Build a Complete Lead Gen Pipeline with 3 Free APIs

#javascript #tutorial #api #startup

What if you could go from "I need leads in the restaurant industry in Chicago" to a spreadsheet of 200+ contacts with emails — in under 5 minutes?

Here's how to build a 3-API lead generation pipeline using free tiers:

The Stack

Step	API	What It Does
1. Find businesses	Google Maps Scraper	Extracts business listings from Maps
2. Get emails	Email Extractor	Scrapes email addresses from websites
3. Enrich contacts	Apollo Lead Scraper	Finds decision-maker names and titles

The Pipeline Code

const axios = require('axios');
const fs = require('fs');

const headers = (host) => ({
  'X-RapidAPI-Key': process.env.RAPIDAPI_KEY,
  'X-RapidAPI-Host': host
});

// Step 1: Find businesses on Google Maps
async function findBusinesses(query, limit = 20) {
  const { data } = await axios.get(
    'https://google-maps-scraper12.p.rapidapi.com/google-maps-scraper/search',
    { params: { query, limit }, headers: headers('google-maps-scraper12.p.rapidapi.com') }
  );
  return data.results;
}

// Step 2: Extract emails from their websites
async function extractEmails(websites) {
  const emails = [];
  for (const url of websites.filter(Boolean)) {
    try {
      const { data } = await axios.get(
        'https://email-extractor1.p.rapidapi.com/email-extractor/extract',
        { params: { url }, headers: headers('email-extractor1.p.rapidapi.com') }
      );
      emails.push(...data.emails.map(e => ({ email: e, source: url })));
    } catch {}
    await new Promise(r => setTimeout(r, 500));
  }
  return emails;
}

// Step 3: Enrich with decision-maker data
async function enrichLeads(industry, city) {
  const { data } = await axios.get(
    'https://apollo-lead-scraper.p.rapidapi.com/apollo-lead-scraper/search',
    { params: { query: `owner ${industry} ${city}`, limit: 20 },
      headers: headers('apollo-lead-scraper.p.rapidapi.com') }
  );
  return data.results;
}

// Run the full pipeline
async function leadGenPipeline(industry, city) {
  console.log(`Finding ${industry} businesses in ${city}...`);
  const businesses = await findBusinesses(`${industry} in ${city}`);

  console.log(`Extracting emails from ${businesses.length} websites...`);
  const emails = await extractEmails(businesses.map(b => b.website));

  console.log(`Enriching with decision-maker data...`);
  const enriched = await enrichLeads(industry, city);

  // Merge and export
  const leads = businesses.map(b => ({
    business: b.name, phone: b.phone, address: b.address,
    website: b.website, rating: b.rating,
    email: emails.find(e => e.source === b.website)?.email || '',
    decisionMaker: enriched.find(e =>
      e.company?.toLowerCase().includes(b.name.split(' ')[0].toLowerCase())
    )?.name || ''
  }));

  // Save as CSV
  const csv = ['Business,Phone,Address,Email,Decision Maker,Rating'];
  leads.forEach(l => csv.push(
    `"${l.business}",${l.phone},"${l.address}",${l.email},${l.decisionMaker},${l.rating}`
  ));
  fs.writeFileSync('leads.csv', csv.join('\n'));
  console.log(`Pipeline complete: ${leads.length} leads exported to leads.csv`);
}

leadGenPipeline('restaurants', 'Chicago IL');