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How to build and import your prospect list

All you need to know about importing your prospects

Written by Denis Bauer

Learn about 5 ways to import prospects into Extrovert natively plus third-party tools for events and competitor data.

Think strategically: who to import first

Before importing anyone, define your goal. Different strategies need different types of people:

Your goal

Who to import

Where to find them

Warm up prospects before outreach

Cold prospects you plan to reach out to

Sales Navigator search, outreach tools, lead databases

Nurture pipeline + customers

Current deals, past customers, partners, dormant prospects

Your CRM, recent connections, Sales Navigator filters

Get discovered by your audience

Big influencers in your space (medium engagement)

Manual search, professional-network post search, industry lists

Build creator support network

Friendly creators who already engage with you

Your post commenters, mutual connections

☝️ Pro tip: Start with one strategy. Most successful users begin with warming up prospects before outreach, then expand to other strategies.

🔗 Full guide: Use cases and expected results

Define your ICP (ideal customer profile)

Your ICP is the set of traits every good prospect shares. Pin these down before you import so your list stays on-target:

  • Role and seniority - the titles and levels you want to reach (e.g., "VP Sales and above", "Founders").

  • Industry - the sectors your product fits (e.g., B2B SaaS, fintech).

  • Company size and type - headcount, stage, or model (e.g., 50-500 employees, Series A+).

  • Geography - the regions or markets you focus on.

  • Reachability - they post regularly, or you can reach them through indirect engagement if they rarely post.

Who makes a good prospect

  • Include people who fit your ICP and are reachable, whether because they post or because you can reach them through indirect engagement.

  • For new-business campaigns, exclude existing customers, closed-lost deals, and direct competitors.

  • Skip profiles that never post unless you plan to reach them through indirect engagement.

Your plan sets how many prospects you can hold in total. See Plan features and differences.

5 native import options

In Extrovert, click Add prospects to open the import dialog. It has five tabs: Profile URLs, Recent connections, Sales Navigator, LinkedIn search, and CSV file. You can also import programmatically through the API.

1. Profile URLs

Copy and paste profile URLs directly into Extrovert.

Best for:

2. Recent connections

Import your recent connections directly.

Best for:

Paste a Sales Navigator people-search URL, or a saved list URL, to import the profiles from it.

Requires an active Sales Navigator subscription connected to the account. Without one, Extrovert prompts you to connect Sales Navigator before you can import from a search. If you don't have Sales Navigator, use the LinkedIn search tab below instead.

Best for:

☝️ Pro tip: Use recent-post activity filter in Sales Navigator to focus on active prospects.

Paste a LinkedIn People Search URL to import the profiles from it. This works without Sales Navigator - use a normal search from the LinkedIn search bar. Prospects are added starting from the first page up to the maximum amount of prospects, and you can limit how many to add.

Best for:

  • Targeted prospect lists when you don't have Sales Navigator

5. CSV file

Upload a CSV file with profile URLs or profile data.

Best for:

6. Using API

Import prospects programmatically using Extrovert's API.

Best for:

☝️ Pro tip: For warming up prospects, use webhooks to automatically push warmed prospects to your sequencer.

Reach prospects who don't post

For prospects who rarely post but read the professional network actively, use our lurkers feature:

  • We track what posts your prospects like most often

  • We find profiles they engage with regularly

  • You comment on those posts to stay visible

  • Your prospects see your comments in their feeds

🔗 Full guide: Reach prospects who don't post

Third-party tools for specialized data

Event attendees and post engagement

Export people who attended events or engaged with specific posts using Icypeas.

Competitor followers

Export your competitors' followers using Scrapeli.io.

Best practices

  • Define your ICP first - Know your ideal customer profile before building lists

  • Start small - 50-100 prospects for warming up campaigns

  • Focus on active users - Use recent-post activity filters when possible

  • Include adjacent roles - Add team members who prospects follow for wider reach

  • Quality over quantity - Better to have fewer highly relevant prospects

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