Managing Contacts

Learn how to create, edit, search, and organize your contacts in Readybuild.

The Contacts List

The Contacts page is organized into three main tabs:

Tab	Description
All Contacts	View all contacts regardless of type
Clients	View only leads and customers
Vendors	View only vendors and subcontractors

Each tab provides its own toolbar with relevant actions.

Creating a New Contact

Adding a Client/Lead

1. Navigate to Contacts in the main menu
2. Click the Clients tab (or stay on All Contacts)
3. Click + New Client (green button)
4. A dialog opens with the contact form

Adding a Vendor

1. Navigate to Contacts in the main menu
2. Click the Vendors tab
3. Click + New Vendor (green button)
4. Complete the vendor-specific form

Contact Form Fields

The contact form adapts based on whether you're adding a client or vendor:

Basic Information

• Contact Type - Prospect, Client, or Vendor. A workflow's Update Field Value action can also set it
• First Name / Last Name - Primary contact name
• Company Name - Business or household name
• Client ID - Auto-generated identifier (can be customized). Must be unique; if you enter a Client ID already used by another contact, it will be rejected.

Automatic Promotion to Client

A Prospect becomes a Client automatically on whichever of these happens first:

• A project is marked Won — whether you drag the project into a Won stage on the board, use Mark as Sold, mark an estimate sold, or the client signs a contract.
• A qualifying contract is fully signed — a Project Proposal, Design Services Agreement, or Deposit Agreement, including custom templates of those types. Promotion happens once every client signee has finished signing, even if the project stays in its current stage.

How promotion behaves:

• The change is recorded in the contact's change history as Contact Type: Prospect → Client.
• Automatic promotion runs any workflow that watches the Contact Type field, the same as changing it by hand.
• Change orders do not promote the contact, whether by stage or by signing, since they are created in the Won stage by design.
• Signing a purchase order, vendor quote, or substantial completion certificate does not promote the contact.
• Vendors and subcontractors are never promoted.
• Moving the project back out of a Won stage does not change the contact back to Prospect. Set the Contact Type manually if you need to reverse it.

Secondary Contact (Clients Only)

For households with two decision-makers:

• Partner First Name / Last Name - Second contact name
• Separate phone numbers and emails for each person

Address Information

• Street Address - Address line 1 and 2
• City, State, ZIP - Location details
• County / Municipality - For permit tracking

Contact Methods

• Phone Numbers - Add multiple with types (Mobile, Home, Work, etc.)
• Email Addresses - Primary and secondary emails
• Preferred Contact Method - Phone or email preference
• Do Not Call - Compliance flag

Marketing Attribution

• Source - How the contact found you (Website, Referral, etc.)
• Campaign - Associated marketing campaign
• Secondary Source/Campaign - Additional attribution

Referral Information

• Referred by Employee - Internal referral tracking
• Employee Referral Date - When the employee referral was made (stamped automatically when an employee referrer is set during intake)
• Referred by Client - Customer referral tracking
• Client Referral Date - When the client referral was made (stamped automatically when a client referrer is set during intake)

Employee Referral Workflow

Employee referrals are tracked at two levels.

• Contact-level (the default for this contact's future projects): Reference value. Setting an Employee Referrer on the Contact (via the contact form or the Referrals tab) stamps the Employee Referral Date automatically and configures the employee/date that will copy onto every new Project created for this contact. Change it any time — only new projects pick up the updated value; existing projects keep what they were created with.

• Project-level (what counts for commissions/reports): Each Project has its own Referred By Employee and Employee Referral Date on the Project Info screen. These are the values that drive commission/bonus eligibility and reporting. The contact-level value is copied here at project creation, then lives independently on the project — editing the contact later does not retro-update existing projects.

• Reports: The Employee Referral Report sources from the Project-level fields only. Contact-level referrals never appear in the report on their own — they must flow into a project. Warranty and Change Order projects are excluded.

Automatic project stamping: Every new Project created under a contact (Project Request Form, Add Opportunity, external lead conversion) inherits the contact's current Employee Referrer + Date. Override on the Project Info screen any time a specific project needs a different referrer or date.

Sales Assignment

• Salesperson - Assigned sales representative
• Marketing Outcome - Expected outcome category

Vendor-Specific Fields

When adding a vendor, additional fields appear:

• Vendor Classification - Supplier, Subcontractor, Professional, etc.
• Website - The vendor's web address, shown as a clickable link on their record. Enter the full address including https:// so the link opens correctly
• Vendor Types - Trade categories (Plumbing, Electrical, etc.), configured under Settings > Contacts & Addresses > Vendor Types
• Preferred Vendor - Mark as preferred
• Billing Address - Separate billing location
• Billing Attention - Attention line for invoices

Searching Contacts

Quick Search

Click the Search button to expand the search panel with comprehensive filters.

Search Fields

Contact Information

Field	Searches
First Name	Primary contact first name
Last Name	Primary contact last name
Company Name	Company or household name
Email	Any email address on record
Phone Number	Any phone number (any format)
Additional Contact	Names of related contacts

Address Information

Field	Searches
Address	Street address
City	City name
State	State (dropdown)
ZIP	Postal code

Marketing/Sales Information

These filters appear based on your system configuration:

• Salesperson - Filter by assigned rep
• Source - Filter by lead source
• Campaign - Filter by marketing campaign
• Secondary Source/Campaign - Additional attribution filters
• Referred by Employee - Internal referral source
• Referred by Client - Customer referral source

Vendor Filters (Vendors Tab)

The Vendors tab adds filters built for trade-partner/vendor reporting. They work alongside the standard name, email, and company filters with no conflict.

Filter	Description
Vendor Classification	Supplier, Subcontractor, and/or Design/Architect — check any combination
Active Contact	Limit to active vendors only
Preferred	All, Preferred only, or Non-Preferred only
Vendor Type	Select one or more trade-partner/vendor types; matches vendors assigned any of the selected types
Certificate status (per type)	For each certificate type (e.g. General Liability, Worker's Compensation), filter by the status of the vendor's most recent certificate

Certificate status options mirror the color shown in the certificate columns:

Status	Meaning
Valid	Expires more than 30 days from today (green)
Expiring soon	Expires after today and within the next 30 days (orange)
Expired	Expires today or earlier (red)
Missing	No certificate of this type on file

When you set a status for more than one certificate type, a vendor must match all of them.

Using Search

1. Click Search to expand the filter panel
2. Enter criteria in one or more fields
3. Click Search to apply filters
4. Click Cancel to clear filters and close the panel

tip

Name searches are flexible - searching "John" will find "John Smith" and "Johnny Johnson". The system searches the combined full name field.

Viewing Contacts

List View

The contacts list displays:

• Name - Click to view the full contact record
• Address - Full address display
• Email - Primary email with mailto link
• Date Created - When the contact was added

On the Vendors tab the columns differ:

• Company Name - A gold star (⭐) marks Preferred Vendors
• Phone and Email
• Vendor Type - The vendor's assigned types, comma-separated
• Certificate columns - One per certificate type, color-coded by the most recent certificate's expiration (green = valid, orange = expiring within 30 days, red = expired)
• Status - Active or Inactive

Sorting

Click any column header with a sort indicator to sort the list:

• Click once for ascending order
• Click again for descending order

Pagination

For large contact lists, use the pagination controls at the bottom to navigate between pages.

Editing Contacts

1. Click a contact name in the list to open their record
2. Click the pencil icon in the page header
3. The contact form dialog opens with current data
4. Make your changes
5. Click Save

All changes are saved when you click Save - there's no auto-save for the edit dialog.

Exporting Contacts

Export contacts for use in other systems or for mailing lists:

1. Apply any filters to narrow the export (optional)
2. Click the Export button
3. Choose an export option:
   • Basic Export - Primary contact information only
   • Export with Additional Contacts - Includes related contacts

The export honors whatever filters you've applied, so the file contains the same rows you see on screen.

Exports from the Vendors tab also include Preferred (Yes/No), Vendor Type(s) (comma-separated), and Last Updated, in addition to vendor classification and billing columns. "Export with Additional Contacts" appends related-contact columns as usual.

The export is processed in the background and you'll receive an email when it's ready.

Importing Contacts

Importing Clients

1. Go to the Clients tab
2. Click the Import button
3. Follow the import wizard
4. See Client Data Import for detailed instructions

Importing Vendors

1. Go to the Vendors tab
2. Click the Import button
3. See Vendor Import for detailed instructions

Managing Contact Status

Active vs Inactive

Contacts can be marked as active or inactive:

1. Open the contact record
2. Click the More menu (⋮)
3. Select Set Contact as Inactive or Set Contact as Active

Inactive contacts remain searchable but are clearly marked.

Disqualifying Leads

For leads that won't convert:

1. Open the lead's contact record
2. Click the More menu (⋮)
3. Select Disqualify Lead
4. Enter a reason for disqualification
5. Click Disqualify Lead

To re-qualify a disqualified lead:

1. Open the contact record
2. Click the More menu (⋮)
3. Select Qualify Lead

Deleting Contacts

warning

Contacts with associated projects cannot be deleted. Mark them as inactive instead.

For contacts without projects:

1. Open the contact record
2. Click the More menu (⋮)
3. Select Delete Contact
4. Confirm the deletion

Deletion is permanent and cannot be undone.

Contact Tags

Organize contacts with custom tags:

1. Open a contact record
2. Click the green + button next to the status chips
3. Select or create tags
4. Tags display as colored chips on the contact

Remove a tag by clicking the X on the tag chip.

Downloading vCards

Save contact information to your phone:

1. Open the contact record
2. Click the More menu (⋮)
3. Select Download [Name]'s vCard
4. For households, separate vCard options appear for each person

Related

• Contact Details - Understanding the contact record
• External Leads - Processing incoming leads
• Client Data Import - Bulk importing clients
• Vendor Import - Bulk importing vendors