Add & Customize Contacts - Account Owners & Followers

What you'll learn

Common Use Cases

Once you know how to add and customize contacts, here's what you can start doing right away.

⚡

Add A Contact In Seconds

Use the flash icon or the Add A Contact button in the Contacts feature to get a new contact into your system fast.

📝

Customize Your Contact Form

Choose which fields show up every time you add a contact, mark the ones that are required, and put them in the order that makes sense for your business.

👤

Assign An Owner

Set who on your team is responsible for a contact, so it's always clear who's driving that relationship forward.

👀

Add Followers For Visibility

Give other teammates visibility into a contact without making them the owner, so the right people stay in the loop.

Key definitions

Terms worth knowing

The person on your team assigned to a contact. Only people who are on your team and have access to your CRM can be set as an owner, and it's a great way to make it clear who is responsible for that relationship.

A teammate you add to a contact so they can stay aware of what's happening, even though they are not the owner. Conversations for that contact will show up under Followed By Me for anyone added as a follower.

A field on the contact form used to mark whether someone is a lead or a current customer. It can be customized to fit your own business categories.

A setting on a contact that stops outreach across a channel. Turn it on only if a contact specifically asks not to receive emails, texts, or calls, or if an inbound number keeps calling in a way you don't want to continue.

The screen where you choose which fields appear on your contact form, drag them into the order you want, and organize them under Contact Fields, General Information, and Additional Information.

A record found in Settings that tracks system activity on a contact, including what was changed, who changed it, and when, so you can review the history at any time.

"Remember, the goal here is to capture, nurture, and close more sales by managing your contact data."

How it works

Adding, Customizing, And Managing Your Contacts

Two fast ways in

Look for the flash icon and select Add A Contact for the fastest path, or go into the Contacts feature and select the blue Add A Contact button. Either way lands you on the same screen to add your contact. Every contact needs a first and last name, and the system will require either an email or a phone number so it can keep track of that contact's data. If a contact fills out two different forms with the same email but different phone numbers, your software will associate them as the same contact. If they use two different email addresses instead, depending on how things are set up, you may end up with a duplicate contact, which is normal and can be merged later.

Build the form your business needs

The customized form is where you decide what gets filled out every time a contact is added. You can upload a contact image using the pencil icon, and the form will show you the recommended size, max file size, and supported formats. Beyond name, email, and phone, you'll also see Contact Type, so you can mark whether someone is a lead or a customer, a Time Zone field if you work across time zones, and DND On All Channels if a contact should not be reached. Selecting Save adds the contact to your system using whatever fields you've set up.

Choose, require, and reorder your fields

Clicking the customized form takes you into Settings, then Objects, then Custom Fields for a contact, where every current field is listed along with its field type, whether it's required, and an option to delete it. From there, select Manage Fields to choose exactly which fields show on your form. First name is always locked since it's required to create a contact, and the rest come from Contact Fields, General Information, and Additional Information. You can drag and drop fields into any order, for example moving email up to appear right after the name, and unchecking anything you don't need, like time zone, removes it from your Selected Fields automatically. A Preview button lets you see exactly what the form will look like before you save.

Assign who's responsible and who's watching

Inside a contact record you can assign the Owner, which includes anyone on your team who has access to your CRM, so it's clear who is responsible for that contact. You can also assign Followers, which gives other teammates visibility into that contact's activity without making them the owner. Tags live right next to Owner and Followers and are a great way to organize contacts by the products or services they're interested in, covered in more detail in the Tags lesson.

Everything tied to one contact, in one place

Inside a contact record, All Fields organizes information the way your fields and folders are set up, starting with the contact's own details like name, email, and phone, then General Information and Additional Information. The middle of the record covers conversations, so you can text, email, or leave an internal comment right from the contact. The third column shows how the contact came in, along with associations, tasks, notes, appointments, documents, and payments, all connected to that one contact. You can also delete a contact from here, with a confirmation step that requires typing "delete" so it doesn't happen by accident.

Tips

Worth remembering

If your administrator has already set up your contact fields, just follow the fields they've provided rather than changing them yourself.
Only turn on DND for a contact if they specifically ask not to be reached, or if an inbound number keeps calling in a way you don't want to continue.
Use the sort arrow next to Created or Last Activity to decide whether your newest or oldest contacts show up first in list view.
Assign an Owner for accountability and add Followers for visibility, they serve two different purposes on the same contact.
Check Audit Logs, found in Settings, any time you need to see what changed on a contact, who changed it, and when.

Check yourself

Quick Knowledge Check

Four quick questions on this lesson. One attempt each, and the answer is revealed either way.

0 of 4 answered

Besides a first and last name, what does your software require to add a contact?

Where do you go to choose which fields appear on your contact form and put them in order?

What's the difference between an Owner and a Follower on a contact?

When should you turn on DND for a contact?

Apply it

Try this with your favorite AI

📝Design my contact form fields

You are helping me decide which fields to include on my contact form in my software. Here is my situation: - What my business sells or does: [describe] - The information I actually need from every new contact: [list it] - Anything I'd like to track that isn't a standard field, like a birthday, referral source, or product interest: [describe] Based on that, give me a recommended list of fields to include, which ones should be required, and a suggested order to arrange them in so the most important information is captured first. Finish by asking me whether I want to group any of these fields under a custom folder.

👤Set my Owner & Follower rules

You are helping me set simple rules for who should be the Owner and who should be a Follower on a contact in my software. Here is my situation: - The people on my team and their roles: [list them] - How contacts get assigned today, if at all: [describe] - Situations where more than one teammate needs visibility into a contact: [describe] Based on that, suggest a simple set of rules for when to assign an Owner versus when to just add a Follower, so my team always knows who's responsible for a contact. Finish by asking me which one rule I want to start using today.