Skip to content
Glossary

Data enrichment.

The process of completing an account or contact record with the information it lacks, such as sector, size, role or professional contact details, from external sources.

Data enrichment means completing what you know about an account or a contact with information from elsewhere. A record that holds only a company name becomes usable once you add its sector, size, market and the people in the relevant roles. Enrichment lets you check that an account matches your ideal customer profile and know whom to write to; the reason to reach out will come from a signal.

What gets enriched

  • Company data: sector, headcount, country, locations, tools used when they are public.
  • Contact data: name, role, level of responsibility, professional contact details.
  • Context data: founding date, announced funding, open job ads.

Sources

The information comes from public sources: the company’s website, its job ads, public professional profiles, the press and official company registries. It also comes from vendors who aggregate these sources and sell the result. In that second case, the original source and the collection date are not always visible: keep at least the enrichment date and the vendor’s name.

Data freshness

Enriched data describes a situation at a given date, and in the meantime people change roles and companies get acquired. A role recorded a year ago may be wrong today, and a new role counts as a signal because it makes these records obsolete. Check the fields used in the message just before writing.

Personal data and the GDPR

In the European Union, the contact details of an identifiable person, including a named professional email address, are personal data under the GDPR. Enriching them is processing: it requires a legal basis, informing the people concerned, including when you didn’t collect the data from them, respecting their right to object to direct marketing and limiting the data to what is necessary. Rules on B2B email prospecting also vary by country: in France, for instance, the CNIL accepts it without prior consent when the message relates to the person’s job and they can easily object. Check these rules with the person in charge of data protection in your company.

See also: Target account, Ideal customer profile (ICP), and Intent data.

Frequently asked questions

Are data enrichment and signals the same thing?
No. Enrichment describes an account or a contact as it is and helps check fit; a signal describes a dated change, which gives the moment and the reason for contact.
How often should you update enriched data?
Before each outreach for the fields used in the message, such as the role. The others, when a fact calls them into question, such as an acquisition or strong growth.
Does the GDPR forbid enriching professional contacts?
No, but it regulates this processing: legal basis, informing people, right to object, limiting data to what is useful.

Klairon

Your accounts’ signals, every morning.

Klairon follows your target accounts, explains every signal in one sentence and writes the message that goes with it.

Get started with Klairon