How to Build a Better Outbound Prospect List (With 8 Enrichment Calls)

A better outbound list comes from eight calls in a fixed order. Size the audience for free, search, pull the roster, enrich, add phones, then export. This guide runs all eight against the LeadOcean API with real queries.

TL;DR

• Two of the eight calls are free: a people count and a company count. Run them before you spend a record.
• The whole recipe takes about 40 minutes and spends about 130 records, well inside the 1,000 on the free plan.
• Every call below is a plain HTTP request to https://api.leadocean.io, so a script or an MCP client can run it.

Prerequisites

• A LeadOcean account on the free plan (no card). The app is at app.leadocean.io.
• An API key in your shell: export LEADOCEAN_API_KEY=.... Free keys carry both scopes, search and enrich.
• curl and jq. The MCP route needs only the server URL https://api.leadocean.io/mcp and an OAuth sign-in.
• An ICP written as filters. The example here: Directors in sales, United States, companies of 51 to 200 people.

Step 1: Size the people list (free)

Send count=true as a query parameter with limit=1. It returns the total and spends nothing.

curl -s -G "https://api.leadocean.io/v1/people/search" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY" \
  --data-urlencode "count=true" \
  --data-urlencode "limit=1" \
  --data-urlencode "jobLevel=Director" \
  --data-urlencode "jobFunction=Sales & Business Development" \
  --data-urlencode "country=US" \
  --data-urlencode "employeeRange=51-200" | jq '.meta'

Read meta.total. It is capped at 100,000, so narrow the filters if you hit that. Enum values are exact strings: check them with GET /v1/enums or the leadocean_list_enum_values tool before you guess.

Step 2: Size the company list (free)

Count companies with the same ICP at the account level. GET /v1/companies/count is free and breaks the total down by industry, headcount band and HQ country.

curl -s -G "https://api.leadocean.io/v1/companies/count" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY" \
  --data-urlencode "employeeRange=51-200" \
  --data-urlencode "hqCountry=US" \
  --data-urlencode "hasMailableContacts=true" | jq

In an MCP client the same call is the leadocean_count_companies tool. Ask: "Count US companies with 51 to 200 employees that have a mailable contact."

Step 3: Pull the first page of people

Search returns one record per person. Ask for 25 first, not 100, to check the filters on a small page.

curl -s -X POST "https://api.leadocean.io/v1/people/search" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY" \
  -H "content-type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "jobLevel": ["Director"],
    "jobFunction": ["Sales & Business Development"],
    "country": ["US"],
    "employeeRange": ["51-200"],
    "limit": 25
  }' | jq '.meta'

The body is flat JSON and filters are arrays. Page with meta.nextCursor, passed back unchanged. One search pages to 10,000 rows, then meta.depthCapped turns true and no cursor is issued.

Step 4: Pull the roster of a target account

When a company is already on your list, get its people directly. GET /v1/companies/{domain}/people returns thin records, one record per person.

curl -s "https://api.leadocean.io/v1/companies/acme.com/people" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY" | jq '.meta'

Use it to find a second or third contact at an account where the first one bounced. Contact points are not in this response. Enrich a person for those.

Step 5: Enrich one person

Enrich takes exactly one of linkedin_url, email, phone or person_id. There is no name plus domain lookup, so search first, then enrich by person_id.

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": "PERSON_ID_FROM_SEARCH", "reveal_email": true}'

reveal_email returns the address at no extra record. A person we hold nothing for is a 404 and costs nothing.

Step 6: Read the career history

Person enrich returns resume_data since October 2026: past roles, education, certifications and awards, each when held. Use the past roles to write one true line in the opener.

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": "PERSON_ID_FROM_SEARCH"}' \
  | jq '.data.resume_data.experiences'

Past employers carry no company_id yet, so match them by name, not by ID. The current role is in contact_current_experiences[].

Step 7: Add a phone number

Phones come from GET /v2/people/phone. It takes linkedin_url, contact_id or person_id and costs one record per call, even when it finds nothing. So filter first with hasPhone=true in the search.

curl -s -G "https://api.leadocean.io/v2/people/phone" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY" \
  --data-urlencode "person_id=PERSON_ID_FROM_SEARCH" | jq '.data'

Numbers come best first. Each has a phone and a type, the source's own label (mobile, office and so on). Treat an unfamiliar label as unknown.

Step 8: Export the list

For more than a few hundred people, stop calling one by one and run a bulk export. POST /v1/exports takes up to 50,000 rows a request and 500,000 a day. Bulk CSV export is not on the free plan, so this step needs Solo ($97 a month) or higher.

curl -s -X POST "https://api.leadocean.io/v1/exports" \
  -H "x-api-key: $LEADOCEAN_API_KEY" \
  -H "content-type: application/json" \
  -d '{
    "name": "sales-directors-us-51-200",
    "filters": {
      "jobLevel": ["Director"],
      "jobFunction": ["Sales & Business Development"],
      "country": ["US"],
      "employeeRange": ["51-200"],
      "emailStatus": ["verified"]
    },
    "limit": 5000,
    "preset": "full"
  }'

The export is async. Poll GET /v1/exports/{id}, then download from /v1/exports/{id}/download. Every row costs one record whatever the columns. The app does the same on its Exports page: filter builder, column picker, price preview, CSV download.

What you get

The free count for the ICP above, from the leadocean_count_leads tool on 2026-10-21. It counts mailable people by default (verified, catch_all_valid or catch_all):

{
  "total": 36453,
  "totalIsExact": true,
  "totalAll": 119788,
  "distinctCompanies": 20473
}

total counts mailable people. totalAll is the same filters with no email condition. The gap between them is the people you would pay a record for and not be able to email.

A person-enrich record has this shape (response shape from the API reference, placeholder values). profile_data holds identity, headline and location; the reference leaves its fields untyped, so print one real response before you map them.

{
  "success": true,
  "data": {
    "profile_data": { },
    "contact_data": {
      "has_email": true,
      "email_status": "verified",
      "email_type": "work",
      "contact_emails": [{ "email": "jane.doe@acme.com", "type": "work", "status": "verified" }],
      "contact_current_experiences": [ { } ]
    },
    "resume_data": {
      "experiences": [{ "job_title": "Sales Manager", "company_name": "Acme", "start_date": "2019-01", "end_date": "2022-06" }],
      "educations": []
    },
    "meta": { }
  }
}

The phone endpoint returns data with no meta: person_id, found, phones (best first, each { "phone": "+14155550133", "type": "mobile" }) and best.

Troubleshooting

FAQ