Lead Campaign — Apollo → Verify → Instantly

Turns a target market into a running cold email campaign in one pass: Apollo search → email verification → sequence copy → Instantly campaign, built paused and launched only on explicit approval.

When to Use This Skill

• User asks to find leads, build a prospect list, or pull a list from Apollo
• User asks to set up, build, or launch a cold email campaign / outreach campaign
• User asks for a cold email sequence with follow-ups
• User names a niche + geography + company size and wants to sell into it
• User says "run the pipeline", "do the full thing", "leads to campaign"

Quick Start

Default run (dental clinics, US/CA/UK, AI lead-follow-up offer):

bash ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/scripts/pipeline.sh --icp dental --offer ai-followup --limit 1000

Anything else: read the ICP config, edit it in memory for the new niche, then run the same six phases below.

Procedural Workflow

Run the phases in order. Do not skip Phase 0 or Phase 5.

Phase 0 — Lock the brief (one message, no interrogation)

Read the preset and restate it back in four lines, then proceed unless the user corrects you:

cat ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/config/icp.dental.json
cat ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/config/offer.ai-followup.json

Restate: niche · geography · company size · titles · volume target · offer.

Defaults if the user gave no detail: dental clinics · US/CA/UK · 2–50 employees (hard ceiling 250) · owner/practice-manager titles · verified emails only.

Never ask more than one clarifying question. If the user already named the niche, the geo, and the size band, ask nothing — go.

Phase 1 — Pull leads from Apollo

Preferred route is the Apollo MCP tools. If they're loaded, use them. Otherwise run the script:

python3 ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/scripts/apollo_search.py \
  --icp ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/config/icp.dental.json \
  --limit 1000 \
  --out ./campaign/01_apollo_raw.csv

Rules that matter:

• contact_email_status = ["verified"] is always set. Apollo's "verified" is a starting filter, not a substitute for Phase 2.
• Employee bands are passed as Apollo ranges (1,10 / 11,20 / 21,50). The 250 ceiling is a fallback band only used if the tight band returns too few leads — tell the user when you widen it.
• One contact per company by default. Two decision-makers at the same 6-person clinic reads as spam.
• Search results return masked emails. The script bulk-enriches in batches of 10 to reveal them. That step burns Apollo credits — report the credit spend in the summary.

Full parameter reference:

cat ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/references/apollo-search.md

Phase 2 — Verify every address

Never push an Apollo list straight into Instantly. Bounce rate above 3% damages the sending domains.

python3 ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/scripts/verify_emails.py \
  --in ./campaign/01_apollo_raw.csv \
  --out ./campaign/02_verified.csv \
  --provider instantly

Keep valid only. Drop invalid, disposable, and unknown. Route catch_all/accept_all to a separate file and hold it back from the first send — offer it to the user as a second-wave list.

Report the pass rate. Below 70% means the Apollo filters were too loose; say so.

cat ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/references/email-verification.md

Phase 3 — Write the sequence

Load the offer preset and the copy playbook, then write 5 emails: initial + 4 follow-ups.

cat ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/references/copywriting.md
cat ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/assets/sequence.dental-ai-followup.json

Structure (day offsets are gaps from the previous email):

Hard rules:

• Under 90 words each. Email 1 under 75.
• One ask per email. Interest-based CTA ("worth a look?"), never "book a 30-minute call" on email 1.
• Blank subject on steps 2–5 so Instantly threads them into the original.
• Never invent client names, clinic names, or results. Proof placeholders stay as {{proofPoint}} until the user fills them in. Ask for one real number before writing email 3.
• Two variants on email 1 for A/B. One variant is enough on the rest.
• Spintax uses single braces {a|b}; Instantly variables use double {{firstName}}. Don't nest them.

Phase 4 — Build the campaign in Instantly

Split by region — one campaign for US + CA (America/New_York), one for UK (Europe/London). A single campaign can't send at 9am in both.

python3 ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/scripts/instantly_push.py \
  --leads ./campaign/02_verified.csv \
  --sequence ./campaign/03_sequence.json \
  --name "Dental · AI Follow-Up · US-CA" \
  --region us \
  --daily-limit 40

The script creates the campaign paused and uploads leads. It never activates. Settings it applies:

• stop_on_reply: true, text_only: true
• link tracking off, open tracking off (pixel/redirect hurts inbox placement on cold)
• email_gap: 10 minutes, daily limit split across connected mailboxes

cat ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/references/instantly-api.md

Phase 5 — Approval gate (never skip)

Print for the user before anything sends:

1. Lead count per campaign, after verification
2. All 5 emails in full, exactly as they'll send
3. Sending schedule, daily limit, and mailbox count
4. Est. days to work the full list at that limit

Then ask plainly: "Activate, or change something first?"

Only on an explicit yes:

python3 ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/scripts/instantly_push.py --activate <campaign_id>

Cold email at volume is outward-facing and hard to unsend. One approval covers one campaign — a second campaign needs a second yes.

Phase 6 — Report

Write ./campaign/RUN.md: Apollo pulled → verified → pushed, credit spend, per-campaign IDs, and the ramp plan. Then read the deliverability guide and hand the user the first-two-weeks ramp:

cat ~/.claude/skills/lead-campaign/references/deliverability-compliance.md

Tool Usage

Examples

See examples/ for a full dental run and a swapped-niche run.

Notes / Edge Cases

• Under 200 leads after verification — the ICP is too narrow. Widen the employee ceiling to 250 or add adjacent titles before adding countries.
• Over 5,000 leads — don't push it all. Cap the first campaign at what the mailboxes can work in 30 days and hold the rest.
• New sending domains — do not launch at full volume. 20/day per mailbox for week one, then step up. The ramp table is in the deliverability reference.
• UK sole traders and partnerships are treated as individuals under PECR, not corporate subscribers. The compliance reference covers what that changes.
• Catch-all domains are common in healthcare. Expect 15–25% of a dental list to land there; that's normal, not a broken run.