An explanation of how to use the free account option for Data.com, formerly called Jigsaw, to source sales prospects in general and complement lead generation efforts via LinkedIn.

1. How to Use
Data.com (formerly Jigsaw)
For Prospecting
By
Steve Fawthrop
Updated April 4, 2015
I have often recommended Data.com (www.data.com), formerly
known as Jigsaw, as a resource for sales prospecting.
The company originally started as a free, crowd sourced business
directory and can still be used for free, although the home page of
the website does not make the free registration real obvious.
When the company sold to Salesforce a few years ago, the name was
changed and more focus has been made on the paid component,
emphasizing bulk downloads of contacts and automated data clean
up synced with Salesforce accounts.
Let me address the benefits of using a free account.
I use it in conjunction with LinkedIn to help make my LI sourcing
more efficient.
Because it is crowd sourced, Data.com is not a perfect information
source, but it helps to identify people within companies by name, title
and department. You can then complement it with searches on
LinkedIn so your LI efforts are not as random.

2. As an example, I might search for a company via Data.com and it will
first pull up the general listing like the following example for
Starbucks:
Department listings are shown on the right or I can click on the
bottom right corner link and display all people.
You might display all for a smaller company or scan all by name if you
do not find someone under a department listing as expected. They
might be coded to a different department than you expected. This
can happen if you have a different idea of their title than how listed.
If I go to a department view then I see people by their names and
titles, along with locations which can be helpful too. Do know though,
some not located at the main location may still be listed there. If the
person who created the original contact information does not list a
specific location then it defaults to the main address.

3. You might go to a company marketing department and see five
people with the title of "marketing director." One might be THE
marketing director at HQ and the other regional or field marketing
directors but whoever created the contact listing, for example, did not
indicate “Field Marketing Director-Southeast.”
Of course, the structure might become clear when you look at the LI
profile of the individual. Or you might see the person at HQ is really
the Senior Marketing Director.
Below is a departmental listing for the marketing department at
Starbucks:
The listing defaults to show 107 people coded to the marketing
department with names in alphabetical listing.
You can sort other ways, though, like by title or location.

4. As you learn of better contact information, you can update
information in the database and earn credit points to retrieve other
information for free.
You also earn credits if you add a company, new individuals or make
significant updates to the information of an individual.
Using contact names lead me to a specific search of the person on
LinkedIn, which often saves search time.
LI also has the "people who search for this person also searched for..."
with others to the right. This might point out other connected
contacts of interest via a more specific search on LI and some of the
people discovered might not be listed in Data.com. So the two
sources complement each other with their information.
Data.com hides the email address and phone number of a person
listed. You can, of course, call through the general line and the
general company information is listed.
The contact listing will show if a direct line is listed. You see it by the
phone symbol. You can use a credit to see the email and phone of
an individual either by purchase or by contributing contacts to
the database yourself. So you add one to earn a credit to take
one. That is the crowd sourcing incentive.
If you get the direct email you then you may save on sending a
LinkedIn InMail if you feel the direct email outreach is a better way to
make contact or you simply want to save an InMail credit.

5. An Example is below of a contact listing after the phone and email
address have been revealed. It formats like a business card:
To note, under your account there is a tab that shows you all the
names you have claimed so you can always reference old information
easily.
There is also an indication of your current total points so you can
know how much credit you have to claim names. Redeeming a record
is 5 points.
As you are developing ideas for targeting, you can do searches in the
database and save them in a draft format.
For example, I might do a sort of manufacturers who have phone
numbers in the area codes of 206, 425 and 360 which are the codes
that cover Western Washington. I can list all businesses in a particular
zip code if I want information that is broad but geo targeted.

6. If you create a new contact to the directory or significantly update a
current listing then you become the owner of that listing. If others
claim it to see the hidden contact information then you get a royalty
point. I typically get 25-30 points per month so I can claim 5-6 new
contacts for information without adding anyone new.
An example of a monthly royalty report is below. It lists the name,
title and company of a person claimed where I am listed as the
royalty owner because I created the original contact record or
upgraded it from the original listing:
If someone significantly improves on a record you created, then you
lose the royalty rights and are notified as such via email.

7. A few key tips:
1) The most accurate company search will be via a web address if you
know it.
Some companies were first entered with slight inaccuracy and the
search function is not very intuitive. If the company is Acme Corp. and
someone created the record as Acme LLC or Acme Inc., it will not
always show the company even though you know the company exists.
I did a recent search for the “Seattle Times” but the actual name of
the company is The Seattle Times Company. There can only be one
accurate website listing, though.
2) You can save time and credits if you figure out the general email
format of the company. If standard and the person does not have a
direct line, so you have to call the general line anyway, Data.com at
least gives you a sense of players at the company and you can go
from there without wasting a credit to retrieve unnecessary
information.
I hope you find this helpful.
To sign up
Go to the “pricing” tab and click on it.
When it open to pricing you will see an option for a free account.

8. About Me
I have been a sales professional in advertising, marketing and media as a career. This has
included managing my own territories, selling with others and managing sales teams.
Some highlights:
• Seven years in sales management including five years at the Puget Sound Business
Journal in Seattle growing local sales to over $5 million annually (+70%). In Seattle I
worked with an in-market staff but I have also worked with dispersed reps for outside
territories and inside sales staff.
• Joint selling with local reps in the U.S. mostly in the West/Midwest. Also had the unique
opportunity to work with independent reps in Asia while maintaining individual revenue
responsibility while at USA Today. All of the work in Asia was pioneering to break new
markets with my dominant focus on Japan. At one point my national territory for USA
Today was nearly $7 million annual revenue.
• Have opened and grown individual sales territories for local, regional and national
accounts. This included opening the first office in Los Angeles for the Network of City
Business Journals, the national sales arm of American City Business Journals. I have
shifted deeper into digital media, including mobile advertising, since 2008.
I was born and raised in Seattle and graduated from the University of Washington with a B.A. in
Communications in Advertising. Studies also included an emphasis in business and economics.
While a good portion of my professional career has been spent in California—19 years split
between Los Angeles and Orange County—I returned to Seattle late 2012.
Feel free to reach me by phone, e-mail or via LinkedIn
Steve Fawthrop
714-876-7062, cell
stevefawthrop@outlook.com
http://www.linkedin.com/in/stevefawthrop
www.google.com/+stevefawthrop
Twitter: @SteveFawthrop