Outbound from intent signals (L3)

The steps

1. 01

   Select high-signal intent topics

   Identify three specific 'Intent Topics' (Bombora) or 'Keywords' (6sense) that represent a high-intent signal for your solution. Do not choose generic terms like 'Software' or 'Business'; instead, choose 'Category' keywords that competitors own or 'Problem' keywords your USP solves. For example, if you sell cybersecurity, your topics might be 'Ransomware Protection,' 'SOC 2 Compliance Automation,' and 'Endpoint Security Review.' • Go to your Intent Provider dashboard (Bombora or 6sense). • Navigate to 'Topic Research' or 'Keyword Discovery.' • Select 3 terms that have a high correlation with your past 10 closed-won deals. • Document these in a shared doc with a 'Reason for Intent' summary for each (e.g., 'If they search X, they likely have problem Y'). Owner: Marketing Ops or Sales Lead. Time Estimate: 2 hours. Prerequisite: Active subscription to Bombora, 6sense, or G2. Pitfall: Selecting topics that are too broad, leading to 'false positive' signals. Definition of Done: A list of 3 verified intent topics mapped to 3 specific buyer pain points.

2. 02

   Automate the intent-to-Clay sync

   Establish a daily automated export of accounts that are 'surging' on your selected topics. You must filter this list strictly by your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) before it enters your prospecting tool. • Create a new 'Segment' or 'Report' in 6sense/Bombora. • Add filters: Topic Score > 70 AND Employee Count (e.g., 500-5000) AND Industry (e.g., Fintech, Healthcare). • Set the export frequency to 'Daily.' • Use a webhook or a direct Clay integration (if available) to push these accounts into a new 'Clay Table.' Owner: RevOps. Time Estimate: 1 hour. Prerequisite: Defined ICP criteria (Headcount, Geography, Industry). Pitfall: Importing every surging account without filtering for ICP, which wastes credits and rep time. Definition of Done: A functional automation that pushes roughly 10-50 high-fit, high-intent accounts into a Clay table every 24 hours.

3. 03

   Enrich accounts with decision-makers

   Once the accounts arrive in Clay, you need to find the right people and the specific context of their intent surge. • Use the 'Find People' action in Clay. Search for 'Job Titles' like VP Sales, Head of Ops, or Director of IT. Limit to 2 contacts per account. • Use the 'Find Work Email' enrichment (using providers like Waterfall, Hunter, or Apollo) to get verified addresses. • Crucially, use the 'Get Account Details' action to pull the specific 'Intent Topic' and 'Trend Score' for that account into a separate column. • Use the Clay 'Scrape Website' tool or 'Google Search' tool to find a recent company news item (e.g., a recent 10-K report or a LinkedIn post) to combine with the intent data for 'Double Relevance.' Owner: Sales Ops. Time Estimate: 3 hours for initial setup. Prerequisite: Clay.com account and API credits. Pitfall: Only finding one contact per account; intent surges are often team-wide signals. Definition of Done: A Clay table with verified emails for 2 key personas per surging account, side-by-side with their intent surge topic.

4. 04

   Generate the 3-touch AI sequence

   Use a Clay 'AI Prompt' column to write a personalized 3-touch sequence for each lead. The AI must use the 'Intent Topic' as the primary hook. • Prompt Example: 'Using the Intent Topic [Column: Topic] and Company Description [Column: Description], write a 2-sentence opening for an email. Mention that we noticed their team is researching [Topic] and ask if they are looking to solve [Pain Point tied to Topic]. Keep it casual, no fluff.' • Create 3 columns: Touch 1 (The Intent Hook), Touch 2 (The Value Prop), Touch 3 (The Case Study/CTA). • Use the 'LLM' (GPT-4o or Claude 3.5 Sonnet) within Clay to generate these. • Ensure the AI references a 'Reason for Reachout' that isn't creepy (e.g., 'Noticed your team is exploring new ways to handle [Topic]'). Owner: Sales Lead / Copywriter. Time Estimate: 4 hours. Pitfall: Sounding like a bot by using 'I am writing to you because our data shows...'. Definition of Done: 3 unique, personalized email drafts for every lead in the Clay table.

5. 05

   Push to Sales Engagement Platform

   Push the enriched leads and their custom AI-generated snippets into your execution tool (Outreach, Salesloft, or Apollo). • Create a specific 'Intent-Based Sequence' in your sales engagement platform. • Ensure the sequence has 3-4 steps: Day 1 (Email), Day 2 (LinkedIn Connection/Manual Task), Day 4 (Email 2), Day 8 (Email 3). • Map the Clay columns (Touch 1, Touch 2, etc.) to 'Custom Fields' in your sales tool (e.g., {{custom_field_1}}). • Set a strict throttle: Limit this to 50 new 'Intent' accounts per rep per week to prioritize quality over quantity. Owner: Sales Ops / SDR Manager. Time Estimate: 2 hours. Prerequisite: Sales engagement tool (Outreach/Salesloft/Apollo). Pitfall: Forgetting to map the custom fields, resulting in emails that say 'Hi {{first_name}}, {{custom_field_1}}.' Definition of Done: Leads flowing from Clay into an active, throttled sequence with AI snippets correctly inserted.

6. 06

   Audit and prune low-performing topics

   Monitor the performance of your intent topics over a 60-day window. You are looking for 'Intent Signal Quality',specifically the conversion rate from MQL (account identified) to SQL (meeting booked). • Weekly: Review the 'Open' and 'Reply' rates per topic. • Monthly: Calculate the 'Cost Per Meeting' by dividing your intent tool/Clay costs by the number of meetings booked from these triggers. • Threshold: If a specific intent topic (e.g., 'Cloud Storage') has a < 1% conversion to meeting after 60 days, delete it from your Bombora/6sense monitors and replace it with a new hypothesis. • Feedback Loop: Ask reps if the 'Intent' mentioned in the email actually resonated in the live discovery calls. Owner: RevOps / Growth Lead. Time Estimate: 1 hour weekly. Pitfall: Keeping 'dead' topics active because they generate high open rates but zero meetings. Definition of Done: A monthly reporting dashboard showing performance by intent topic and a 'Kill/Keep' decision for each.

Next playbooks

• Always-on AI meeting notes (L1)
• ChatGPT for first-draft cold emails (L1)
• Personal AI assistant for repetitive sales admin (L1)
• Zapier + ChatGPT inbound lead summarizer (L1)