What B2B leads with phone and email should cost, and how to compare offers honestly
Seat licences, credit bundles, per-lead pricing and agency retainers priced side by side, plus the hidden costs that make a cheap list expensive.
8 min read · Updated September 8, 2026
Key takeaways
- Seat licences hide cost in the hours your team spends building and exporting lists.
- Credit bundles charge for reveals, including reveals that turn out to be wrong.
- Per-lead delivery prices the outcome, so the comparison is straightforward.
- Always divide by usable leads, not total records, and count the replacement policy in the price.
The four pricing models
Seat licences, credit bundles, per-lead delivery and agency retainers. Each moves the work and the risk to a different place.
A seat licence gives access to a searchable database. You pay for the tool, and your team supplies the labour of building lists, exporting them and loading them into the CRM.
A credit bundle charges per contact revealed. It looks precise, but credits are usually spent whether or not the revealed number is correct.
Per-lead delivery charges for records delivered against your profile. There is no interface to learn and no export step, and quality risk sits with the provider if replacements are free.
An agency retainer bundles data with execution. It is the most expensive per record and makes sense when you are buying the calling team as well as the contacts.
| Model | You pay for | Hidden cost | Best for |
|---|---|---|---|
| Seat licence | Access to a database | Hours spent building and exporting lists | Teams with a dedicated data owner |
| Credit bundle | Each contact revealed | Credits burned on wrong records | Occasional, low-volume needs |
| Per-lead delivery | Records delivered to your ICP | None if replacements are free | Teams that want pipeline, not tooling |
| Agency retainer | Data plus execution | Long commitments, limited data ownership | Teams without a calling function |
Cost per usable lead, the only number worth comparing
Divide what you paid by the number of records that were in your ICP, reachable, and worked by a rep. Records that never got dialled are not leads, they are inventory.
Two offers at the same headline price can differ by a wide margin once you exclude out-of-profile records, dead numbers, duplicates of contacts you already own, and rows that expired unworked.
Add internal time to the numerator. An hour a day of list building is a real line item, and it is the cost most comparisons quietly omit.
LeadNumbers pricing in plain arithmetic
Packages are monthly, paid up front, and the effective per-prospect price falls as volume rises. Every record includes a mobile number or direct dial, a verified work email and the company and role context, delivered to your inbox and CRM.
| Plan | Prospects per month | Price | Per prospect |
|---|---|---|---|
| Starter | 200 | $49 | 24.5 cents |
| Growth | 500 | $99 | 19.8 cents |
| Most Popular | 1,000 | $149 | 14.9 cents |
| Scale | 2,500 | $299 | 12 cents |
| Pro | 5,000 | $499 | 10 cents |
| Volume | 10,000 | $799 | 8 cents |
Questions to ask before you sign anything
The answers to these five questions explain most of the price difference between providers.
- What share of delivered records include a mobile number or direct dial in my exact segment?
- What happens to a record that turns out to be wrong, and how fast is the replacement?
- Are contacts I have already received suppressed automatically?
- Does delivery reach my CRM without a manual import step?
- Can I change my targeting mid-cycle without renegotiating?
Test before you commit
No pricing table replaces a sample worked by your own reps in your own segment. LeadNumbers sends five sample prospects to a work email address with no card required, so you can judge reachability before choosing a package.
Frequently asked questions
How much should a B2B lead with a phone number cost?
It depends on the model and the volume. LeadNumbers packages run from 24.5 cents per prospect at 200 prospects a month down to 8 cents per prospect at 10,000, with mobile or direct dial, verified work email and company context included.
Are database subscriptions cheaper than per-lead delivery?
Not usually, once you count the hours your team spends building lists, exporting them and importing them. Compare cost per usable lead delivered into your CRM rather than headline licence price.
What is cost per usable lead?
Total spend, including internal time, divided by the records that were in profile, reachable and actually worked by a rep. It is the only figure that compares different pricing models fairly.
Can I try leads before buying a package?
Yes. LeadNumbers sends five free sample leads to a work email address, one per company, with no card required.
See the data before you decide
Five sample leads in your ideal customer profile, with mobile or direct dial and verified work email. No card required.