suede-prospecting

name	suede-prospecting
description	Suede-owned prospecting and qualification discipline. Use when defining an ICP, sourcing and enriching a bounded lead list, finding early adopters or design partners, scoring account fit, or documenting disqualification evidence. NOT FOR: sending outreach (use suede-cold-email), changing CRM routing (use suede-revops), or profiling competitors instead of prospects (use suede-competitor-profiling).
metadata	{"version":"1.1.0"}

Suede Prospecting

Suede Prospecting turns an approved ICP into a source-backed, scored lead sheet across B2B SaaS, general B2B, local business, and early demand-signal motions. Every candidate carries qualification evidence, disqualification logic, and a compliance-aware handoff before outreach begins.

Before Starting

Check for product marketing context first: If .agents/product-marketing.md exists (or .claude/product-marketing.md, or the legacy product-marketing-context.md filename, in older setups), read it before asking questions. Use that context and only ask for information not already covered or specific to this task.

Pick the Branch

Prospecting motions differ enough that the workflow forks at intake. Pick one branch based on who the user is selling to:

Branch	Sell to	What "qualified" looks like	Possible sources after access and terms checks
SaaS	Other SaaS companies / digital businesses	ICP fit + tech stack match + growth signals (funding, hiring, product velocity)	Public company sites, directories, developer sources, or licensed data available to the user
B2B	Non-SaaS B2B (services, manufacturers, enterprises, mid-market)	Industry + size + geographic fit + buying signals (trigger events, vendor changes)	Public company records, industry directories, or licensed business data available to the user
Local SMB	Local small businesses (shops, gyms, restaurants, clinics, salons, services)	Active business + website status + proximity + decision-maker access	Public business sites and manually reviewed listings allowed by their terms
Demand-signal	Early-stage: first customers, design partners, or beta users	A cited public pain, demand, or timing signal, not just firmographic fit	Public forums, reviews, issues, posts, jobs, and launch records reachable with current authorized tools or manual review

Before using any named platform or vendor, discover what is currently callable, authenticated, authorized, and permitted by its terms. If no research connector or browser is available, give the user a manual source checklist and work from URLs, exports, screenshots, or source text they provide.

If the user describes a hybrid motion (e.g., "SMBs that are also SaaS"), pick the dominant branch and pull in qualification signals from the other. If the user is early-stage and needs their first customers or design partners — evidence of demand over list coverage — use the Demand-signal branch.

For the branch-specific deep dives:

• SaaS → see references/saas-prospecting.md
• B2B → see references/b2b-prospecting.md
• Local SMB → see references/local-prospecting.md
• Demand-signal (find your first customers) → see references/demand-signals.md

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Shared Framework (all branches)

Every prospecting engagement follows the same five phases. Tools and qualification signals change per branch; the phases don't.

Phase 1 — Define the ICP

Pull from product-marketing.md if available. Otherwise, gather:

1. Firmographic fit — industry, company size, revenue band, geography, business model
2. Technographic fit (SaaS branch) — what tools they already use, what they're missing
3. Buying signal — why now? (trigger event, funding, hiring, new initiative, dissatisfaction with current vendor, recent move/expansion)
4. Decision-maker profile — role, seniority, what they care about
5. Disqualifiers — what makes a prospect a clear "skip"

Output the ICP as a one-paragraph statement plus a checklist of pass/fail criteria. Don't move to discovery without this.

Phase 2 — Build the candidate list (discovery)

Start with a bounded candidate sample sized to the requested output, source access, and review capacity. Expand only when observed disqualification rates show that another batch is needed.

• SaaS / B2B: cross-check material claims across available first-party, public, or licensed sources. Named vendors are candidates only after access, freshness, terms, and cost checks.
• Local SMB: use an authorized research connector or manual public-source review, then cross-check listing claims against the business's own site or another current source.

A smaller evidence-complete list is preferable to padding the output with unverified candidates.

Phase 3 — Qualify each candidate

Score every candidate against the ICP checklist. Add evidence (a source URL or two) for each qualification — never assert without backing.

Confidence levels (used across all branches):

• High: confirmed by at least two independent sources or official business page
• Medium: one credible source plus consistent search evidence
• Low: incomplete or ambiguous evidence — flag what remains uncertain

For email contacts, discover whether an authorized validator is callable and read its current result semantics before use. If none is available, label the address unverified, keep it out of send-ready exports, and provide a user-operated validation checklist. Never claim that validation guarantees delivery.

Phase 4 — Score and prioritize

Apply this rubric for the SaaS, B2B, and Local SMB branches. The Demand-signal branch scores differently — 0–100 demand-fit, not Hot/Warm/Cold — see references/demand-signals.md.

Score	Definition
Hot	Strong ICP fit + clear buying signal + decision-maker accessible + verified contact
Warm	ICP fit + softer or older signal + contact verifiable
Cold	Loose ICP fit OR no clear signal OR contact unverified
Skip	Disqualifier hit (out of ICP, closed business, duplicate, irrelevant, low confidence)

Branch-specific signals refine the scoring — see each reference file. Let the evidence determine the number in each label; never force a Hot/Warm/Cold quota.

Phase 5 — Output the lead sheet

(SaaS / B2B / Local SMB. The Demand-signal branch ships an evidence report instead — see references/demand-signals.md.)

Default to a markdown table in chat. Switch to CSV when the list is >25 rows or the user explicitly asks for a file.

After the table, add "Priority review candidates" when the evidence supports one or more: a bounded set ranked by current signal strength, with one sentence on what was verified and what still needs review.

Columns vary by branch (see reference files), but every lead sheet includes:

• score, business/company name, contact (where applicable), why-it's-a-prospect, source(s), confidence, last verified date

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Compliance Guardrails

These apply to every branch. Read first, every engagement.

1. No bulk scraping of LinkedIn, Google Maps, paywalled sites, or rate-limited APIs. Browser is an assisted research tool, not a scraper.
2. No CAPTCHA, login wall, or bot protection bypass. If a site requires it, work with what's publicly visible.
3. Public business contact channels only. Use info@, hello@, contact@, and named-role emails (founder, owner) where they're published on the business's own site. Personal/private emails require a lawful basis (existing relationship, opt-in, etc.).
4. GDPR / CAN-SPAM / CASL aware. Capture and retain the source URL and date for every contact you add to a list — required for downstream outreach compliance.
5. No reselling extracted data from Google Maps, LinkedIn, or any platform whose terms prohibit it. List building for the user's own outreach is fine; productizing the list to sell is not.
6. Rate limit yourself. Even on public sources, space requests. Don't fingerprint as a bot.
7. No breached, leaked, or unprovenanced data. Don't source prospects from breached datasets, scraped-contact marketplaces, or list brokers with no source lineage. Licensed B2B data providers (Apollo, ZoomInfo, Clearbit, Clay) are fine when used within their ToS and with a lawful basis — the ban is on illicit/unprovenanced data, not on legitimate enrichment vendors.
8. Never target or infer sensitive traits. Don't qualify, segment, or personalize on health, financial hardship, political belief, sexuality, religion, or other protected/sensitive attributes — even when a public post reveals them.

For the full compliance reference (GDPR, CAN-SPAM, CASL, LinkedIn ToS, Google Maps ToS, Clay/Apollo/ZoomInfo use restrictions): see references/compliance.md.

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Inputs to Collect

If missing, ask once, then infer reasonable defaults and continue:

• Branch (SaaS / B2B / Local SMB / Demand-signal) — usually inferable from context; pick Demand-signal for early-stage first-customer discovery
• ICP description — pull from product-marketing.md if present
• Target count — use the requested count or propose a bounded pilot justified by source coverage and review capacity
• Geography (essential for Local SMB; useful for B2B; less critical for SaaS)
• Tools the user has access to — discover current callable tools and authenticated accounts; never assume a vendor connector or browser exists
• Output format — chat table (default) or CSV
• Buying signal preference — what triggers should they prioritize? (funding rounds, hiring, recent move, etc.)

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Tool Selection Quick Picks

Full breakdown in references/data-sources.md. Quick picks:

Treat every named product below as a candidate, not an available capability. Discover currently callable tools and verify the user's authenticated access, license, source terms, and cost first.

If the user has access to...	Use it for
Apollo	B2B / SaaS firmographic + contact discovery
Clay	Multi-source enrichment, waterfall lookups, custom scoring
Clearbit	Email-to-company and company enrichment
ZoomInfo	Enterprise B2B contact + intent data
Hunter or Snov	Email pattern guessing and verification
Truelist	Email deliverability validation (before adding to outreach list)
LinkedIn Sales Navigator	Decision-maker mapping (manual, no scraping)
BuiltWith / Wappalyzer	Tech stack qualification (SaaS branch)
Crunchbase	Funding signals (SaaS branch)
GitHub	Stargazers / forks of competitor or adjacent repos (dev-tool SaaS branch)
Google Maps + browser	Local SMB discovery
Firecrawl / Browserbase	Programmatic extraction from individual prospect websites — never from platforms

If the user has no enrichment or browser tools: provide exact public-source queries and a qualification worksheet, then work from URLs, exports, or screenshots the user supplies.

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Output Formats

Default — chat table

For SaaS / B2B (≤25 rows):

| Score | Company | Industry | Size | Signal | Contact | Email status | Source | Confidence |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |

For Local SMB (≤15 rows) — port from the local-prospector reference:

| Score | Business | Category | Area | Website status | Website/Social | Phone | Why it's a prospect | Confidence |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |

CSV — when >25 rows or user requests a file

SaaS / B2B columns:

score,company,domain,industry,size_band,country,signal,contact_name,contact_title,contact_email,email_status,linkedin,source_urls,why_prospect,confidence,verified_date,notes

Local SMB columns:

score,business,category,area,distance_km,website_status,website_url,social_urls,phone,email,source_urls,why_prospect,confidence,verified_date,notes

Include after the table

• Priority review candidates: a bounded evidence-ranked set with one-sentence rationale each
• Search parameters: branch, ICP, location/radius, target count, date generated
• Open questions: anything you couldn't verify and the user should look at

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Quality Checks (before finalizing)

• Remove duplicates (by domain for SaaS/B2B, by business + address for Local SMB)
• Every "Hot" lead has a verified contact + at least one source URL
• Email status comes from a currently authorized validator with documented result semantics, or is explicitly unverified; failed results stay in a separate invalid bucket
• No lead labeled "Hot" lacks a clear buying signal
• Confidence levels honest — "High" requires 2 independent sources, not just two of your own searches
• No leads sourced from prohibited scraping (LinkedIn at scale, Google Maps bulk extract, etc.)
• Source URL + date captured for every contact (GDPR / CAN-SPAM lineage)
• Final count matches user's request, or you've explained why it's smaller (quality bar)

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Common Mistakes

1. Starting discovery without an ICP. Build candidates against vague criteria and you'll qualify the wrong things.
2. Treating data sources as authoritative without cross-checks. Apollo and ZoomInfo are out of date often; verify before scoring as "Hot."
3. Presenting unverified contacts as send-ready. Use an available authorized validator or keep the address labeled unverified with a manual validation handoff.
4. Bulk scraping LinkedIn or Google Maps. Real risk: account suspension + ToS violation. Browser as an assisted tool only.
5. Mixing branches. Don't apply Local SMB scoring (website status) to a B2B SaaS prospect, or vice versa.
6. "Hot" labels without buying signals. ICP fit alone is not enough — the signal is what makes the timing right.
7. No source URLs. Every claim should be traceable to a public source. Future outreach depends on this lineage.
8. Ignoring quiet hours / time zone when scheduling the downstream outreach (handoff to suede-cold-email).
9. Forgetting to retain consent / lineage records. Required for GDPR DSARs and CAN-SPAM audits.

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Task-Specific Questions

1. Which branch — SaaS, B2B, Local SMB, or Demand-signal (early-stage, finding your first customers)?
2. What's your ICP? (Or: should I pull from your product-marketing context?)
3. How many qualified leads do you want?
4. Which research or validation tools are currently callable and authorized? If none, can you provide URLs, exports, or screenshots for manual review?
5. What's the triggering buying signal you care most about?
6. Geography or radius (Local SMB / B2B)?
7. Chat table or CSV?

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Tool Integrations

These are selection examples, not guaranteed integrations. Before using one, verify current vendor documentation, account access, pricing, data freshness, export rights, platform terms, and whether a callable connector is actually available in the current session.

Tool	Best For	Verify Before Use
Apollo	B2B / SaaS firmographic + contact discovery	Freshness, export terms, email validation
Clay	Multi-source enrichment + waterfall	Credit cost, providers, field provenance
Clearbit	Email-to-company enrichment	Current product access and coverage
ZoomInfo	Enterprise B2B contact + intent	License, export rights, signal freshness
Hunter / Snov	Email pattern discovery	Verification status and lawful basis
Truelist	Email deliverability validation	Result meanings and current API limits
Outreach	Sales engagement after approval	Sequence permissions and suppression rules
RB2B	Visitor identification	Privacy basis and company-vs-person grain
GitHub	Public developer-intent signals	API terms, rate limits, company mapping
Firecrawl / Browserbase	Single-target public-site research	Target terms, scope, and session access

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Boundaries

• Do not send outreach, import contacts, buy data, mutate a CRM, or enroll a person in a sequence.
• Do not invent contact details or qualification evidence, evade source terms, collect unnecessary personal data, or label a lead verified without a cited current source.
• Do not decide legal compliance or claim deliverability. Apply the applicable consent, privacy, and suppression rules before any downstream contact.

Routing

• Use suede-product-marketing to define the ICP and positioning context.
• Use suede-cold-email after a qualified list is approved for outreach copy.
• Use suede-revops for approved CRM routing and lifecycle handoff.
• Use suede-sales-enablement for collateral used in active sales work.