ZoomInfo Targets Enterprise Growth With AI Credits, New Pricing and Cost Cuts

ZoomInfo Targets Enterprise Growth With AI Credits, New Pricing and Cost Cuts

ZoomInfo is shifting toward enterprise growth by expanding its dedicated enterprise sales force, accepting longer sales cycles and pursuing larger contracts. The company reported $107 million in second-quarter unlevered free cash flow, up 7% year over year, alongside improved margins following cost cuts. The company is expanding its AI and data-credit strategy through a hybrid seat- and consumption-based pricing model. New packaging will unify Studio, Copilot and ZoomInfo Marketing, with broader integrations planned for platforms including Claude, ChatGPT and Gemini. ZoomInfo is pulling back from downmarket customers and facing continued weakness among software clients, where “build versus buy” decisions are delaying purchases. Management is also weighing debt repurchases, share buybacks and reinvestment while maintaining strict cost discipline.

ZoomInfo Technologies NASDAQ: ZI is prioritizing enterprise customers, expanding consumption-based pricing and restructuring parts of its business as it seeks a return to durable growth, Chief Financial Officer Graham O'Brien said at the KeyBanc Capital Markets Technology Leadership Forum. O'Brien described ZoomInfo as a provider of data and software for business-to-business go-to-market professionals, including sales representatives and revenue operations teams. The company’s data asset includes more than 100 million companies and more than 500 million professionals, he said, along with billions of signals that are surfaced through artificial intelligence to help customers identify potential buyers and determine when and how to engage them.

O'Brien said ZoomInfo’s second-quarter results were generally above expectations, highlighting $107 million of unlevered free cash flow, up 7% year over year. He also pointed to year-over-year margin improvement after the company restructured its business and reduced its cost base during the quarter. The CFO said ZoomInfo recorded one of its strongest quarters for new business involving customers spending at least $100,000 annually. The company attributed that performance to its focus on a dedicated enterprise account executive organization.

ZoomInfo began segmenting its sales organization roughly two years ago, according to O'Brien. The change involved accepting longer sales cycles, building buying committees within prospective customers and pursuing higher-value initial contracts that can later expand. “You’re starting to see that,” O'Brien said of the strategy. “I think it started really catching, getting traction there about a year ago, but this was hit at full speed in Q2.” The company has also increased specialization by industry, he said, assigning sales personnel more narrowly to verticals such as financial services or manufacturing rather than having them sell across several sectors.

O'Brien said ZoomInfo Copilot, the company’s AI product, has been in the market for more than two years and has generated hundreds of millions of dollars in annual contract value. Going forward, he said the company aims to increase consumption of both its data credits and AI credits through its own platform and through external integrations, including application programming interfaces and connections to platforms such as Claude, ChatGPT and Gemini. ZoomInfo is moving toward a hybrid consumption model that can support customers using its products through soft...