ZoomInfo Alternative: The RevOps Leader's Guide to Modern Data Platforms

There is a moment most RevOps leaders know well. It arrives about sixty days before a ZoomInfo renewal, when someone pulls the utilization report and the room goes quiet. Seats that haven't been logged into in months. Exports that went into spreadsheets, then into nothing. A contact database that cost $20,000, $35,000, maybe $50,000 — and that your CRM has never once talked to automatically.

The question isn't whether ZoomInfo has data. It does. The question is whether a proprietary contact database, sold as a standalone subscription, is still the right architecture for how enterprise revenue teams actually operate in 2025.

This guide is for RevOps leaders actively evaluating their options at renewal time. It covers what ZoomInfo gets right (and it does get some things right), the specific friction points that are driving enterprise teams to look elsewhere, what to require from any alternative, and how a modern Revenue Data Platform is built differently.

What ZoomInfo Gets Right

Any honest evaluation has to start here. ZoomInfo became the industry standard for a reason, and if you're running a replacement process, you need to understand what you'd be giving up.

Phone number accuracy at scale. ZoomInfo's direct-dial and mobile coverage — particularly in North America — remains among the best in the industry. This is the result of years of data acquisition, crowdsourced verification, and significant investment in compliance infrastructure. For SDR-heavy outbound teams where the phone is a primary channel, this matters.

Data breadth. Over 300 million professional profiles, 100 million company records. The sheer coverage means teams can find records for accounts that don't show up in smaller or more specialized databases.

Regulatory investment. ZoomInfo has put real resources into GDPR compliance, CCPA opt-out infrastructure, and SOC 2 certification. Enterprise legal and security teams know the ZoomInfo compliance story. That familiarity reduces friction in vendor approval processes.

Ecosystem integrations. Years of investment in native connectors for Salesforce, HubSpot, Outreach, and Salesloft mean that ZoomInfo can push data into the tools teams already use — at least at a basic level.

Intent data. ZoomInfo's B2B intent signal product (acquired via Bombora's data partnership) gives teams some signal on which accounts are actively researching relevant topics.

These are real capabilities. If your team's primary need is a large, accurate North American contact database with a known compliance story, ZoomInfo is a defensible choice and this guide will say so explicitly in the section on when ZoomInfo is still the right answer.

The problem isn't that ZoomInfo does its core job poorly. The problem is that the core job has changed.

Why Enterprise RevOps Teams Are Re-Evaluating

The five friction points below come up consistently in conversations with VP RevOps and RevOps directors at B2B SaaS companies. They're not complaints about data quality. They're structural mismatches between how ZoomInfo is built and how modern revenue operations actually work.

1. Multi-Year Lock-In on a Single Proprietary Database

ZoomInfo's sales model has historically pushed multi-year contracts, often with auto-renewing terms and price escalators. The practical result: revenue teams that signed three-year agreements in 2021 or 2022 are now locked into a pricing structure that doesn't reflect the current competitive market — and can't easily pivot even if a better option is available.

The deeper issue is architectural. ZoomInfo is a single proprietary database. When you sign a ZoomInfo contract, you're betting that their data is and will remain the best available source for your specific ICP. That was a more defensible bet in 2018. In 2025, the B2B data market has fragmented significantly — with specialized providers for intent, technographics, hiring signals, private company data, and industry-specific contact coverage that often outperform ZoomInfo in specific niches.

Multi-year lock-in on a single source means you can't adapt as the data landscape evolves.

2. Single Proprietary Database vs. Multi-Source Aggregation

Related to the above: ZoomInfo's core product is their database. When ZoomInfo's coverage is weak for your ICP — say, your accounts are primarily mid-market EMEA SaaS companies, or you sell into healthcare, or your buyers are in roles that ZoomInfo's contact acquisition has historically underindexed — you have limited options. You can layer on additional data subscriptions and manage them separately, or you accept the gaps.

Modern enterprise RevOps teams are increasingly running 6–10 data subscriptions simultaneously: ZoomInfo for core contacts, Clearbit or Apollo for additional coverage, Bombora for intent, a specialized provider for technographics, LinkedIn Sales Navigator for relationship data. Managing these separately — with different contracts, different API structures, different data schemas — is a significant operational burden. And the data still isn't unified.

The architecture of a single proprietary database made sense when ZoomInfo was the clear market leader in data quality across all use cases. It's a harder argument to make today.

3. No Native Workflow Automation

ZoomInfo surfaces data. It does not act on it.

When a champion at a target account changes jobs — one of the highest-signal events in B2B sales — ZoomInfo can tell you it happened (if you're watching). It won't automatically update the Salesforce opportunity, alert the account owner in Slack, research the champion's new company to assess whether it's a net-new ICP-fit account, or trigger an Outreach sequence for the new contact. Those actions require a separate workflow tool, and someone to build and maintain that workflow.

For high-volume signal monitoring across hundreds or thousands of accounts, the manual overhead of "ZoomInfo tells you, then you figure out what to do" is substantial. The gap between data and action is where most signal value gets lost.

4. No Reverse ETL — Data Doesn't Flow Back Automatically

ZoomInfo's integrations push data in one direction: from ZoomInfo into your CRM or SEP, at the point of export or initial enrichment. There is no native mechanism for ZoomInfo to continuously monitor your CRM records, identify which ones have gone stale, enrich them automatically, and write the updated values back.

The practical result is what most RevOps teams know as "CRM decay." ZoomInfo enriches a contact record at import. Six months later, 30–40% of contact data is inaccurate — people have changed jobs, companies have been acquired, phone numbers have changed. ZoomInfo can tell you the current state of a record if you go look. It won't proactively find and fix the stale records in your CRM.

Maintaining CRM data quality using ZoomInfo requires a human running regular export-enrich-reimport cycles, or a custom integration that someone on your team built and now maintains.

5. Legacy Architecture in an AI-Native World

ZoomInfo was built as a database product. It's now retrofitting AI features onto that foundation — Einstein-style scoring, conversation intelligence through Chorus, buyer intent signals. These are real product investments. They're also features added onto a core architecture that wasn't designed for agent-based automation, semantic data modeling, or autonomous workflow execution.

Enterprise RevOps teams that have moved to a more programmatic, agent-driven approach to pipeline management find that ZoomInfo's AI layer isn't deep enough for the workflows they want to run. It's an enrichment database with AI features, not an AI-native platform where agents are the primary interface.

What to Look for in a ZoomInfo Alternative

If you're running a formal evaluation, these are the criteria that matter for enterprise RevOps teams. Not all alternatives will check all boxes — the goal is to know what you're trading off.

Data Accuracy Through Multi-Source Aggregation

The strongest data coverage comes not from any single proprietary database, but from waterfall enrichment across multiple specialized sources. An alternative worth considering should be able to connect to 50 or more third-party data providers and apply deduplication and confidence-scoring logic to return the best available data point across all sources.

Ask any vendor: "When your database doesn't have a record, what happens?" The answer reveals a lot about architectural philosophy.

Automated CRM Sync — In Both Directions

The alternative should be able to read from your CRM, identify records that need enrichment or updating, enrich them against current data, and write updated values back — on a schedule or triggered by events — without manual intervention. This is reverse ETL, and it's the capability that eliminates the CRM decay problem.

Ask: "How does your platform handle ongoing CRM data maintenance? Walk me through what happens to a contact record six months after initial enrichment."

Enterprise Compliance Infrastructure

SOC 2 Type II, GDPR, and CCPA compliance are table stakes for enterprise procurement. Any serious alternative will have these certifications and be able to produce documentation. If a vendor can't confirm SOC 2 Type II certification, that's a disqualifier for most enterprise security review processes.

Implementation Model and Time to Value

ZoomInfo's self-serve model means you get access to the database quickly, but configuration and integration with your existing stack is your problem. An enterprise alternative should be able to answer: "What does week one look like, and what does your team do for us during that week?"

Implementation support that consists of documentation and a support ticket queue is different from a dedicated engineer working in your Slack channel. Know which you're getting.

Flexibility vs. Vendor Lock-In

Evaluate the contract structure carefully. Can you add or remove data sources as your needs evolve? Is the data model flexible enough to represent your specific account hierarchies, territory logic, and product lines? Can you export your data and your workflow configuration if you need to migrate?

The best alternative is one that gets more valuable as your business changes, not one that becomes harder to leave.

The Modern Alternative: How Lantern Is Built Differently

Lantern is a Revenue Data Platform built specifically for enterprise revenue teams. The architecture is fundamentally different from ZoomInfo's in ways that matter for the friction points described above.

Multi-Source Data Aggregation, Not a Proprietary Database

Lantern connects to 100+ third-party enrichment providers and applies waterfall logic to return the best available data across all sources. The practical result: better coverage across more ICPs, because no single data provider is the best source for every company profile or every contact role.

When ZoomInfo coverage is thin — for EMEA accounts, for specialized verticals, for contacts in roles that ZoomInfo has historically underindexed — Lantern surfaces data from the providers that cover those gaps. The client doesn't manage 10 separate subscriptions. Lantern manages the source layer and returns a unified, deduplicated result.

Revenue Ontology: A Data Model Built Around Your Business

ZoomInfo stores contacts and companies in a generic schema. Lantern builds what it calls a Revenue Ontology — a custom data model that represents each customer's specific business: their account hierarchies, territory assignments, product lines, customer segments, and ICP definitions.

This is the capability that makes Lantern "semantic" rather than generic. When a Lantern agent runs account research or scores a new lead, it's doing so against a data model that understands your business — not a generic contact database that has no awareness of how your revenue team is organized.

For enterprise teams with complex account hierarchies (parent/subsidiary relationships, multi-product customer segments, overlapping territories), this distinction is significant. A generic schema requires your team to build and maintain mapping logic. A semantic data model built around your business means the platform understands the relationships natively.

AI Agents That Act, Not Just Surface

Lantern deploys pre-built and custom agents that run autonomously against the Revenue Ontology:

• Signal agents monitor for champion job changes, intent spikes, and product usage signals across all accounts, and trigger configured actions — Slack alerts to the account owner, Salesforce field updates, sequence enrollment — automatically.

• CRM cleaning agents run continuously against your Salesforce instance, identifying stale records, enriching them against current multi-source data, and writing clean values back. No manual export-enrich-reimport cycles.

• Research agents run prospect research, account scoring, and ICP-fit analysis on inbound leads and target account lists, populating Salesforce fields with structured outputs.

• Voice agents handle inbound qualification calls and outbound prospecting calls against defined playbooks.

These agents don't wait for a human to export a list and decide what to do. They run on schedule or on trigger, and they write results back into the tools your team already uses.

Automated Reverse ETL — The Loop ZoomInfo Doesn't Close

Lantern's workflow automation layer handles the full cycle: data is enriched, processed through the Revenue Ontology, acted on by agents, and the results are pushed back into Salesforce, Outreach, HubSpot, or Slack automatically. This is the capability that eliminates CRM decay and closes the loop that ZoomInfo leaves open.

Forward-Deployed Engineers: Your Team's Dedicated Technical Resource

Every Lantern enterprise customer gets forward-deployed engineers who work in a dedicated Slack channel with the customer's RevOps team. These engineers configure integrations, build custom agents, optimize workflows, and handle the technical work that typically falls on an already-stretched RevOps team.

This is not a support ticket model. It is dedicated technical capacity — engineers who know your Revenue Ontology, know your Salesforce configuration, and are accountable for the platform performing the way it was designed to.

Lantern is SOC 2 Type II, GDPR, and CCPA compliant with 50+ enterprise customers including TriNet, backed by $15M from M13, 8VC, Primary Venture Partners, and Moxxie Ventures.

ZoomInfo vs. Lantern: Side-by-Side Comparison

What the Migration Looks Like

One of the most common objections to evaluating an alternative mid-cycle is implementation risk. "We don't have the bandwidth to migrate right now." Here is what the actual transition looks like with Lantern.

Week One: Data Sources and Revenue Ontology Configuration

The forward-deployed engineer assigned to your account connects Lantern to your existing Salesforce instance and data subscriptions. They map your account hierarchy, territory logic, and ICP definitions into the Revenue Ontology. Existing data does not disappear — Lantern reads what's already in your CRM and enriches it incrementally rather than requiring a clean-slate reimport.

By the end of week one, Lantern has a working data model of your business and has pulled enrichment data against your existing account and contact records.

Week Two: First Agents Running

The engineer configures the initial agent suite against your Revenue Ontology. Typically this starts with CRM maintenance agents (ongoing deduplication and enrichment of existing records) and one or two signal agents (champion job change monitoring, intent spike alerting). The RevOps team can see agents running and results flowing into Salesforce within 10–14 days of contract signature.

Week Three and Beyond: Workflow Expansion and Optimization

Once the baseline is running, the engineer works with your team to expand the agent configuration — additional signal types, research agents for inbound lead qualification, custom scoring models. This is an ongoing relationship, not a one-time implementation.

What carries over from ZoomInfo: All of your existing CRM data. Any contact lists or account lists you've built. Your ICP definitions. Your territory structure. Nothing is lost; Lantern enriches what you have rather than starting from scratch.

What the engineer handles in week one: Integration setup, Revenue Ontology configuration, initial agent configuration, Salesforce field mapping, and the first enrichment run against your existing records.

Is ZoomInfo Still the Right Choice?

Honest evaluation means acknowledging when the incumbent is still the right answer.

ZoomInfo remains a strong choice if:

• Your primary use case is North American direct-dial coverage for high-volume SDR outbound, and data quality at volume outweighs the need for workflow automation.

• Your team is early-stage (fewer than 50 employees) and doesn't yet have the account complexity, tool sprawl, or CRM scale that a Revenue Data Platform addresses.

• You operate in a regulated industry where your security team has already approved ZoomInfo's compliance documentation and a new vendor review process would take 6–12 months.

• Your only need is a contact database — you have no interest in automated CRM maintenance, agent-based workflow automation, or reverse ETL. You have a dedicated team member who handles data operations manually, and that model works for your scale.

• Your ICP is entirely North American and the specialized enrichment sources that Lantern aggregates for EMEA or other regional coverage aren't relevant to your business.

If any of the above describes your situation, the switching cost probably outweighs the benefit, at least at this renewal cycle.

If your situation looks more like: multiple data subscriptions managed separately, CRM data quality problems, signal monitoring that requires manual follow-up, agents you want to run autonomously, or an implementation model where your RevOps team is doing work that should be automated — then the renewal moment is the right time to evaluate what else is available.

The Renewal Moment Is the Right Time to Evaluate

ZoomInfo's contract structure often creates the false impression that staying is the default and evaluating alternatives is the disruptive choice. The math is actually the opposite: staying in a multi-year renewal without benchmarking the market locks in costs and architecture for another two or three years.

The questions worth asking before you sign again:

• Is the data we're getting from ZoomInfo flowing into our CRM automatically, or are we still running manual exports?

• Are we managing additional data subscriptions separately because ZoomInfo coverage is thin for parts of our ICP?

• When we spot a high-signal event — a champion job change, an intent spike — how many manual steps does it take to act on it?

• When did we last audit CRM data quality, and who owns the ongoing maintenance?

If the answers reveal a gap between what your team needs and what your current stack delivers, the renewal conversation is the right moment to close that gap.

If your ZoomInfo contract is coming up for renewal, talk to a Lantern engineer before you sign again. The conversation is a technical one — data sources, CRM configuration, Revenue Ontology design — and it's free. You'll leave with a clear picture of what modern architecture can do for your specific stack, and what the transition actually requires.

Schedule a technical call at withlantern.com.