Why Company Identification is Trickier Than You Think

Reverse IP Lookup is the most common method used by B2B marketing tools that claim to provide company data based on the IP addresses of website visitors. Reverse IP identification is similar to calling *69 (back in the olden days before smartphones and caller ID.) Just as you once needed a phone book to map phone numbers to people, most tools need to look up an IP number in the IP registry to find what company owns an IP address.

The problem is, just like that cool, mysterious person you met at the coffee shop (in 1999) whose phone number was unlisted, many companies aren’t connected to their IP addresses in the registry. You can’t get their contact information. They’re not deliberately trying to be sneaky, but they actually aren’t the proprietors of their own IP addresses.

Rather, they lease an IP from their Internet Service Provider (ISP), such as Comcast or Time Warner. Therefore, when you do a reverse lookup to find out who owns the IP address, you get the name of the ISP, not the potential customer visiting your site. In short, reverse website IP lookup won’t take you far, because the registry is filled with inaccurate and/or incomplete data.

Real-Time Technology for Accurate Data and Analytics

Fortunately, there’s a better way. Demandbase’s patented real-time company identification technology grabs IP addresses and maps them to the correct company – regardless of who technically owns the IP address. Instead of relying on the IP registry and potentially faulty data, we’re able to leverage our technology to map billions of IP addresses and assign them to the correct company. Furthermore, we deliver important and robust business attributes such as company’s size, annual revenue, employee count and industry to name a few. And it all happens in real-time.

The goal of company identification and website analytics is to help you make smarter decisions, capture the right leads and deliver a personalized customer experience, from first to last touch. But choose your solution carefully – it’s going to be hard to accomplish those goals if your data isn’t accurate in the first place.

Want to see what’s possible when you have the right data? Learn how B2B Marketers use customer attributes to engage buyers.