What is ZoominfoBot?

ZoominfoBot is a web crawler operated by Zoom Info, a B2B contact database company that collects and maintains business information. First seen around 2017, this bot systematically crawls websites to gather and update company and professional information for ZoomInfo's extensive business intelligence database. Technically classified as a marketing web crawler, it functions by scanning company websites, team pages, press releases, and other public business information to extract data about organizations and their employees.

The bot identifies itself in server logs with user agent strings like ZoominfoBot (zoominfobot at zoominfo dot com) or simply zoominfobot. It operates primarily from Google Cloud infrastructure with U.S.-based IP addresses. ZoominfoBot is the successor to earlier crawlers from the same company, including "NextGenSearchBot" which was active from approximately 2009 to 2017.

ZoominfoBot typically respects standard crawling protocols and provides contact information in its user agent string, allowing website administrators to reach out with questions or concerns about its crawling activities.

Why is ZoominfoBot crawling my site?

ZoominfoBot is likely crawling your site to collect business information that helps ZoomInfo maintain its database of company and professional profiles. The bot is particularly interested in:

Company information (size, industry, location, etc.)
Employee details (names, job titles, contact information)
Corporate hierarchy and organizational structure
Recent company news, press releases, and updates

The frequency of visits depends on your site's size, how often your content changes, and the relevance of your business information to ZoomInfo's database. Larger companies with frequently updated team pages or news sections may experience more regular visits.

ZoominfoBot's crawling is generally considered authorized in the sense that it follows standard web crawling practices, though the specific use of your data for ZoomInfo's commercial services happens without explicit permission unless you've opted out.

What is the purpose of ZoominfoBot?

ZoominfoBot serves ZoomInfo's core business function of maintaining what they market as the industry's most comprehensive B2B database. The data collected helps power ZoomInfo's suite of sales and marketing intelligence products that enable businesses to:

Identify potential sales prospects
Enhance customer relationship management (CRM) data
Conduct market research and competitive analysis
Power sales outreach with accurate contact information

For website owners, there's no direct benefit from being crawled by ZoominfoBot. The value flows primarily to ZoomInfo and its customers who use the collected data for business development purposes. Some website owners may have concerns about their professional information being aggregated into a commercial database without explicit consent, particularly regarding employee contact details.

How do I block ZoominfoBot?

ZoominfoBot generally respects the robots.txt protocol, making this the simplest method to control its access to your site. To completely block ZoominfoBot from crawling your entire website, add the following directives to your robots.txt file:

User-agent: ZoominfoBot
Disallow: /

To block only specific sections of your site, such as employee directories or contact pages, you can use more targeted directives:

User-agent: ZoominfoBot
Disallow: /about/team/
Disallow: /contact/
Disallow: /employees/

Since ZoomInfo uses the collected data for its commercial services, you may also want to contact them directly about removing your information from their database. The email address included in their user agent string (zoominfobot at zoominfo dot com) provides a contact point for such requests.

Blocking ZoominfoBot will prevent your business and employee information from being included or updated in ZoomInfo's database. This may reduce unwanted sales outreach to your employees but could also decrease your company's visibility to potential business partners or customers who use ZoomInfo's services for research. Consider your organization's privacy preferences and business needs when deciding whether to allow or block this crawler.

ZoominfoBot