Contacts are the people who ring you regularly: your landlord, your suppliers, your best customers. Add a contact once and their name appears on every call from that number, past and future, in your call history and in your email and SMS notifications. You can also have your assistant greet them by name the moment they call.
This article covers everything you can do yourself: adding and removing contacts, pasting a list from a spreadsheet, and switching greeting by name on or off.
Where to find it
Open your Dashboard.
Select your assistant and open the Settings & Integrations section.
Select Your Contacts.
The page has three parts:
Your assistant's first phrase at the top. This is what your assistant says when it answers, and it's where the caller's name goes.
The contacts table, with a column for each contact's number, number of calls, internal name, greeting name, and a Greet by name switch.
Two links under the table, Greet every contact by name and Don't greet anyone by name, which change every contact at once.
Add a contact
Select Add contact.
In Phone number, enter the caller's number. Irish numbers can start with 0, for example 087 123 4567 or 01 234 5678. For other countries, start with + and the country code, for example +44 7700 900123.
In Internal label for this contact, enter a name you'll recognise, for example Mary Byrne (landlord). Only you and your team see this label. It's tagged on your Call History page and in any email or SMS notifications.
If you want your assistant to greet this caller by name, select Greet this caller by name. We suggest a greeting name from the label (Mary, in this example). Change it if you like, then check the preview under Your AI assistant will say.
Select Save changes.
The new contact appears at the top of the table marked New. Its call count shows Counting… until we've tagged the caller's past calls, which takes a few minutes. The count fills in by itself; you don't need to refresh.
Note: Each number can only be added once per assistant. If you enter a number that's already in your contacts, you'll see This number is already in your contacts. Edit the existing contact instead.
Paste a list from a spreadsheet
If you have your callers in Excel or Google Sheets, you can add them all at once.
In your spreadsheet, select two columns: the name and the phone number, in either order. A header row is fine. Copy them.
On the Contacts page, select Paste a list.
Paste into Your list. You can also type or paste plain text with a comma or semicolon between the name and the number.
Check the preview. Every row gets a status:
Ready: the row will be added.
Already added: this number is already in your contacts, so the row is skipped.
Listed twice: the number appears more than once in your list. The first row is added.
Check number: we couldn't read the number. Fix it in your spreadsheet and paste again.
No name or No number: the row is missing one of the two columns.
If you want your assistant to greet everyone in the list by name, select Greet everyone in this list by name. We use the first name, for example Mary for Mary Byrne. You can change it for anyone afterwards.
Select Add 12 contacts (the number matches your Ready rows). Contacts are added one at a time, and the button shows Adding 3 of 12… as it goes.
Copy and paste directly from Excel or Google Sheets.
Tip: Converting the columns to text before copying is the best way to avoid long numbers converting to scientific notation like in the above example.
Only rows marked Ready are added, so it's safe to paste the same list again after fixing a few numbers. Rows that are already in your contacts are skipped.
Greet a caller by name
When greeting is on, your assistant opens the call with the caller's name: "Hi Mary, you're through to Greenway Pharmacy. How can I help?"
Each contact has two names:
The internal name is for you and your team. It can be as detailed as you like, for example Mary Byrne (landlord).
The greeting name is what your assistant says out loud. Keep it short and natural, for example Mary. Your assistant says it exactly as written, so spell it the way it sounds.
Switch greeting on for one contact
Find the contact in the table.
Turn on the Greet by name switch at the end of the row.
If the contact doesn't have a greeting name yet, a pop-up opens with one suggested from the internal name. Check it, change it if needed, and select Save changes.
We suggest the first word of the internal name. If the name starts with a title such as Dr, Mr, Mrs, Ms, Miss, Fr or Prof, we keep the title and the surname, so Dr Patricia Walsh becomes Dr Walsh.
The change takes effect from the caller's next call.
Switch greeting off for one contact
Turn off the Greet by name switch. Your assistant stops using the name straight away, but the contact's name stays on your call history and notifications.
Note: The first time you switch greeting on, we also check your assistant's first phrase. See the next section for what happens.
Your assistant's first phrase
Greeting by name only works if your assistant's first phrase has a place for the name. That place is marked with {{caller_name}}. When a contact rings, your assistant swaps in their greeting name. For anyone else, it says "there" instead, so "Hi {{caller_name}}" becomes "Hi there".
Your first phrase is shown at the top of the Contacts page under Your AI assistant's first phrase.
What happens the first time you switch greeting on
If your first phrase doesn't have {{caller_name}} yet, we try to add it for you:
If your phrase starts with a hello, such as "Hi there, you're through to…" or "Hello, thanks for calling…", we add the name for you. The strip turns yellow and tells you what changed, for example We've added the caller's name to your first phrase so Mary will be greeted by name. Everyone else will now hear "Hi there". Select Got it to keep it, or Undo to put the phrase back. Undo also switches greeting off again, because without the name in the phrase nobody can be greeted.
If your phrase doesn't start with a hello, we don't change it. Instead we show a Suggested first phrase. Select Use this phrase to accept it, or Edit to write your own. Until you choose, nobody is greeted by name.
Edit the first phrase yourself
In the strip, select Edit.
Type your phrase. Put {{caller_name}} exactly where the caller's name should go, for example "Good morning {{caller_name}}, you're through to Main Street Pharmacy."
Select Save greeting.
Changes apply from the next call.
Important: If you remove {{caller_name}} from the phrase, nobody will be greeted by name, even if their switch is on. The page warns you with "Your greeting doesn't include the caller's name, so nobody will be greeted by name" until you add it back.
Greet everyone, or no one
Use the two links under the table to change every contact at once.
Greet every contact by name switches greeting on for all your contacts. Anyone without a greeting name gets the first word of their internal name, which you can change afterwards.
Don't greet anyone by name switches greeting off for all your contacts. Their names stay on your call history.
Both links ask you to confirm before anything changes. Contacts are updated one at a time, and the link shows Updating 4 of 12… while it works.
Tip: Switching everyone on is the quickest way to try greeting by name. If it doesn't suit your business, Don't greet anyone by name turns it all off again in one step.
Edit a contact
Find the contact in the table and select the pencil at the end of the row.
Change the internal name, the greeting name, or whether they're greeted by name.
Select Save changes.
You can't change a contact's phone number. If someone's number changes, delete the contact and add them again with the new number. This keeps your call history accurate, because the old number's calls were from the old number.
Select Save changes or Cancel.
Delete a contact
Find the contact in the table and select the bin at the end of the row.
Read the confirmation, then select Delete contact.
Deleting a contact removes their name from every call from that number, including past calls, and your assistant stops greeting them by name. The past calls themselves are not deleted; they just lose the name tag. It takes a few minutes for all past calls to update.
Name a caller from your call history
You don't have to go to the Contacts page to add someone. When you're reading a call, you can name the caller on the spot.
Open the call on your Call History page.
Next to the caller's number, select Add name.
In Caller name, enter the name you want to see on this caller's calls.
Select Save.
The name shows on every call from this number, past and future, and the caller is added to your contacts. Greeting by name is off for contacts added this way. To switch it on, open Manage all contacts and turn on their Greet by name switch.
If the caller is already a contact, the pill shows their name instead of Add name. Select it to change the name.
Phone number rules
We tidy up numbers for you, so spaces, brackets and dashes don't matter. Here's how we read what you enter.
You enter | We save it as | Why |
087 123 4567 | +353 87 123 4567 | An Irish number starting with 0 |
01 234 5678 | +353 1 234 5678 | A Dublin landline starting with 0 |
871234567 | +353 87 123 4567 | A spreadsheet dropped the leading 0, so we put it back |
+44 7700 900123 | +44 7700 900123 | Starts with + and a country code |
0044 7700 900123 | +44 7700 900123 | 00 works the same as + |
087 123 | Not accepted | Too short. You'll see Check the number and include the area code |
Mary's mobile | Not accepted | Letters aren't allowed. You'll see Use digits only |
A full number, including its country code, is between 10 and 15 digits. Anything shorter is treated as incomplete. A matching call is one from exactly the same number, so a caller who rings from a different phone won't be recognised until you add that number too.
Note: Calls with a withheld or blank number are never tagged, so there's no point adding a contact without a number.
Find things quickly
Search. Type in Search name or number above the table. It matches the internal name, the greeting name and the number as you type.
Sort. Select a column heading to sort by it. Select it again to reverse the order. The table starts sorted by number of calls, with your most frequent callers at the top.
Newest first. Contacts you've just added stay pinned at the top until you refresh the page, whatever the sort order.
Good to know
Past calls take a few minutes to update. When you add or delete a contact, we go back through that number's past calls and tag or untag them. The call count on the Contacts page shows Counting… until it's done. If you paste a long list, allow a little longer.
Contacts belong to one assistant. If you have more than one assistant, each has its own contacts. Add the same caller to each assistant that should recognise them.
Only your team sees internal names. Callers never hear the internal name. The only thing they hear is the greeting name, and only when their Greet by name switch is on.
Greeting applies to phone calls. Your assistant recognises contacts by the number they call from. Calls from a withheld number aren't recognised.
Names are your responsibility. Use names your callers would be happy to be greeted by. If you're unsure, leave greeting off and keep the name for your own records.
Something not saving? Refresh the page and try again. If a change still won't save, email [email protected] with the contact's name and we'll take a look.
Final Note
If you have a list of hundreds of contacts in a CRM or other data source, get in touch - we can usually integrate directly into that to save you managing lists in two places. This is especially useful if your list is always changing.