list not only increases campaign deliverability and response rates but also empowers your team to focus time on high-potential prospects, not data cleaning.

In this guide, we’ll break down a proven, step-by-step approach to building high-quality lead lists using Apollo—walking through each essential filter and insider technique. You’ll learn tactical tips to cut through the noise, avoid common pitfalls, and create lists that actually match your ideal customer profile.

Based on the original video:

Understanding Lead Sourcing in Apollo

Apollo is widely considered a powerhouse for B2B contact data, offering powerful search capabilities across more than 217 million leads and 30 million companies. While Apollo includes built-in email sequencing and other sales tools, this guide will focus strictly on lead sourcing—that is, finding and building your ideal lists of companies and contacts.

Effective lead sourcing in Apollo involves navigating both broad company-level criteria and granular people-level filters. Depending on your goals—whether you want broad outreach or pinpointed lists—it’s crucial to understand these nuances.

• Two main approaches: Start with companies first (for precise targeting), or filter by people to quickly identify available contacts.
• Companies-first enables a secondary filter layer, ideal when you want to remove companies that aren’t a perfect fit or when you plan AI enrichment later.
• People-first is faster and easier in most cases, but may surface many prospects from the same companies unless properly configured.

Setting Up Your Apollo Filters for Laser Precision

The real power of Apollo lies within its extensive filter options. However, not all filters are equally useful. Mastering a few key parameters—especially Job Titles and Industry/Keywords—will help you avoid unnecessary noise and build actionable lists.

Understanding Lists and Bulk Company Imports

Apollo lets you save leads or companies into “lists”, essential for segmenting and exporting contacts. You can import up to 10,000 companies per list, making it easy to bring external data into Apollo for further filtering and enrichment. For large imports, split your companies across multiple lists and use the include/exclude functionality to keep your database clean.

Customizing Company Filters

• Lists: Use existing company lists as the base for deeper prospecting, especially if you’ve pre-qualified firms elsewhere or need to avoid contacting current clients.
• Manual Company Selection: Only recommended for small batch work; for scale, always use the list import features.
• Exclude List: Essential for keeping outreach ethical by removing competitors, current partners, or past clients from your campaigns.

Job Titles & Personas

The Job Titles filter is one of the most critical aspects of lead quality:

• Include only decision-makers relevant to your offer (e.g., “Founder”, “VP Marketing”).
• Exclude irrelevant titles (e.g., add “product owner” to exclusions if searching for company owners).
• Management Level/Departments: Can be useful but generally less precise—better to handpick exact titles.
• Include People With Similar Titles: Uncheck this option to avoid extra, often irrelevant titles.

Job titles can vary considerably between company sizes and industries. Leverage AI tools like ChatGPT to ask for recommended job titles for your ICP, segmented by company size or type whenever possible.

Location Targeting

You can refine your list by specifying either the location of the company or the location of the contact (based on their LinkedIn data). Exclude certain regions or states if required. For example, to target all US B2B prospects except those in California, exclude “California” under company or contact location as needed.

Employee Count & Company Size

Rather than relying on revenue data—which can often be inaccurate—focus on filtering by employee count or create custom ranges. This tends to produce more reliable segmentation of SMBs versus mid-market or enterprise accounts.

Advanced Filters: Industry, Keywords, Technology, and More

Once you’ve set the basics, take your targeting further with advanced filters. Not all of these are necessary in every scenario, but understanding them gives you a competitive edge.

Industry & Company Keywords – The Hardest Filters to Master

Filtering by industry is effective, but it’s rarely enough—especially if your niche is not precisely mapped to Apollo’s 115 listed industries. This is where company keywords shine.

• Use Apollo’s industry list as a starting point. If you’re unsure which industries suit your value proposition, paste the list into ChatGPT and get recommendations.
• Mix and match company keywords: Add keywords that appear in company names, descriptions, or SEO/social tags to narrow or expand your pool. For example, targeting “corporate training”.
• Exclude keywords: Remove types of businesses you don’t want to contact (e.g., exclude “fitness” for training companies).
• Iterate with A/B testing: Dive into results on later pages (e.g., page 20 or 50 of Apollo results) to check ongoing relevance—this is essential for list hygiene.

Remember: Often, initial filter results may look promising, but deeper into the pages, quality may drop if your parameters aren’t tight enough. Continuously review and refine for best-rank prospects.

Technology Filters

Want to only contact companies that use a specific software like Salesforce? Apollo’s “Technologies” filter, similar to BuiltWith, allows you to target firms based on their software stack, creating highly tactical lists for integrations, SaaS reselling, and martech outreach.

Email Status & Verification

Although Apollo provides email status indicators (safe to send, send with caution, do not send), don’t rely solely on them. Always run your export through third-party verification tools like Debounce or NeverBounce to achieve inbox-ready quality, as Apollo data can contain out-of-date or bounced emails. If your audience is broad, filtering by “verified” can save time. For more niche lists, include all emails, then enrich and verify externally for maximum reach.

Other Niche Filters

• Funding: Segment by companies that have recently raised capital.
• Job Posting: Target organizations actively hiring for specific roles (though other tools may offer deeper insights).
• Time in Current Role: Useful for reaching established decision-makers (e.g., CEOs with 10+ years tenure).
• Languages or Founded Year: Only apply if highly relevant to your ICP.

Most users won’t need every available filter—focus on those that best match your go-to-market motion and buyer personas.

Practical Workflow: Exporting & Scaling Your Lead List

Once your filters are dialed in, you’re ready to export.

• If using Apollo’s non-enterprise plan, you can only save 100 leads at a time. Export in batches—apply, save, assign to a list, refresh, and repeat until complete.
• For large-scale exports (e.g., 4,000 leads), this process is manual but ensures compliance with platform limits.
• Follow up with enrichment and email verification before importing contacts into your outbound or cold email campaigns.

Investing more effort upfront in qualified, double-checked contact data pays off with higher reply rates, less wasted time, and protects your sender reputation.

Pro Tips to Maximize Lead Quality

• Always cross-verify leads to fight list decay (learn more about this challenge and solutions in this guide on verifying and replacing stale leads before cold emailing).
• Use AI assistants (like ChatGPT) to supplement your list-building with recommended job titles and industry focus areas.
• Continually review your result pages—not just the first one—to catch noise and false positives.
• Document and systematize your ideal filters and keywords for fast, repeatable list creation across your team.

Frequently Asked Questions About Apollo Lead List Building

What is the best way to begin building a lead list in Apollo?

Start by defining your target companies—either import a pre-qualified company list or filter using company criteria like employee count, industry, and location. Then, switch to the people tab and layer on job titles and additional filters to select relevant contacts. This two-step approach maximizes relevance and minimizes irrelevant contacts.

Should I trust Apollo’s email verification?

While Apollo provides a “safe to send” status, these emails can still bounce or be outdated. For best campaign results, always run your exported lead lists through dedicated third-party email verification tools before outreach.

How do I refine my list to only reach decision-makers?

Use the job titles filter carefully: include only the decision-makers or influencers who match your buyer persona (e.g., CEO, VP, Director). Ask AI tools to expand or adjust your lists, and avoid the “include similar titles” option for greater precision.

How important is filtering by company keywords and industries?

Mastering industry and company keyword filters is critical for eliminating untargeted noise and surfacing companies that actually fit your offer. Continually A/B test keywords and validate leads on later result pages to avoid catching unrelated firms.

What limits should I consider when exporting from Apollo?

With standard (non-enterprise) Apollo plans, exporting is capped at 100 leads per batch, so large lists require multiple rounds of saving and exporting. Plan accordingly for time and segment your exports to keep each batch manageable and organized.