Add leads to a campaign
Bring people into a campaign by importing a CSV, pasting addresses, or reusing a list — duplicates, unsubscribes and bounced addresses are filtered out automatically.
Where: Campaign → Leads step (also the Leads tab of a deployed campaign) → the "Add leads" cards: Import a CSV · Paste emails · From an existing list.
How to do it
- Open the campaign's Leads step.
- Choose Import a CSV to upload a file, map columns and set options — extra columns become {{variables}} you can use in emails. Smartlead / Instantly exports work.
- Or choose Paste emails, paste addresses one per line or comma-separated, and click Add emails — they're imported into a new list named "<campaign> · pasted" and added to the campaign.
- Or choose From an existing list and pick any list from your Leads page.
- In the import dialog, tick "Skip contacts already in another campaign" if you don't want anyone who is currently being emailed by a different campaign added here (they still import into your Leads, just not into this campaign).
- Click Continue to sequences in the header when you're done.
Good to know
- Anyone unsubscribed, bounced, blocked or on your blocklist is never enrolled. People already in this campaign are skipped, so re-adding a list is safe.
- After an import the counters show "N in this campaign", "new · updated" and "skipped rows". The notice line reads e.g. "120 added · 5 skipped (already in another campaign) · 320 in this campaign".
- A lead who is known to be out of office (their auto-reply gave a return date) is enrolled but doesn't get the first email until the day they're back.
- Filter chips on the list: All, Opened, Not opened, Clicked, Replied, Bounced, Unsubscribed, Not sent. Opened means one of the campaign's emails to them was opened (any recorded open, the automatic ones mail-security scanners make included); Clicked means they clicked a link 5 minutes or more after the email was sent (earlier clicks are scanners). "Not opened" means at least one email arrived and none was opened — different from "Not sent"; a lead whose only emails so far were blocked as spam is in neither. Counts are for the whole campaign.
- Status chip per person: Queued (nothing sent yet), Contacted · step N, Replied, Bounced, Unsubscribed, Finished, Paused.
- The list shows 300 people at a time — click "Show 300 more" for the next page. Search covers name, email and company.
- Export downloads the current filter as a CSV. Find LinkedIn URLs looks up missing LinkedIn profiles for the people in view (it asks for confirmation and tells you how many monthly lookups it will use).
- Remove (trash icon on a row, or "Remove from campaign" in the lead panel) takes one person out of this campaign only; they stay in your Leads and can be added back. Remove all clears every lead from the campaign after a confirmation — this can't be undone.
- Click any row to open the lead panel: their sequence position, the next email and when it goes out, a preview of every step as they will receive it, emails sent, replies, company details, other campaigns they're in, and all fields. Edit details lets you change fields; edits save three seconds after you stop typing.
Questions people ask
Can I add more leads after the campaign is live?
Yes. New leads join at step 1 and are paced by the campaign's "New leads entering per day" setting.