A PR agency sells at the moment a company has news: a funding round, a product launch, a new executive or a crisis. The lead generation software worth buying is the kind that notices those moments and lets you write within days of them, because a company that just closed a round has new money and a reason to be seen. Pay $14 to $100 a month for the tools; the signals themselves come from public filings and news you can read for nothing.

Signals, ranked by how fast they turn into a retainer

  1. A funding announcement. A company that has just raised money has a budget line and a reason to be visible. In the United States, a company that sells securities under Regulation D files a Form D notice. The Code of Federal Regulations, 17 CFR 230.503, says the notice is due no later than 15 calendar days after the first sale and must be filed electronically through the SEC's EDGAR system. So a raise can show up there within about two weeks of the first sale.
  2. A product launch date. Launch pages, waitlists and beta announcements tell you a story is coming and nobody is telling it yet.
  3. A new head of marketing or communications. A new leader reviews agencies in the first 90 days.
  4. An executive hire or departure. Both create something to say, and the second can create something to manage.
  5. A regulatory, legal or product problem. Crisis work cannot be pitched in advance, but a calm note from an agency that has handled the type of problem is remembered.
  6. An award, a conference slot or an analyst mention. These are warm-up signals rather than buying signals, and you should treat them that way.

This is the same pattern as intent data, applied by hand. What is intent data explains the term, and lead generation software for marketing agencies covers the neighbor business, which sells on a calendar rather than on news.

What the software has to do

  • Reach the right buyer by stage. At a seed-stage company the buyer is the founder; at Series B it is a head of marketing; at a public company it is a communications chief or an investor relations lead. A tool that cannot filter by seniority and function will bury you.
  • Write something about the news. A first line that quotes the announcement shows you read it. A first line that praises the company in general terms looks like every other agency email. An agency that sells communications should write better than that.
  • Move fast. The value of a funding signal decays in weeks. Check how long it takes to go from a target description to a sent email.
  • Keep pitches and prospects apart. If you also email journalists for clients, those messages should come from a different mailbox from your new business outreach. Mixing them risks your clients' media reputation.

What the pieces cost, as published on October 30, 2026

Lusha listed Starter at $49.90 a month ($37.45 annual) for 400 credits, Professional at $69.90 ($52.45 annual) for 600 credits and Premium at $399.90 ($299.95 annual) for 3,400. Hunter listed Starter at $49 a month ($34 billed yearly) for 2,000 credits. Smartlead's Base plan was $39 a month ($32 on annual billing) for 2,000 active leads and 6,000 emails, and Instantly's Growth plan was $47 ($37.60 yearly). Pipedrive listed Growth at US$468 per seat per year for the CRM.

Media databases and monitoring services, the kind used for pitching journalists, are a different category with different buyers. We did not price them here because they serve client work rather than new business.

Compliance in one paragraph

The Federal Trade Commission's CAN-SPAM guide says the law makes no exception for business-to-business email, requires a valid physical postal address in each message, requires opt-outs to be honored within 10 business days and carries penalties up to $53,088 for each violating email. Use your agency's real address and an honest subject line. If you email people in the European Union or the United Kingdom, the rules are different, so ask counsel before you start.

A worked example

Say Harlow & Pike Communications, a six-person agency in Austin, specializes in B2B software launches. The founder, Naomi, watches Form D filings and a funding feed for software companies in Texas and the Southwest, and each Monday writes the week's target in plain words: "Founders and heads of marketing at software companies in the Southwest that raised a seed or Series A in the last 21 days."

Her email, sent within a few days of the announcement:

"Hi Raj, congratulations on the round. I read the announcement and saw that the product goes to general availability in January. We usually start a launch plan 6 to 8 weeks ahead. Would a short plan for what to prepare between now and then be useful? No retainer talk unless it helps. Naomi, Harlow & Pike, 9 Birch Ln, Austin, naomi@harlowpike.example.com. Reply "stop" and I won't write again."

She sends up to 8 a day and follows up on day 5 and day 14. Those who say "we have an agency" are logged with the contract's likely end date. Because news arrives weekly, her list never goes stale, and her pipeline depends on how often she checks the feed, a task that is easy to skip in a busy month and the reason she wants software to hold the follow-ups.

Rocketship handles the outreach loop: you describe the companies in plain words, it reads each company's website before writing, finds the people, emails from your Gmail, follows up and books the call on your calendar. It does not monitor funding feeds, does not pitch journalists, does not send from Outlook and does not send LinkedIn messages, so Naomi would still pick the targets each Monday. See pricing for the plans, or begin the 7-day trial.