What Kuration is, and when to reach for it instead of a database

A database answers a query. Kuration runs a research job.

When you search a static database you are querying rows that were collected months ago and filtered by whatever fields that vendor decided to store. If your ideal customer is not describable in those fields, the database cannot find it. Everyone paying that vendor gets the same rows, in the same order, from the same filters.

Kuration works the other way around. You describe what you want, and the platform goes and researches it now, against live sources: Google Maps, company websites, directories, review sites, job boards, PDFs, registries, LinkedIn. Two people describing the same market get different lists, because the research is run fresh each time against the exact description you gave.

The honest version: when not to use it

If your ICP is fully describable by industry code, headcount band and country, and you need it right now, a database filter is faster and you should use one. Kuration earns its place the moment your definition contains something a filter cannot hold: a signal, a document, a language, a market nobody indexed, or a judgement call.

What the platform is made of

Three things, and you will meet all of them in the next lesson. A set of list builders that produce rows from a source. A Toolbox of research tools that run down a column and fill it in, grouped into find people, contact details, custom research, enrichment, integrate and automation. And a table that holds the result, which is also where filtering, scoring and export happen.

• A project is a table. Rows are companies, or people once you transpose it.
• A tool column runs an agent down that column, row by row.
• Conditions stop that agent running on rows you do not care about. This is the single biggest lever on cost.
• Credits are charged three different ways, which is lesson four.