Leads - where they come from, how they are assigned to managers, and how not to lose a call

A lead is not a client yet. It is a person who wrote "how much is it" and is waiting for an answer. While they wait, they write to the salon next door. The leads section exists so that nobody gets lost between "wrote" and "booked".

Leads are available on the Start plan and above.

Where they come from

A lead can come from a form on your website, from Google Forms, from any system via a webhook, from a messenger, from a phone call or from an administrator's hands. For forms and webhooks a key is created in the sources section; the form sends a name and a phone number together with advertising tags: utm tags, the page and the referrer. A month later you can see which ads bring leads and which only spend the budget.

Two fields are required: a name, and a phone or an email. A lead you cannot contact is not a lead.

The status funnel

You define the statuses and the transitions between them: "new", "call back", "in progress", "booked", "lost". If there are no transition rules, everything is allowed. Every status change is written to the history with a date and an author.

A status can have a term: for example, "call back" in two hours. Then moving into that status gives the lead a next-call time, and the system creates a "Call back" task with a deadline for the responsible person. The "time to call" list shows everything whose call time has come or comes today.

Automatic assignment

Assignment is off by default: a new lead waits until someone takes it. When you switch it on, you choose how a manager is assigned:

• round-robin: leads go in turn;
• least loaded: to whoever has fewer open leads;
• by weight: with weights 2/1/1, two of four leads go to the first manager;
• by source: to the manager attached to the form or channel;
• random.

Assignment respects the schedule: a manager who has a day off or is at lunch does not get the lead. During quiet hours the lead either waits for the morning or goes to the person on duty. A lead assigned by hand is left alone.

Every assignment is logged with a reason: "assigned", "assignment off", "nobody available", "quiet hours". If leads seem to go to the wrong place, the answer is in the log.

Duplicates

If the phone number of a new lead matches another lead or a client, the lead is still created but flagged as a "possible duplicate" with a link to the found record. Blocking creation would be wrong: the person may have written a second time because nobody answered, and that is information too.

A lead becomes a client

One button: "Convert to client". If a client with that phone number already exists, the lead is linked to them and fills in missing fields; otherwise a new client is created. The lead gets the status "converted", and the source gets plus one in its conversion statistics. A lead can also be booked for a visit directly without creating the client separately.

The lead list with all its filters exports to CSV.