Leads

The contact form on your website collects a name, email, subject and message. A phone number and a checkbox agreeing to text messages are optional. Once the visitor submits it, MeridianOS™ works through these steps on its own.

1. An invisible bot check must pass.
2. A built-in spam filter scores the submission. Spam stops here.
3. The email domain is checked to confirm it can receive mail, and the phone number format is validated.
4. The lead is saved and appears under Lead Forms as unread.
5. A New lead push notification goes to admins who use the MeridianOS™ app. Each admin can turn that alert off. See Notifications.
6. If Add new leads to customers is on, the lead is attached to a matching customer, or a new customer is created with the status Lead.
7. If the visitor agreed to texts and the lead confirmation text is switched on, they get a confirmation text.
8. An alert email, New contact form submission, goes to the business with every detail. Replying to it replies to the lead.
9. The visitor gets a We received your message confirmation email. This is a setting, and it is on by default.

The bot check is set up per site. Stack Digital turns this on for your site. Confirmation texts need texting, which Stack Digital also turns on for your site.

The spam filter looks for these signs in a submission:

• A gibberish name or a subject made of random characters.
• A message that is only a link.
• Links written as markup.
• 3 or more links.
• A message with no letters in it.

Spam is dropped silently and never appears under Lead Forms. The sender still sees a success message, so they get no signal to adjust and try again.

Confirmations are capped at 10 per contact per day and 100 per hour across your site, so your form cannot be used to flood someone's inbox.

The header shows how many leads you have in total and how many are unread. The page has two buttons, Export CSV and Add lead.

• Unread leads are bold with a dot. Opening a lead marks it read.
• Check several leads and choose Mark as read or Mark as unread to change them together.
• The page loads your most recent 1,000 leads.

Select a lead to open it. The dialog shows the message, the Source, and SMS consent as Yes or No. Click the email address to write to the person, or the phone number to call.

1. Open the lead.
2. Select Convert to customer.
3. MeridianOS™ checks your customers first. If the lead's email or any phone number matches someone you already have, the lead joins that customer and fills in a missing phone or email. With no match, a new customer is created with the lead's source.
4. The button now reads View customer. Select it to open the customer's page.

You can also delete a lead from the dialog. MeridianOS™ asks you to confirm first.

Use Add lead for inquiries that arrive by phone or in person.

1. Select Add lead.
2. Enter the person's name, email and phone.
3. Choose a Source. It defaults to Manual entry.
4. Type the Message.
5. Set Consented to SMS if the person agreed to receive texts.

A lead you add by hand is saved as already read, so it does not raise the unread count.

Export CSV downloads the list as it is currently filtered. Set your search and filters first if you want only part of the list.

The file has these columns: First Name, Last Name, Email, Phone, Message, Photos, SMS Consent, Source, Received.

In Settings, under Leads, the Add new leads to customers switch decides whether website leads join your customer list on their own. It is on by default. Changing it shows a confirmation that explains the effect.

• Matching checks the email and all three phone numbers on your existing customers before anyone new is created. A match also receives any contact detail it was missing.
• Every website form a person submitted is listed on their customer page under Lead forms. See Customers.
• Your KPIs count a lead as converted when its customer later gets a job. See KPIs and profit.
• Online bookings use the same email and phone matching. A booking is attached to an existing customer, or a new one is created with the lead source Online booking. See Online booking.