What are the real differences between LeanData vs. ZoomInfo Operations?
Whether you’re investigating purchasing LeanData or ZoomInfo, or you’ve been offered ZoomInfo Operations (aka Ringlead) as part of an enrichment data package, we’ll help you make an informed decision.
How are LeanData and ZoomInfo Operations/Ringlead Similar?
There are three basic areas where LeanData and ZoomInfo Operations/Ringlead overlap. Both platforms can:
- Match, route, and assign inbound leads from web forms
- Route any Salesforce standard or custom object
- Route prospects based on round robin or customized rules
Outside of these basic functions, LeanData and ZoomInfo Operations/Ringlead are quite different in flexibility, customization, and scalability.
How are LeanData & ZoomInfo Operations/Ringlead Different?
LeanData is best for companies focused on revenue operations tools for ABM, Buying Groups, and sophisticated routing workflows across sales, marketing, and post-sales functions.
In contrast, many users select ZoomInfo Operations/Ringlead for CRM data enrichment, deduplication, and data governance.
Here are the six core areas where the two platforms are different:
#1 LeanData vs ZoomInfo/Ringlead Matching Accuracy
- LeanData: LeanData’s fuzzy matching algorithm matches on six fields and offers tie-breakers to identify the best possible match at 95% accuracy, providing reps with the right context in their accounts.
- ZoomInfo Operations: ZoomInfo provides “light” out-of-the-box matching that must be customized using 46+ list-based rules for better accuracy. Since their matching is dependent on time-consuming manual configuration and a limited number of matching rules, customers run the risk of unreliable or incorrect matches.
“I’ve never been particularly impressed with Ringlead. We’ve seen a lot of issues where we’ve built things out, tested them, they’re working fine, and then, for whatever reason, they drop off. The lead-to-account matching piece is a big issue where it just doesn’t work fully. It’s not that friendly to build it out, configure it, and make changes to it. It just fundamentally hasn’t delivered on the value we were hoping for.”
Head of Revenue Operations SMB Software Development
#2 Visual FlowBuilder
- LeanData: Flexible, drag-and-drop FlowBuilder for any routing scenario.
- ZoomInfo Operations: ZoomInfo marketing shows they have a visual flow builder, but users report that workflows are built with complex list-based rules that are prone to error.
#3 Auditing and Reporting
- LeanData: Provides the best routing tool for Salesforce with native reporting and detailed audit logs. This allows customers to easily identify and troubleshoot errors.
- ZoomInfo Operations: ZoomInfo’s audit logs only provide high-level information. They do not offer visual routing insights to help troubleshoot and optimize your flows.
#4 Notifications & Alerts
- LeanData: LeanData allows customers to send customized notifications, including interactive buttons to update Salesforce from Slack.
- ZoomInfo Operations: ZoomInfo’s Slack notifications are not customizable or actionable, requiring customers to spend more time determining the next step.
“I wanted to give Ringlead a chance because I’d never used their routing before and our organization already had them set up. They’re just not meeting my expectations. Especially when going between environments, production, and sandbox. It’s just absolutely a nightmare.”
Lead Business Systems Analyst Enterprise Software Company
#5 Customer Service
- LeanData: From onboarding to implementation and adoption, LeanData provides expert advice to accelerate time-to-value.
- ZoomInfo Operations: ZoomInfo’s customers complain about a lack of support and difficulties getting issues resolved.
#6 Salesforce-Native
- LeanData: As the only Salesforce-native, no-code revenue orchestration platform, LeanData enables a fully connected GTM stack and streamlined operations that increase productivity and deliver better customer experiences.
- ZoomInfo Operations: ZoomInfo is not built natively on Salesforce. Their integration comes with an increased risk of data security issues, data loss, processing delays, and API limitations. This also creates a step between your Marketing Automation Platform and Salesforce, slowing the marketing to sales handoff.
But What if You’re Getting ZoomInfo/Ringlead for “Free”?
Some ZoomInfo users report that ZoomInfo Operations/Ringlead was included for free in their data enrichment pricing and packaging. You would think any organization would jump at the chance of getting a free routing tool, right?
But, maybe the better question here is: What’s the level of quality in a free routing tool?
If it’s being bundled for free, how much investment has gone into its development, support, and innovation? Free doesn’t always mean value. It can mean shortcuts that introduce inefficiencies over time, such as routing errors or limited scalability.
Plus, what kind of value are you getting from a free routing solution that doesn’t work well and creates more problems in the long run?
Go-to-market strategies and scalability are often like a house of cards. The foundation may seem stable at first, but as you grow and processes become more complex, cracks begin to show. That’s where LeanData comes in—acting as the framework that holds your go-to-market strategy together with precision routing, reliable workflows, and flexibility at scale.
The key isn’t just having a routing tool—it’s having the right tool that grows with you.
“We don’t like working with Ringlead. We’ve had many issues with the router, and with getting data from the platform to understand if routing was happening. Where are things being routed? Who did they get routed to?”
Revenue Operations Leader Mid-market Software Development
Data Enrichment & Deduping: Beware of Conflicting Interests
If your organization uses ZoomInfo for data enrichment and ZoomInfo Operations/Ringlead for routing, this situation poses a conflict of interest when it comes to your data.
After all, the same vendor that adds data to your CRM shouldn’t be the vendor that’s in charge of cleaning it up. In fact, ZoomInfo users report that ZoomInfo data enrichment creates duplicate records that later require deduping.
Data integrity isn’t just a hygiene issue; it’s a revenue issue. Bad data affects every downstream process, from lead scoring to nurturing campaigns, resulting in misaligned follow-ups and missed opportunities. Then, left unchecked, these conflicts can increase operational costs, erode trust between sales and marketing teams, and impact forecasting accuracy. This ultimately stalls revenue growth and damages customer relationships.
How Does LeanData Clean Your Data?
LeanData has the power to automate deduping actions in your Salesforce CRM in five ways:
- Flag Duplicate Accounts: LeanData’s matching functionality will identify a duplicate Account record and, using our routing functionality, stamp the Account.
- Identify Lead & Contact Dupes & Merge: LeanData can identify both duplicate Leads and duplicate Contacts and merge them.
- Cloudingo Integration Node: Using the Cloudingo Merge Account Node, LeanData can deduplicate Accounts as they’re routed through your graph, in real time, reducing any need for manual triage.
- Preserving Specific Fields When Merging: Using a simple true/false decision node, LeanData looks at a field on a duplicate record, determines if it meets the true/false criteria, and either preserves the field or updates the field on the Lead record.
- Account Dedupe & Merge: If LeanData identifies a new duplicate Account, assignment and routing can still occur. However, in addition, the LeanData Routing Scheduler can run a daily Cloudingo merge job that preserves the oldest Account as the “master” record.
While data hygiene is an important component of a successful GTM strategy, it’s just one piece of the puzzle.
Actioning your data is what drives revenue.
A successful GTM strategy takes a CRM and all the applications related to it, and makes those pieces work together to book more meetings, increase pipeline, get more customers, and prevent churn.
Short-Term Routing vs Long Term Revenue Orchestration
While ZoomInfo Operations/RingLead may work for simple use cases, LeanData offers the most scalable go-to-market tools for organizations focused on growth and precision routing.
Don’t settle for a free routing tool with limitations—invest in the right solution that ensures long-term success.
Save your organization time, money, and the headache of ripping and replacing by installing a reliable tool that scales with your business as it grows.
