n8n Lead Scoring Workflow with MadKudu & Hunter

Imagine a world where your best leads rise to the top automatically, your sales team always knows who to contact next, and you never waste time chasing low quality prospects. That is exactly what this n8n lead scoring workflow with MadKudu and Hunter is designed to unlock for you.

With a single automated flow, you can capture leads from any form, verify their email addresses, enrich and score them with MadKudu, then alert your team via Slack or email the moment a hot lead appears. Instead of sorting spreadsheets and guessing who to prioritize, you get a focused, high impact pipeline that supports real growth.

The problem: manual lead triage drains your energy

If you have ever opened your CRM or inbox to a flood of new leads, you already know the challenge. Someone has to decide who is worth a follow up, who is a perfect fit, and who is likely to waste your time. Doing this by hand is:

• Slow and repetitive
• Inconsistent from one person to another
• Prone to errors and missed opportunities
• A distraction from real relationship building

Every minute you spend manually checking email addresses, Googling companies, and scoring leads is a minute you are not talking to customers or improving your product. At scale, that friction becomes a real growth blocker.

The mindset shift: let automation qualify for you

Automation is not just about saving a few clicks. It is about changing how you work. When you let tools like n8n, MadKudu, and Hunter take over repetitive qualification tasks, you free up time and mental space for higher value work.

This workflow invites you to adopt a new mindset:

• Trust data-driven scoring instead of gut feeling alone
• Standardize what “hot lead” means for your team
• Respond faster and more consistently to your best opportunities
• Continuously refine your process instead of starting from scratch each time

Think of this template as a starting point, not a finished product. It is a foundation you can customize, extend, and evolve as your business grows.

The possibility: an always-on lead scoring engine

With this n8n lead scoring workflow, every new form submission can automatically follow a clear, reliable path:

• Capture the lead from any form or website
• Verify the email address with Hunter
• Enrich and score the lead with MadKudu
• Check if the lead qualifies as “hot” based on your threshold
• Notify your team instantly via Slack or email when a high-fit lead appears

Instead of wondering which leads to work on, your team receives focused alerts that say, “This one is worth your time.” Over weeks and months, that consistency compounds into better conversion rates, shorter response times, and a more predictable pipeline.

The workflow as your practical tool for growth

Let us walk through how this template actually works in n8n, step by step. You will see that behind the transformation is a simple, understandable sequence of nodes that you can adapt to your own stack.

High level template flow

The workflow follows a mostly linear path with a few key decision points:

1. Form Trigger captures the lead’s email from any form.
2. Hunter Email Verification checks if the email is deliverable.
3. Validate Email (If node) routes only valid emails forward.
4. MadKudu Lead Scoring (HTTP Request) enriches and scores the lead.
5. Customer Fit Check (If node) compares the score to your hot-lead threshold.
6. Notifications send Slack and/or Gmail alerts for high-fit leads, while low-fit leads can be logged or ignored.

Each of these steps is a building block. You can keep them as-is, or extend the chain with CRM creation, tagging, or nurturing flows as your automation skills grow.

Step 1: Form Trigger – where the journey begins

Every lead’s journey into your automated scoring engine starts with the Form Trigger node. In the template, it collects the lead’s business email, but you are not locked into a single form provider.

You can:

• Use the built-in n8n Form Trigger
• Swap in Typeform or Google Forms
• Use a webhook from your website or landing page

The key is simple: make sure the email field from your form flows into the next node. Once that is in place, every new submission automatically enters the scoring pipeline.

Step 2: Hunter Email Verification – protect your time and budget

Before you invest in enrichment and scoring, you want to know that the email address is actually usable. That is where the Hunter Email Verification node comes in.

Hunter returns statuses such as valid, risky, or invalid. The template uses an If node called Validate Email to check this result and only forward valid emails to MadKudu. This simple filter helps you:

• Avoid wasting MadKudu API calls on bad addresses
• Improve the quality of leads that reach your sales team
• Control costs related to enrichment and outreach

By verifying first, you keep your workflow lean and focused on leads that can actually convert.

Step 3: MadKudu Lead Scoring – turn data into insight

Once an email is verified, the workflow sends it to MadKudu for enrichment and predictive scoring. This is where raw contact information becomes insight your sales team can act on.

The template uses an HTTP Request node to call MadKudu’s persons endpoint by email. MadKudu then returns:

• customer_fit.score – a numeric score that represents how well the lead matches your ideal customer profile
• Top signals and enriched data about the person and company

Make sure your MadKudu API key is configured in n8n credentials and referenced in this HTTP Request node. Once connected, every valid email that enters the workflow gets scored automatically.

Step 4: Customer Fit Check – define your “hot lead” standard

Automation is powerful when it reflects your own definition of success. The Customer Fit Check node is where you translate your ideal customer profile into a simple rule.

This If node checks whether $json.properties.customer_fit.score is greater than a threshold you define. In the template, the default is 60, but you should adjust this to fit your business.

For example:

• Higher threshold means fewer notifications, but each one is a stronger fit
• Lower threshold means more alerts for SDRs to triage, which can be useful if your team prefers volume

If the condition is true, the workflow treats the lead as “hot” and triggers notifications. If it is false, the lead is routed to a low-fit path where you can log, nurture, or simply ignore it depending on your strategy.

Step 5: Notifications with Slack and Gmail – act at the right moment

Once a lead passes the fit check, the workflow moves into action mode. This is where your team feels the impact of automation most clearly.

The template sends:

• A formatted Slack message to a channel you choose
• An alert via Gmail (or another email provider you configure)

You can customize the message templates to include:

• First name and company
• Email and domain
• Top MadKudu signals and the customer_fit.score

With these alerts in place, your sales team does not have to dig through dashboards. The right leads simply show up where they already work, ready for fast follow up.

Setup checklist: prepare your workflow for launch

Before you activate this n8n lead scoring template, walk through this checklist to make sure everything is wired correctly:

• Create and add MadKudu API credentials in n8n and link them in the HTTP Request node (HTTP header auth as in the template).
• Add a Hunter API key in n8n and select it in the Hunter node credentials.
• Configure your Gmail or SMTP credentials for email alerts, or choose another email node if you prefer.
• Set your Slack app credentials and specify the channel where hot lead alerts should appear.
• Update the recipient email in the Hot Lead Email Notification node so the right person receives instant alerts.
• Adjust the customer fit threshold in the Customer Fit Check node to match your ICP (ideal customer profile).

Once these pieces are in place, you have a fully functional scoring engine ready to run in the background of your business.

Testing your workflow: build confidence before going live

Testing is where you turn a promising idea into a reliable system. n8n makes this easy with its Test Workflow feature and sample data in the Form Trigger pinData.

To test the full journey:

1. Click Test Workflow in n8n and submit an example email through the Form Trigger.
2. Confirm that Hunter returns a valid status for the email.
3. Check that MadKudu responds with a customer_fit.score and top_signals.
4. If the score meets your threshold, verify that both Slack and Gmail receive the correctly formatted message.

Run this a few times with different emails and scores. As you see the workflow behave consistently, you gain the confidence to let it run automatically on real leads.

Customization ideas: evolve the template with your needs

One of the biggest advantages of building this in n8n is that you are never stuck with a rigid system. You can start simple, then gradually layer on sophistication as your team and volume grow.

Adapt the entry point

• Replace the Form Trigger with Typeform, Google Forms, or a custom webhook from your website.
• Map the email field from your chosen source into the Hunter node.

Fine tune lead volume

• Raise the MadKudu score threshold to focus on fewer, higher quality alerts.
• Lower the threshold to give SDRs more leads to review manually.

Deepen CRM and nurturing integration

• Use MadKudu signals to automatically add tags in your CRM for segmentation.
• Log low-fit leads to a spreadsheet, Airtable, or your CRM for later nurturing instead of dropping them.
• Extend the workflow to create leads in Salesforce, HubSpot, or Pipedrive when a lead passes the fit check.

Every small improvement you make here saves you time repeatedly in the future. Over time, your workflow becomes a unique asset that reflects exactly how your business wants to prioritize and respond.

Security and cost: automate responsibly

As you scale automation, it is important to balance power with responsibility. This workflow uses external APIs, so keep these points in mind:

• Use Hunter to verify emails before calling MadKudu to reduce unnecessary enrichment costs.
• Monitor your Hunter and MadKudu API usage and quotas so you stay within your plan.
• Store all API credentials securely in n8n and avoid exposing them in logs, code, or public channels.
• Minimize exposure of PII (personally identifiable information) when sending notifications, especially in shared Slack channels.

With these practices in place, you can enjoy the benefits of automation while protecting your data and budget.

Troubleshooting: turn roadblocks into learning

If notifications are not arriving or something feels off, use it as an opportunity to understand your system more deeply. Common checks include:

• Review n8n execution logs for errors in the MadKudu or Hunter nodes.
• Confirm that your API keys are correct, active, and have remaining quota.
• Verify that the If node conditions reference the correct JSON path, for example $json.properties.customer_fit.score.
• Test Slack and Gmail credentials independently in n8n to rule out authentication or permission issues.

Each issue you solve makes you more confident and capable with n8n, which pays off when you build your next automation.

Lead scoring best practices to maximize impact

To get the most value from this workflow over time, treat it as a living system rather than a one-time setup. A few best practices:

• Define an internal SLA for how quickly sales should act on a hot lead, for example “respond within 1 hour”.
• Monitor conversion rates from scored leads and refine your MadKudu model and thresholds as you learn.
• Enrich lead data with firmographic and behavioral signals to improve predictive accuracy.
• Set up analytics to measure lift from automated lead routing, such as win rate, time-to-contact, and MQL to SQL conversion.

As you tune these elements, your lead scoring engine becomes more accurate, more aligned with your strategy, and more valuable to your team.

From idea to action: your next step with n8n

This n8n lead scoring workflow with MadKudu and Hunter is a lightweight yet powerful starting point. It verifies emails, applies predictive scoring, and alerts your sales team when high-fit leads appear. Most importantly, it frees you from manual triage so you can focus on meaningful conversations and strategic work.

You do not have to automate everything at once. Start with this template, get comfortable, and then keep iterating. Each improvement you make is a step toward a more focused, more scalable way of working.

Ready to move from theory to practice?

• Import this template into your n8n instance.
• Add your MadKudu and Hunter credentials.
• Set your notification email and Slack channel.
• Adjust your customer fit threshold.
• Use the built-in example data to test and refine.

If you need help customizing thresholds or connecting your CRM, collaborate with your automation team or explore the n8n documentation. With each iteration, you will build a workflow that fits your business like a glove.

Take action now: activate the workflow and start receiving high quality lead alerts today. Let this be the first of many automations that give you back time, focus, and momentum.