How to Enrich Leads on a Bootstrapped Budget (6 Tools Under $100 a Month)

TL;DR

• Run LeadOcean first. The Free plan gives 1,000 records for life, no card, and sizing a list costs nothing.
• Add one cheap finder for gaps. Icypeas at $19 a month is the lowest paid entry price in the table below.
• Takes about 30 minutes and spends about 25 LeadOcean records.

Prerequisites

• A free LeadOcean key from app.leadocean.io, exported as $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY.
• curl and jq.
• A list of target titles and a country. Placeholders below use "Head of Growth" and "US".

The six tools, with monthly list price first and the billed-yearly figure after it:

Prices are per seat or per account as each vendor lists them. Re-check before you buy.

Step 1: Size the list for free

Count before you spend. Counts cost no records on any LeadOcean plan.

curl -s -X POST "https://api.leadocean.io/v1/people/search?count=true" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"title":["Head of Growth"],"country":["US"],"limit":1}' | jq .meta

count=true goes in the query string, not the body. meta.total is capped at 100,000. If the total is far above what you can contact, narrow the filters now.

Step 2: Pull a small page with the free records

A search page of 25 is 25 records. Pull one page and keep it.

curl -s -X POST "https://api.leadocean.io/v1/people/search" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"title":["Head of Growth"],"country":["US"],"limit":25}' > page1.json
jq '.meta' page1.json

The body is flat JSON, filters are arrays, limit runs 1 to 100, and the next page uses cursor. Free allows 5 requests a second, so a loop needs a short sleep.

Step 3: Enrich only the rows you will email

Enrich takes exactly one of linkedin_url, email, phone or person_id. Each search row carries its id at meta.source_ids.person_id. A person we hold nothing for is a 404 and costs nothing.

curl -s -X POST "https://api.leadocean.io/v1/people/enrich" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -d '{"person_id":"1234567890","reveal_email":true}'

Check email_status before you send. Mailable means verified, catch_all_valid or catch_all. There is no refund for bounces.

Step 4: Fill the gaps with one cheap finder

Some rows come back without an email. Do not buy a bigger plan for 40 rows. Use a free tier or the smallest paid one.

• Free first: Hunter gives 50 credits, Prospeo 100 and Apollo 75 a month at $0 (September 2026).
• Cheapest paid: Icypeas Basic is $19 for 1,000 credits, and a search that finds nothing costs nothing (Icypeas pricing, September 2026).
• Small batches: Anymail Finder starts at $29 for 400 credits (pricing, September 2026).

Pick one. Running three finders on the same 40 rows wastes credits and time.

Step 5: Set the budget rule

Write the rule down so you stop paying for tools you forgot.

1. Count in LeadOcean (free).
2. Spend LeadOcean records on the first 1,000 contacts.
3. Fill gaps with a free tier.
4. Upgrade one tool only when a free tier runs out in under a month.
5. Upgrade LeadOcean to Solo ($97 a month) when you need bulk CSV export or more than 1,000 records.

Paid LeadOcean plans have a fair-use pace, not credits. Nothing to top up.

What you get

A free count run on 2026-10-21 through the LeadOcean MCP tool leadocean_count_leads, for the Step 1 filters (title "Head of Growth", country US):

{
  "total": 2298,
  "totalIsExact": true,
  "totalAll": 4476,
  "distinctCompanies": 2036,
  "credits": 0,
  "defaults": "Counted only addresses worth sending to (emailStatus: verified or catch_all_valid or catch_all), which is this tool's default."
}

The 2,298 is the mailable count. totalAll is the same filters with no email condition. Cost: 0 records.

A search row has this shape (response shape from the API reference, api.leadocean.io/openapi.json, October 2026). Values are placeholders:

{
  "success": true,
  "data": [
    {
      "profile_data": {
        "profile_full_name": "Jane Doe",
        "profile_headline": "Head of Growth at Acme"
      },
      "contact_data": {
        "has_email": true,
        "email_status": "verified"
      },
      "meta": { "source_ids": { "person_id": "1234567890" } }
    }
  ],
  "meta": { "count": 1, "limit": 25, "nextCursor": "CURSOR" }
}

Troubleshooting

FAQ