Need some information about a company or person you want to work with but Facebook only shows what they do after the workday is done (TMI!)? Looking for a partner for your next business venture or simply curious where that dude from your summer internship is working now? Whatever your search entails, there are online resources you can utilize to research, market, and make important connections to improve your professional status or company’s endeavors. Business directories are the way to go and there are a bunch available with subscription options to suit your search needs. Of these, we’ve whittled the field down to what we consider the two on top, Hoovers and ZoomInfo. Both have amazing perks and years of experience in the business directory industry, but we’re zooming in on ZoomInfo as our #1. Here’s the (Zoom)info…

ZoomInfo has been a business-to-business leader for over a decade, founded by Jonathan Stern in 2000. Over 6 million people search ZoomInfo every month (that’s a LOT of folks!) and customers include prestigious companies like Microsoft, Yahoo!, PepsiCo, Oracle, and more, including 20% of the Fortune 500 companies. Currently, ZoomInfo has extensive profiles on over 95 million people and 7 million companies and adds over 20,000 new profiles each month. With this information, you can effectively improve your company’s marketing strategies and update your database with the newest details available. This will help your business increase its revenue by being able to contact the right people and become more organized. ZoomInfo stands out from its competitors due to their semantic search engine and patented technologies. They don’t use manual or user-contributed processes to update their site; it’s all highly technological and automatic, allowing ZoomInfo to be nearly real-time as far as their updating capabilities and data-gathering processes. ZoomInfo is constantly improving – 24/7. Their site is easy to navigate via company name, industry, job title, place of business, and more. A variety of pricing plans are available, including a free option of 10 views per month. Otherwise, packages range from $29.95/month to $99.95/month and up for a pro plan or customized pricing.

What about Hoovers? Hoovers is also a mover in the industry and has been around since the early ‘90s. They consider themselves the “world’s largest business directory” with data on 100,000,000 people in over 85,000,000 companies. Just like ZoomInfo, Hoovers provides detailed company overviews, addresses, finance numbers, competitors, key execs, and more and is easy to use. Here’s the major difference – Hoovers relies on their in-house editorial staff to compile their business data whereas as we mentioned, ZoomInfo has a modern algorithm to compile and analyze. Humans are great and all, but are we really as effective as technology in this case? Also, pricing is a bit steeper for Hoovers with packages ranging from $50 per month up to $128 per month, but they also offer a free trial like ZoomInfo.

All in all, both directories will likely have what most people need. But with ZoomInfo’s more affordable subscription plans and up-to-the-moment computerized updating, ZoomInfo edges out Hoovers as the best online research service in its category as we see it. Your business will soar… no ZOOM, with a subscription to ZoomInfo!