The Leads page and the claim window

The Leads page

Leads is your full list of leads (Today, the first item in the menu and where you land after signing in, shows only what needs you now). At the top of the page one line tells you today's date, whether the assistant is on, and the hours it is allowed to call, in the lead's own time. Export downloads all your leads as a CSV; Add a lead source opens the page where your form and connectors live. The page refreshes itself; if it loses the connection it shows "Offline — retrying…" and keeps trying.

The open window

When a lead arrives, a claim window opens (default 5 minutes; set it under Claim window (minutes, 0-60) on the page or on Settings). While it is open the lead sits at the top of the page in a card of its own, with a dial counting the window down and the two decisions next to it:

I'll call {name} now takes the lead yourself. The card shows "Claimed — your call" straight away and the assistant stands down.
Let the assistant take it ends your window now. The assistant calls on its next pass — usually within a minute — and every check it always makes still applies: consent, calling hours, the stop list, the attempt cap. Outside calling hours it calls at the first lawful moment instead. The decision is written on the lead's timeline as "You let the assistant take it".

If more than one window is open, the soonest to expire is the card at the top and the others appear in the list below with their own countdowns and an I already called button — press that one if you reached the person from your own phone, because a call from a personal handset is invisible to the system.

You can also reply to the lead alert text: CALL, CLAIM or MINE claims the lead; a number (for example 7) extends the window by that many minutes.

Asked for a person

When a caller asks the assistant for a person and does not get one, the lead stays under Needs you with a card of its own until you deal with it. The card says what happened — Asked for a person, Asked for a person · nobody picked up (the transfer went down your transfer list and nobody answered), Asked for a call back from you, or Asked for a call back · nobody took it in time — then what the caller was told (for example "They were told someone will call them back") and by when to call: Call back by {time} when they were given a time, otherwise Call back as soon as you can. A booking the assistant made does not clear it, because they asked for a person, not an appointment. It clears when you press Handled (you called them back or dealt with it), or when you press I already called on an open window. The same cards appear at the top of Today. A person who asked not to be contacted never gets one. On Today a caller whose situation sounds like an emergency (a gas smell, a carbon monoxide alarm, sparks, an active leak, sewage, no heat or no cooling) is listed first and the card says Emergency with what it was; if you have recorded a quote for them it also says Quoted $450 (or Quoted $450–$600). Only emergencies move up — everyone else stays in the order they were already in, and nothing is guessed about a caller who has not said so.

Recent

Everything else is one list, newest first, with a line under each name that says what is true right now:

The assistant is calling them now / The assistant is on the call now — a call is ringing or in progress at this moment; it is never shown as an unanswered try while the phone is still ringing.
Booked · {time} — the appointment is on your calendar, with how long the assistant spoke to them.
Needs outcome — the appointment time has started or passed; press Completed or No-show so your analytics stay true. Cancel and Reschedule both cancel the appointment and text the person first (after you confirm); Reschedule says so and offers the next open times. On my way is not here: it belongs to an appointment that is still ahead of you today.
Asked for a person, not an assistant — they declined AI calling. Nothing automated goes out; call them yourself.
No answer after {n} attempts · nothing further is scheduled — the assistant tried and nothing more is queued.
{n} calls failed — the calls could not be placed, which is different from nobody answering. The whole card opens the record so you can see what happened.
Assistant calls {time} — a call is genuinely queued for that time.
Replied STOP — suppressed across calls and texts.

When the assistant did not call a lead, the card says why in one line — for example No consent to an AI call — call them yourself (someone who called or messaged you without agreeing to a call), Not called — this period's AI conversations were used up. Add more on Billing., or Not called — calling this number is not allowed. Reasons you can fix put the lead under Needs you.

The filters above the list narrow it: Active (everything not finished — what you see first), Needs you (anything waiting on a decision or a fix from you), Booked, Closed (stopped or closed leads) and All. Each filter shows how many leads it holds, counted over everything loaded on the page, so the number and the rows always agree. If you have sent yourself test leads, Real leads · Test leads switches between them; a test lead carries a Test label wherever it appears (its own page too), is never called and is never counted in Analytics.

Each call in a lead's history is written in words: Answered, No answer, Voicemail, We could not place the call and so on. The provider's own code is still there if you hover over the words.

Leads that a Night Window conversation produced overnight are also collected in a strip at the top, one line each.

The lead record

Full record opens the lead's own page: our response time and the source's delivery lag shown separately, the consent evidence, every call attempt with its result, the AI call summary, any Night Window conversation, and the full compliance timeline including the times we did not contact them and why.

Where the lead came from is written out in words, both on the lead's own page (next to its source, "came from: …") and as a small tag on its row in the list: for example "Form on yoursite.com · via a Facebook or Instagram click · campaign spring", "Your page (short link) · from Your contact card", "Text to your number" or "Imported list (Revive)". When the ad's link carries its id (utm_content), the ad is named too ("ad 1202…"). It is built from what the lead's own form page and link carried when they wrote in, so nothing is guessed: a lead with no form page or ad tag simply shows its source. The same words are the last column of Export → All my leads, called came_from.

Who had it

Every lead has a trail: who was asked to take it, whether they opened it, who took it, who passed or did not answer, whether the person was reached, and when it went to the assistant. It is on the lead's own page under Who had it (each step with its time in your own day), and as one line under the lead in the list, for example "With Dana - reached 2:09 PM", "Passed by 2 - with the assistant" or "Nobody took it - with the assistant".

An open lead that nobody is working shows how long it has waited ("Waiting 3 h"), or how long since a person last touched it ("No touch for 2 days").
Two views appear above the list when there is something behind them: No outreach recorded in FirstFiveMin (a lead the assistant was waiting to call that no person took or reached - including the ones everybody passed or ignored) and Taken, never reached (a person took it and was never confirmed as reaching them, so it went back to the assistant). A lead that never had a claim window - an inbound text, for example - is not counted: nobody was ever expected to take it.
"Opened" means the page or link was opened in a person's browser. A messaging app previewing the link does not count, but some previews look like an ordinary browser, so read it as "opened", never "read".
Leads from before the trail existed show no trail; their claim window still decides whether they count as touched.

Give a lead to someone

While a lead is still waiting to be taken, or someone took it and has not reached the person yet, the Give this lead to someone card lets you hand it to another person on your call list. Pick the person, if you like a reason (the same list a pass uses) and one line for them ("prefers mornings; gate code on file"), then press Give it. A lead that is waiting is offered to that person at once and they keep the rest of the time; a lead someone took goes to them with a fresh timer to reach the person. They are texted in words you already know: the claim alert, or "It is yours...". The trail says "Given to ..." with your reason and your line. Your line is yours: it is stored encrypted, shown on this page, and never sent to the customer or put in the text. During your quiet hours the hand-off is recorded and the page tells you to let them know yourself. A lead already reached, closed, handed to the assistant or queued for the morning cannot be given, and the card says why.

Next step

Every open lead can have one owner, one next step and one due time, shown on the lead's page under Next step, for example "With Maria — Follow up · due in 3 h". A person who takes a lead owns it ("Reach them", due when the contact timer ends); when they reach the person it moves on to "Follow up" a day later. You can set the step and when it is due yourself - Reach them, Call them back, Send a quote, Book a visit, Follow up or Waiting on them; due in 1 hour, 4 hours, tomorrow morning, 3 days or a week - and finish it with Mark done or give up with Drop it. It closes by itself when the lead is booked, when the person can no longer be contacted, or when the contact timer runs out and the assistant takes over. The same line shows under each lead on the Leads list (red once overdue) and, soonest first, on Today under "Your next steps".

When a step is overdue you get ONE text on your own phone ("Reminder: "Follow up" for Ana is overdue by 2 h."). If a helper's step is a day overdue you are told once, by name. Nothing is sent in your quiet hours: it goes when they end.
When nobody has touched a new lead for a day you get one nudge ("Nobody has reached Ana in 30 h. It is waiting for you."), at most 3 a day, and the lead becomes yours to reach.
Nothing here ever texts a lead.
Pick a date and time lets you set the due time yourself (from 5 minutes to 90 days ahead, in your account's own time zone). A day that does not exist, or a time that has already passed, is refused.
Waiting on them is not an overdue action: when its time comes it reads "time to check back" (and you get a text saying so), never "overdue". Every other step still reads "overdue by ..." once its time has passed.
Drop it and Mark done end this reminder only. They never change whether the person can be contacted: someone who asked not to be contacted stays that way. To stop all contact, use the do-not-contact button.

Contact outside FirstFiveMin

Reached out another way - your own phone, a text from your phone, an email, a visit? Record it under Contact outside FirstFiveMin on the lead's page so the trail is complete and the lead no longer shows as "No outreach recorded in FirstFiveMin". Pick what happened: Tried calling, Left a voicemail, Sent a text, Sent an email or Spoke with them. The first four are attempts and are kept apart from a conversation: an attempt never marks the person as reached. Spoke with them does: the next step moves on to "Follow up", and if a claim window was still waiting, it is settled the way "I already called" settles it, so the assistant does not call someone you have just talked to. Logging only records it - it sends nothing and calls no one.

Possible previous contact

When the same phone number has contacted you before, the lead's page shows Possible previous contact (the match is the phone number only, so it may be a shared or reassigned number): the earlier enquiries, newest first, with the job and what became of each (Booked, Contacted, Opted out ...), so you know before you call. If you recorded a quote or a result on it, the line also says so (for example "Quoted $450 · Lost — Price"). Each one is a link to that lead.

Quote

On an open or booked lead, the Quote card is your own record of what you quoted: type the Amount (and Up to for a range), what it was for in a few words (no links) and how long it is good for, then Add quote. It is recorded as Sent; a new quote replaces the open one (the old one stays in the list as Replaced). When the customer answers, tap Accepted, or Declined and pick why - Price, Went with someone else, Couldn't reach them, Not a fit, Spam / wrong number or Other. A quote that passes its last day expires by itself. A quote you texted through the assistant shows up here too ("sent by text"), and the customer's YES marks it Accepted.

An accepted quote shows your deposit words if you set them in your booking terms ("Deposit: ..."), or says no deposit is set up. FirstFiveMin never charges or collects a deposit - it only shows your own words.
Text this quote (on an open quote with one amount and a few words saying what it is for): sends the customer the same text as "send Dana a $450 estimate for the water heater" by text to the assistant — the business, the work, the amount, ONE open time from your calendar, your business number and the opt-out sentence — from your business line. You see the exact text and confirm first. If they reply YES, that time is booked and the quote becomes Accepted. It is refused, with the reason, for a person on your do-not-text list, a person who never agreed to texts, or outside their calling hours.
Accepting a quote records the lead as Won at its amount; declining one records it as Lost for that reason - unless you already said how it ended, in which case your answer stays.
Accepted means you marked it so (or the customer replied YES to a quote texted through the assistant). FirstFiveMin does not check a signature or a payment, and the amount is an estimate you gave.
Nothing on this card is ever sent to the customer.

How did it go?

The How did it go? card is where you say how a lead ended: Won (with the job's value, filled in from an accepted quote - correct it if the job came out different), Lost (pick one reason) or No decision yet. It is never required and one tap when you want it. After an appointment has passed, Today lists the leads waiting for an answer, and shows Won this month - the total and how many leads - once something has been won. Job value is the one number you type: a job price, a sale price or a fee. It is not money received and it is not your commission - those are different numbers, and FirstFiveMin does not know them. "Won this month" counts by the day you marked each lead Won; the report on Analytics counts by the day the lead arrived, so the two can differ.

"Did we get this right?"

After the assistant has a real conversation with someone and has written down their name or address, they get one text: "We have your name as Maria Cruz, your number as (512) 555-0100, and your address as 41 Elm St. If anything is wrong, reply FIX." It goes a few minutes after the call, once per person per 30 days, and never after a voicemail or a very short call.

If they reply FIX (just that word), the lead appears under Needs you with Said their details are wrong, the lead's timeline says so, and they get one text back saying we will correct their details. Open the lead, fix the name, number or address, call them if you need to, and press Handled.
A reply that is anything other than that one word is an ordinary reply and is handled like any other.
The text goes only to people who agreed to be texted, follows the same quiet hours as every other text, and ends with the usual "Reply STOP to opt out".

Why a lead was passed

When someone on your list passes a lead, the lead is handed on first - nothing waits for an answer. Then they are asked why, once: by text they can reply 1 Busy, 2 Area, 3 Not offered, 4 Know them, 5 Language, 6 Off, or WHY and their own words (if they passed two leads within a few minutes, a number is not accepted - they are told to use the link in each text, so a reason is never attached to the wrong lead); on the claim link they tap a reason or type one. The answer is shown with the pass on the lead's Who had it card ("Maria passed: Busy with a client"). If nobody answers within 10 minutes it simply says no reason was given. Only the account owner sees the reasons; an ordinary text from the same phone is never mistaken for an answer.

Other things on this page

Load older leads adds the next page of history to the same list, so the filters, their counts and the Real/Test switch include it.
Export (top of the page) is one menu: All my leads (CSV) and Address-only leads (CSV for your mailing list).
New-lead push notifications on this device are a backup to your text alerts; on iPhone add FirstFiveMin to the home screen first.
My settings on this page saves the same fields as the Settings page.

Address-only leads (partial captures)

When someone fills in your form with an address or an email but no phone number, we keep it as an address-only lead. It needs at least an address or an email. Because there is no phone and no consent, FirstFiveMin never calls, texts or emails these people, they get no claim window, and they do not appear in your lead list. When there are any, a Mailer list card on the right of this page says how many there are and shows the latest few (name, address and when they were captured, in your own time zone), with a download link.

Export → Address-only leads (CSV for your mailing list) on this page, or that card's download, gives you them for your own mailing list: first name, last name, email, street, city, state, postal code and when they were captured. Sending the mail is up to you; FirstFiveMin does not send it.

How ready they sound (Hot, Warm, Cold)

After an AI call, your text alert and the lead's page can show Hot, Warm or Cold, always with the reason next to it: either the caller's own words ("we need to move this week") or the appointment they booked. If nothing the caller said shows how ready they are, there is no label. That is on purpose: a guess is worse than no label.

The label is based only on what the caller said or a booked appointment. It never uses their address, ZIP code, name or language.
The label never decides whether you get an alert or when. You get every alert either way.
You can change or clear the label on the lead's page (Change the label). Your change is recorded.

Sign in on your phone

On your computer, open the Leads page and choose Show the code under *Use FirstFiveMin on your phone*. Point your phone's camera at the code. Your phone asks you to confirm the account and then shows a two-digit number. Your computer shows the same request: approve it only if the number matches the one on your phone. Your phone then signs in, so there is no password to type. The code works once and expires after two minutes; if it expires, show a new one.

iPhone: once you are signed in, tap Share, then Add to Home Screen. Open FirstFiveMin from your Home Screen and tap Enable to turn on alerts. Add it while you are signed in: an iPhone copies your sign-in into the Home Screen app only at that moment.
Android: your phone opens the dashboard at the alerts step. Tap Enable.
A phone signed in this way asks you to confirm it is you before any billing or other sensitive change. Logging out on the computer cancels a code you have not used yet.

Talk to your assistant

The Talk to your assistant card calls your own assistant from your browser, so you hear exactly what your leads hear: the same greeting, the same disclosure and the same rules as a real call. Type the first name you want it to use, pick the language, and choose Start test call. Headphones help, so the assistant does not hear itself.

A test call is not a lead. It never appears in your leads, your usage or your analytics, and it is not billed.
Nothing is booked, texted or transferred during a test. When a real call would book a time, text someone or connect a person, the assistant says so instead.
A test call ends by itself after five minutes, and you can end it any time with End test call. You can run a few test calls a day, one at a time.
If the card says it cannot use your microphone, open the page in Safari or Chrome. Browsers built into other apps often cannot use the microphone for calls.

Alerts on your phone

On your phone, FirstFiveMin can alert you the moment a lead comes in. The first time you open your leads on a phone where alerts are not set up yet, a short set of steps appears, with pictures. iPhone: tap Share in Safari's toolbar, choose Add to Home Screen, then Add, open FirstFiveMin from your home screen, tap Enable and then Allow. Do it while you are signed in: an iPhone copies your sign-in into the app only at that moment. Android: tap Install (or choose Install app in your browser's menu), then Enable and Allow; on Android, Enable works even without installing. If you choose Not now, the steps come back once, a week later, while alerts are still off. Settings → Alerts on your phone shows whether alerts are on for the device you are using, and Show me how opens the same steps at any time.

Common problems

No leads yet, but the form is live: open Add a lead source and confirm your website domain is on the allowed list. With no domains listed, the browser widget does not accept leads.
A lead never got called: open Full record. The timeline names the reason (quiet hours, no consent, suppressed, plan cap).
I pressed "Let the assistant take it" and nothing rang: the assistant calls on its next pass, and only inside calling hours and after every check. Open Full record — if a check refused the call, the timeline says which one.

Send a video

A short personal video ("Hi Maria, it's Mike from ABC Roofing, here's what I saw in your photos") gets more replies than text. On a lead's page, Send a video texts that person your message and a link to the video.

Paste a link from your video site (YouTube, Vimeo, Loom, Dubb, Hippo Video, QuickPage, Wistia, Vidyard, Tella, Sendspark or Bonjoro) and write the message in your own words, without a link: the video link is added for you. FirstFiveMin adds nothing of its own except the opt-out line every text carries.
It goes from your own number, like any text you send: the person must have agreed to be contacted, must not be on do-not-contact or have opted out of texts, and it must be inside the hours you may text them. If it is not sent, the page tells you why.
The link in the text is a short link on FirstFiveMin that opens your video. That is how you are told: "{name} just opened your video" by text (at most once an hour per video), a line on the lead's record, and opened N times under Videos you sent. It says "opened", because we can tell the link was opened, not what was played. Search engines and link-preview robots are not counted.
Opening a video is a signal, not a go-ahead: it never starts an assistant call, and it does not replace the person's consent.
No video site on the list yet? Tell us which one and it can be added.

Dubb, QuickPage or another video site that reports views? The short link tells you when it was opened; your video site can also tell us when someone viewed the video. See Know when they watch your video in this Help.

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