Export an Apollo List to Ovalead in 5 Steps

Why export Apollo to Ovalead?

Apollo maintains a database of 275M+ contacts, but its updates aren't real-time. In practice:

• You export 5,000 ICP-fit contacts from Apollo
• 3 months later, ~10% of them have changed companies — Apollo doesn't know yet (update cycle ~monthly to quarterly)
• You launch your campaign on stale data

Fix: run the Apollo list through Ovalead right before launching the campaign. Ovalead runs a live verification at moment T and returns updated records.

Step 1 — Build the list in Apollo

1. Apollo → People or Companies
2. Apply your ICP filters (title, company size, industry, geography)
3. Select the contacts to export (up to 25,000 per export on Pro plans)
4. Optional: save the list as a "Saved Search" for reuse

Step 2 — Export to CSV

1. At the top of the list: Export button
2. Choose CSV
3. Check the required columns: First Name, Last Name, Email, Title, Company, LinkedIn URL
4. Apollo delivers the CSV in seconds (or by email for large volumes)

Important: the LinkedIn URL field is critical for Ovalead. Apollo includes it by default — make sure it's in your export.

Step 3 — Import into Ovalead

1. Ovalead → New job
2. Drag-and-drop the Apollo CSV
3. Ovalead automatically recognizes Apollo columns (native mapping)
4. Check Also enrich the company to get a fresh website, industry and size

Step 4 — Launch the scan

Click Create job. Ovalead verifies each contact against public sources in parallel. For 5,000 contacts with 3 active sources: ~1h.

You can close the tab — the job runs in the background. Ovalead sends an email when it's done.

Step 5 — Use the result

The output CSV contains:

• All your original Apollo columns
• trace_status: updated, job_changed, email_invalid
• trace_new_title and trace_new_company: if the person moved
• trace_email_score: 0-100, SMTP validation

Filter the result by trace_email_score > 80 to launch your campaign only on safe emails. Filter by trace_status = job_changed to flag contacts to re-approach with a contextual message ("congrats on the new role").

Recommended workflow for Apollo users

1. Apollo for the initial sourcing (list acquisition)
2. Ovalead for ongoing maintenance (quarterly re-scan)
3. Lemlist / Smartlead for the campaign send

This hybrid stack typically costs 50-70% less than Apollo Organization alone, with better data quality over time. See our detailed Ovalead vs Apollo comparison.