Every Thursday, one paid app or manual job replaced or improved with AI
THIS WEEK'S REPLACEMENT
Replaces: Apollo's Basic plan ($49 a month per person), or an afternoon of Googling and copy-paste
Setup: 10 minutes
You need: Claude (the no-cost plan works) and an Apify account (also no cost)
Works for: agencies, freelancers, trades, B2B services, anyone who sells to local businesses
Your next 200 clients are already on Google Maps.
Every one of them is listed with their rating, their reviews, their website, and whether anyone has replied to a customer in months.
Finding the ones who need you used to mean an afternoon of tabs and copy-paste. Or $49 a month for a lead database.
Now you can hand that job to Claude. It searches, reads the reviews, scores every business against what you sell, and hands you the shortlist.
Tonight you run your first search. Ten minutes, and it costs nothing.
⚡ What changed
Claude can now plug into outside tools by pasting a single address, and it works on every plan, including the no-cost one, which gets one slot.
Apify, a service that runs ready-made web scrapers, built an official connector for it. So Claude can now run Apify's Google Maps scraper itself, read the results and work through them with you.
Before, this meant logging into a scraping tool, downloading a spreadsheet, cleaning it, then researching every business by hand. Now you describe your ideal customer in a sentence and Claude does the rest.
🔁 How it works
You describe your ideal customer → Claude runs a Google Maps search through Apify → A scored shortlist lands in your chat
You pick who to contact. Claude never emails anyone.
🛠️ Set it up tonight
Make an Apify account. Sign up at apify.com. The no-cost plan includes $5 of usage every month, which covers hundreds of businesses.
Add Apify to Claude. In Claude go to Settings, then Connectors (some accounts show Customize, then Connectors). Click Add custom connector, name it Apify, paste
https://mcp.apify.comand sign in with your Apify account when asked.Start a new chat. Check Apify is switched on in the chat's connector menu.
Paste the prompt below with your business type, area and what you sell filled in.
Approve the run. Claude shows you the cost estimate and the Apify tool it wants to use. Allow it.
Copy the table into Google Sheets. That's your first list.
The starter prompt:
Use the Apify connector to run the Google Maps Scraper (compass/crawler-google-places).
Find 20 [TYPE OF BUSINESS] in [CITY OR SUBURB].
Before you run it, tell me the estimated cost. If it's over $1, stop and ask me.
For each business, give me: name, rating, number of reviews, website (or "none"), phone, and the Google Maps link.
Then score each one from 1 to 5 on how likely they are to need [WHAT YOU SELL]. Score higher for a low rating, few reviews, no website, or an owner who never replies to reviews. Add one line explaining each score, using a real detail.
Show it as a table, best prospects first. Don't run any other tools.It's working if: a few minutes after you approve, you get a table of 20 businesses with a score and a reason for each. In your Apify account, the run shows under Runs with what it cost, usually a few cents.
If nothing happens: Claude can't see the connector. Open the connector menu in that chat and switch Apify on, or remove the connector and add it again to refresh the sign-in.
🧱 Where this version stops
The version above works tonight. Here's where you'll hit a wall by next week:
There are no emails. You get phones and websites, but Google Maps doesn't list email addresses. Without them, the list is a to-do list, not outreach.
You start from scratch every time. Every search means pasting the prompt again and re-explaining what you sell and who needs it.
A list isn't a pipeline. No opening lines, no follow-ups, and no fresh leads next Monday unless you remember to run it.
🔒 In the Pro section today
The Lead Agent: a Claude skill you install once, then one sentence runs the whole job
Verified emails for every lead that has one, so you're not writing to dead inboxes
Opening lines written from each business's own reviews and website
A Monday run that drops 50 fresh leads in your chat while you're asleep
The connector setting that keeps every run cheap, and the email rules that keep you out of spam folders
Plus the full resource library, yours from day one:
The App Builder's Kit: 50 app ideas and 60 prompts. Build it in an evening and get it onto your team's or customers' phones, no code.
Run Your Computer From Your Phone: tell the computer at your desk what to do from your phone. Twenty minutes to set up, 7 parts and 9 prompts.
AI Visibility Improvement and Management: turn your AI Visibility Audit into a plan, improve your site and track whether it's working. 15 parts and 15+ prompts.
Then $17.99/month. Not ready? The starter prompt is in the workflow library with the rest.
📦 Added to the Pro library
This week's 3 prompts are now in the workflow library, sorted newest first:
The Lead Agent: a Claude skill that finds, scores and verifies local leads from one sentence.
The Opener Writer: first emails that start with something true about each business.
The Monday Lead Run: 50 fresh leads and ten ready openers, every Monday at 7am.
Pairs with this setup, already in the resources library:
AI Visibility Improvement and Management: the first thing a new lead does is look you up, often by asking ChatGPT. Turn your audit findings into a plan, improve your site and get mentioned in the places AI pulls from. 15 parts and 15+ prompts.
Run Your Computer From Your Phone: check the Monday lead list and kick off a new search from your phone, using the files and accounts already on your desk computer. Twenty minutes to set up, 7 parts and 9 prompts.
The App Builder's Kit: 50 app ideas and 60 prompts, including small tools you can offer the leads you find. Build it in an evening, no code.
Your move
Run the starter search tonight for one type of business in your area. Then hit reply and tell me how many of your 20 scored a 5. I read every reply.
Till next time,
P.S. The Lead Agent installs once. After that, "find 50 dentists in Denver" is the whole job, every week, while you're doing something else. Start your 7-day trial.
