How to Scrape 10,000 Leads from Google Maps & LinkedIn Using Apify for $1

Lead Generation Automation: The $1 Setup

B2B lead generation software is expensive. Apollo.io costs $49/month. Hunter.io starts at $34. LinkedIn Sales Navigator is $100/month. Phantombuster starts at $56. And none of them give you the raw control that custom scraping does.

Here's the setup I use for clients: Apify's Creator plan at $1/month, which includes $500 in credits, gives you Google Maps Scraper, LinkedIn scrapers, Email Finder, and the residential proxies to run all of them without getting blocked. You can generate thousands of verified leads before you spend more than that first dollar.

→ Sign up for Apify Creator ($1/month, $500 credit)

The Best Apify Actors for Lead Generation

1. Google Maps Scraper — Best for Local Business Leads

The Google Maps Scraper is the highest-ROI lead gen tool I've found. You give it a search query (e.g., "plumbers in Dallas") and it returns every matching business with:

• Business name, address, phone number
• Website URL
• Email address (if publicly listed)
• Review count and average rating
• Business hours
• Google Maps URL
• Category and subcategory

A single run covering 10 cities in one vertical typically costs $2–$5 in Apify credits. At that rate, your $500 in Creator plan credits gets you 100+ lead generation campaigns.

2. LinkedIn Company Scraper — Best for B2B Decision Makers

The LinkedIn Company and People scrapers pull publicly visible profile data. Combined with an email finder Actor, you can go from company name to a verified decision-maker email in two Actor runs.

Workflow:

1. Run Google Maps Scraper to get company names and websites in your target niche/location
2. Run LinkedIn Company Scraper to find the company's LinkedIn page and employee count
3. Run Email Finder Actor with the company domain to generate and verify email addresses
4. Export to CSV or connect directly to your CRM via webhook

3. Yellow Pages / Yelp Scraper — High-Volume Local Leads

For service businesses (HVAC, plumbing, roofing, cleaning, landscaping), Yellow Pages and Yelp are goldmines. The Yelp Scraper returns business names, phones, websites, review counts, and categories. You can pull every contractor in a metro area in under 10 minutes.

4. Apollo.io / Hunter Alternative — Email Enrichment

Apify has email finder and enrichment Actors that use the same techniques as Apollo and Hunter — finding email patterns from domains, verifying deliverability, and enriching with LinkedIn data. A fraction of the cost per record.

Step-by-Step: Google Maps Lead Scraping

Step 1: Set Up Your Apify Account

Sign up here and select the Creator plan. Your $500 credit is applied immediately — no waiting, no minimum commitment.

Step 2: Find the Google Maps Scraper Actor

In the Apify Store, search "Google Maps Scraper" — the main one is compass/crawler-google-places. Click "Try for free".

Step 3: Configure Your Search

In the Actor input form, set:

• Search queries: ["dentists in Miami", "dentists in Orlando", "dentists in Tampa"]
• Max results per query: 200–500
• Proxy: Enable Apify Proxy → Residential (recommended for Google Maps)
• Output fields: Select name, address, phone, website, email, rating, reviewsCount

Step 4: Run and Export

Click Run. For 3 cities × 200 results = 600 leads, the Actor typically finishes in 5–10 minutes. Export the dataset as CSV, JSON, or push directly to Google Sheets via the Apify → Google Sheets integration.

Step 5: Enrich with Emails

Filter the results to businesses with a website URL. Run the Email Finder Actor on those domains to surface the most likely email addresses. Verify them with the Email Verifier Actor before outreach.

Full Code Example: Automated Lead Pipeline

Here's a Python script that runs the Google Maps Scraper via the Apify API, polls for completion, and saves results to a CSV:

import time
import csv
from apify_client import ApifyClient

APY_TOKEN = 'YOUR_APIFY_API_TOKEN'  # from Settings → Integrations
client = ApifyClient(APY_TOKEN)

# Configure the scrape
run_input = {
    "searchStringsArray": [
        "plumbers in Chicago",
        "plumbers in Milwaukee",
        "plumbers in Indianapolis",
    ],
    "maxCrawledPlacesPerSearch": 200,
    "proxyConfig": {"useApifyProxy": True, "apifyProxyGroups": ["RESIDENTIAL"]},
    "exportPlaceUrls": False,
    "additionalInfo": False,
    "scrapeContacts": True,
}

print("Starting Google Maps scrape...")
run = client.actor("compass/crawler-google-places").call(run_input=run_input)
print(f"Run ID: {run['id']} | Status: {run['status']}")

# Fetch results
results = list(client.dataset(run["defaultDatasetId"]).iterate_items())
print(f"Scraped {len(results)} leads")

# Save to CSV
with open('leads.csv', 'w', newline='', encoding='utf-8') as f:
    writer = csv.DictWriter(f, fieldnames=[
        'title', 'address', 'phone', 'website', 'emails', 'totalScore', 'reviewsCount'
    ])
    writer.writeheader()
    for r in results:
        writer.writerow({
            'title': r.get('title', ''),
            'address': r.get('address', ''),
            'phone': r.get('phone', ''),
            'website': r.get('website', ''),
            'emails': ', '.join(r.get('emails', [])),
            'totalScore': r.get('totalScore', ''),
            'reviewsCount': r.get('reviewsCount', 0),
        })

print("Saved to leads.csv")

How Much Does It Actually Cost?

Let's run the math on a realistic lead gen use case:

• Goal: 5,000 verified plumber leads across 10 US cities
• Google Maps Scraper run: 10 queries × 500 results = 5,000 businesses → ~$3–5 in credits
• Residential proxy overhead: ~$2–3 for Google (SERP proxy tier)
• Email enrichment (50% have websites): 2,500 domains → ~$5–8
• Total cost from $500 credits: ~$10–16

That's 5,000 leads with emails for under $16 — compared to $0.10–$0.50 per lead from Apollo or other databases. And you own the data and the pipeline.

Scaling Up: Automated Scheduled Runs

The real power comes from scheduling. Set up a daily or weekly Apify Schedule to automatically re-run your lead Actor. New businesses open every week — automated scraping keeps your lead list fresh without you touching anything.

In the Apify dashboard: Schedules → Create Schedule → select your Actor → set a cron expression. A daily midnight run costs pennies and keeps your pipeline full.

Start Building Your Lead Machine

The Apify Creator plan at $1/month is the lowest-friction way to start generating leads at scale. $500 in credits is enough to run hundreds of scraping jobs, test different verticals, and build a repeatable pipeline — all without committing to a $100+/month tool before you know it works for you.

Get started with Apify Creator for $1 →

Need a custom lead generation pipeline built for your specific niche? I build end-to-end systems — scraping, enrichment, deduplication, and CRM integration. Get in touch for a quote.