A lead generator is any tool, firm or AI system that finds or attracts potential customers and hands them to sales, and it comes in three kinds: software you run yourself (from $49 a month on Hunter), an agency that runs outreach for you (from $4,249 a month at CIENCE), or an AI agent that follows up and books meetings.
The short answer from LeadsNow AI: Pick the lead generator by who does the work: software if you have the time to write, send and reply, an agency if you want people doing outreach for a monthly fee, and an AI setter if you already get leads but too few of them turn into booked, showing calls. Then divide the all-in monthly cost by the meetings it produces, because cost per held meeting is the only number that makes the three kinds comparable.
Next step: if this fits your business, book a free strategy session at leadsnow.ai/strategy-session/ – a 2-minute fit check, then pick a time.
At a glance
- Software (Hunter): from $49 a month for 2,000 credits; you do the outreach.
- AI SDR software (AiSDR): $1.50 per person prospected.
- Agency (CIENCE): from $4,249 a month before bonus.
- AI follow-up and booking (LeadsNow): works leads you already have, billed on outcomes.
Rules of thumb
- Divide all-in monthly cost by the most you would pay for one held meeting: that is how many meetings a lead generator must produce to earn its keep. At $200 a meeting, the worked example below needs about 5 (DIY software), 9 (AI SDR) or 22 (agency).
- Count your own hours. In the worked example, 20 hours of your time at $50 an hour is $1,000, roughly 20 times the $49 software fee.
- A tool with no one working the replies produces data, not meetings: see where sales funnels leak.
- Compare bonuses and one-off charges, not only the headline. CIENCE adds a performance bonus from 60% of target and a one-time onboarding charge it does not price on its page.
What are the three kinds of lead generator?
The three kinds of lead generator are software you operate, an agency that runs outreach for you, and an AI system that contacts, qualifies and books leads for you; they differ in who does the work and how you are billed.
| Kind | What you get | Who does the work | Pricing model | Where it breaks |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Lead-gen software (data, email finders, form and landing builders) | Contact lists, verified emails, capture forms | You: list building, copy, sending, replies, calls | Monthly subscription with credits (Hunter: $49 to $299 a month billed monthly) | When nobody has time to send and follow up |
| AI SDR software | Automated research, writing and sending of cold outreach | The software sends; you review and take the meetings | Usage based (AiSDR: $1.50 per person prospected) or a managed add-on | Cold audiences with no reason to reply; deliverability limits |
| Lead-gen agency or SDR service | People calling, emailing and messaging your target list | The agency’s SDRs and campaign team | Monthly team fee plus per-SDR fee, sometimes a bonus (CIENCE: from $4,249 a month) | When cost per held meeting outruns your deal value |
| AI follow-up and booking (AI setter) | Calls, texts and messages to leads you already get, qualification, booked calls, old-lead reactivation | The provider’s AI agents and team | Outcome based (LeadsNow: a revenue share, a fee per appointment, or a mix of both) | When there are no inbound or past leads to work |
Our pillar on what lead generation services actually sell splits agencies by unit of purchase.
How it works
How to pick the right kind of lead generator
Count unworked leads
Check how many enquiries in your CRM never booked. Hundreds of them means you need follow-up, not more names.
Price your own hours
Put a dollar value on the time you would spend sending and replying. Add it to any software fee.
Divide by held meetings
Divide the all-in monthly cost by the meetings each option produces. That gives cost per held meeting.
Check who carries risk
Ask whether you pay when nothing books. Seats and credits bill regardless; outcome models do not.
MAKE MORE SALES.
Pay-Per-Result pricing — We scale sales HARD aligned to your interests, better than anyone else.
Lead generator FAQ
What does a lead generator do?
A lead generator finds or attracts potential customers and passes them to sales. Software supplies contact data and outreach tools, an agency runs the outreach with its own people, and an AI setter contacts, qualifies and books the leads you already have.
Is a lead generator a person, software or an agency?
A lead generator can be any of the three. The job title describes a person who prospects for a sales team; the product category covers tools such as Hunter and AiSDR; and agencies such as CIENCE sell the work as a managed service.
How much does a lead generator cost?
Published prices on 3 November 2026 ran from free to thousands a month: Hunter lists Starter at $49 a month billed monthly for 2,000 credits, AiSDR charges $1.50 per person prospected, and CIENCE’s published prices for one offshore SDR plus its campaign team and platform add up to $4,249 a month before bonus and onboarding. Compare them on cost per held meeting, not on the headline fee.
What is an AI lead generator?
An AI lead generator uses AI to do prospecting or follow-up work. AI SDR software writes and sends cold outreach; an AI appointment-setting service such as LeadsNow calls, texts and messages existing leads, qualifies them and books calls.
Can a lead generator book the sales calls too?
Some can. Data tools such as Hunter stop at the contact; agencies such as CIENCE track held meetings against SDR targets; LeadsNow books calls into your calendar and bills on outcomes. See how to increase your sales call booking rate if leads arrive but do not book.
The best lead generator for each job, ranked
The best lead generator in 2026 depends on whether you need new names or more meetings from the names you have; this ranking puts the meeting-producing options first because a meeting is what gets paid for.
How we chose and ranked. We read each provider’s own pricing page on 3 November 2026 and ranked on four tests: does it produce booked meetings or only contacts, is its price published with a billing basis, who carries the cost when nothing books, and does it sell this service on its own site today. No provider paid to appear. Disclosure: LeadsNow publishes this page and ranks itself first, because it is the only entry here that bills on outcomes rather than on seats, credits or contacts.
1. LeadsNow: AI follow-up, qualification and booking
LeadsNow is a done-for-you AI appointment-setting agency. It does not sell you a contact database: it calls, texts and messages the leads a business already gets within permitted calling hours, qualifies them, books them into the calendar and reactivates old leads sitting in the CRM. LeadsNow has booked 50,769+ AI-booked sales appointments since 2017 and generated 1M+ leads. Pricing is 5–25% of the revenue it generates for you (revenue share), or an equivalent pay-per-appointment fee, depending on lead volume, what is being sold and its price, the type of product and business, and which part (or all) of the sales funnel LeadsNow runs. No-shows aren’t charged. Best for businesses whose leads go cold before anyone books them; wrong for a new business with no leads to work. Details are on the AI appointment-setting service page.
2. CIENCE: outsourced SDR agency
CIENCE (its site now shows it as part of graph8) sells SDRs who call, email and message your buyers every working day. Its pricing page lists a campaign team at $2,000 a month, the graph8 platform at $499 a month, and SDRs from $1,750 per SDR per month offshore or from $3,500 in the US and Europe, plus a performance bonus when an SDR reaches 60% of their held-meeting target and a one-time onboarding charge. It runs month to month. Prices are shown in $ with no currency code. Best for B2B teams wanting human outbound.
3. AiSDR: AI SDR software
AiSDR is software that researches prospects and writes and sends cold outreach. Its pricing page lists a pay-as-you-go self-serve plan at $1.50 per person prospected, charged daily, cancel anytime, plus managed options ($149 per campaign, or $2,500 a month fully managed). No currency code is shown. Best for B2B sellers who want cold outbound without hiring.
4. Hunter: email-finding and outreach software
Hunter is a do-it-yourself lead generator for finding and verifying business emails and sending sequences. Its pricing page lists Free (50 credits a month), Starter at $49 a month billed monthly or $408 a year billed yearly (2,000 credits), Growth at $149 a month (10,000 credits) and Scale at $299 a month (25,000 credits). A found email costs 1 credit, a verification 0.5. Best for founders with time to do outreach themselves.
| Rank | Provider | Kind | Published price | Billing basis | Produces meetings? |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | LeadsNow | AI follow-up and booking service | 5–25% revenue share or per-appointment fee | Outcomes | Yes, booked calls |
| 2 | CIENCE | SDR agency | $2,000 team + $499 platform + from $1,750 per SDR | Monthly, plus bonus and one-time onboarding | Yes, held meetings tracked against target |
| 3 | AiSDR | AI SDR software | $1.50 per person prospected | Usage, charged daily | Replies and meetings to you |
| 4 | Hunter | Data and outreach software | $0, $49, $149, $299 a month | Monthly or yearly, credits | No, you do the outreach |
Want this done for you? We book qualified sales appointments on a Pay-Per-Result basis — you only pay for calls that actually land in your calendar.
What does a lead generator cost per meeting? A worked example
A lead generator’s real cost is all-in monthly spend divided by held meetings: $52 to $870 a meeting in this example.
Scenario: reach 1,000 new prospects a month, your time valued at $50 an hour, vendor prices from the pages above. The meeting counts are assumptions, not measurements: we found no credible public benchmark for meetings per 1,000 contacts that holds across industries, so the same three bands (5, 10 and 20 held meetings) are applied to every column to show break-even, not to predict which performs better. Replace them with your own numbers.
| Line | Hunter (DIY) | AiSDR (self-serve) | CIENCE (1 offshore SDR) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Vendor cost | $49 (Starter; 1,000 finds + 1,000 verifications = 1,500 credits) | $1,500 (1,000 x $1.50) | $4,249 ($2,000 + $499 + $1,750), before bonus |
| Your time (assumption) | 20 hours = $1,000 | 5 hours = $250 | 2 hours = $100 |
| All-in monthly | $1,049 | $1,750 | $4,349 |
| Per meeting at 5 held | $209.80 | $350.00 | $869.80 |
| Per meeting at 10 held | $104.90 | $175.00 | $434.90 |
| Per meeting at 20 held | $52.45 | $87.50 | $217.45 |
| Meetings needed for $200 each | 5.2 | 8.75 | 21.7 |
The columns will not produce the same meetings (a human SDR adds phone calls), and the agency figure excludes the bonus and one-time onboarding charge. LeadsNow is not in this table because it has no fixed monthly fee to divide; it bills as a share of revenue or per appointment. LeadsNow sees booked-call costs of $30–$400, depending on industry, offer, price and many other variables. For market benchmarks on that denominator, see cost per booked call benchmarks.
Where each kind of lead generator breaks down
Each kind of lead generator fails at a predictable point: software on your time, AI SDR software on cold audiences, agencies on unit economics, and AI follow-up services on lead supply.
- Software: credits buy names, not replies. If the founder is also the closer, the list ages before it is worked.
- Agencies: at $4,349 all-in and $200 a meeting you need about 22 held meetings a month to break even on the meeting price.
- AI follow-up services need inbound flow or a past database. If the real problem is slow response, read speed-to-lead automation first.
If we can’t make you money, we don’t deserve yours.
Pay-Per-Result pricing — performance-based alignment.
How to choose a lead generator for your business
Choosing a lead generator comes down to three questions: do you lack names or lack meetings, who will do the work, and who pays when nothing books.
- Count your unworked leads. If your CRM holds hundreds of enquiries nobody booked, you need follow-up, not more names. Our guide to database reactivation covers that case.
- Price your own hours and add them to any software fee.
- Compare on one unit: credits, contacts, SDR seats and booked meetings are not the same thing.
- Ask who carries the risk. A retainer is paid whether or not anyone books; an outcome model is not. Our comparison of pay-per-result vs retainer agencies sets out the trade-off.
Niche buyers face different shortlists: our ranked lead generation agencies for online course creators in Australia is one example, and the lead generation agency guide covers vetting.
Sources
- Hunter, Plans and pricing, read 3 November 2026.
- AiSDR, Pricing, read 3 November 2026.
- CIENCE, Pricing for SDRs and appointment setting, read 3 November 2026.
Pay-Per-Result appointments
See if we’re a fit
We book qualified sales appointments for you and you pay on results, not retainers. Our booking page asks a few quick questions so you find out in two minutes whether that model suits your business.
- 50,769+ appointments booked without cold calling.
- Pay-Per-Result pricing — you pay for booked, qualified calls.
- Pick your own time on our live calendar, no phone tag.