How to Automatically Route and Assign Leads in a Managed Way
Quickly assigning leads to the right sales reps and responding promptly increases the chances of converting leads into customers. But if there's no way of knowing which reps are available, a contact could be assigned to someone who can't respond right away. Additionally, many sales teams have representatives designated to handle leads from specific industries, regions, or other segments. These reps need to be assigned directly to the relevant leads.
With Insycle's Assign app, you can optimize lead routing and assignment to ensure prospects reach the right representative at the right time to drive better results and foster stronger customer relationships.
Process Summary
- Segment the data using the filter.
- Choose assignees and how leads will be assigned.
- Preview changes and apply to your CRM.
- Save the operation as a template and set up automation.
- Create a recipe to organize multiple templates into an automated process.
Step-by-Step Instructions
Navigate to RevOps Acceleration > Assign.
Select the database and record type from the top menu, then explore the templates for an existing solution that may be close to what you need.
In Step 1 under the Filter tab, select the Field to work with. Use the Condition to set the rule that the data in the selected field must meet. With this filter, you're telling Insycle how to segment the leads.
In the example below, we are looking for records with a Country value of "United States."
Under Step 2, select the Field you want to assign. The field options are limited to reference fields, which include owner properties. You can set rules up to automatically assign across several owners, and you can assign to more than one owner type at the same time.
The Rules give you three options for how records should be assigned:
-
Balanced: Looks at the potential owners and checks existing load allocation based on how many prospects are already assigned to each user, then distributes the new leads so all users wind up with the same total number. Select the Period the new leads were created- only these will be distributed.
For example, 24 leads came in this month that needed to be assigned—initially, Jane was assigned 10 and John 5. When the operation ran again, the Balanced rule gave Jane 2 and John 7, so they each wound up with 12 over the course of the month. -
Weighted: By adding multiple rules for different assignees or groups, you can manage weighted distribution. The Weight value is the number of leads to be assigned, rather than a percentage. The leads are distributed round-robin to each assignee by the Weight number, rule by rule.
For example, if the first rule says 2 to Joe and Josephine, and the second rule says 1 to Jane, the assignments will cycle through assigning 2 to Joe, 2 to Josephine, 1 to Jane. If there are more than 5 leads, it will then cycle back to assign 2 to Joe and Josephine and so on. - Even: Assigns in a cycle, round-robin style through the names in the order listed, 123, 123, 123. With a saved template Insycle will remember where it left off and continuously distribute records evenly among available assignees. For example, if there are 19 items that match the filter and you want to assign them evenly across 3 people, the Even rule will split it as equally as possible so the three assignees will wind up with 7/6/6.
- Random: Without looking at availability or workload, this will assign leads randomly, like rolling a dice.
When using the Even or Random assignment rules, you can set limits to prevent overloading team members using Assign Per Rep and/or Cap Per Rep in the Advanced tab. Learn more in the Advanced How-Tos below.
In the example below, both the Contact Owner and the Success Owner will be assigned.
⚠️ Once you have this configured, it's important to save a template so new items can be assigned in a measured way on an ongoing basis.
Availability
The Availability feature lets you enter work schedule info for each team member, so items are only routed to users that are currently open and able to respond promptly. For example, if there are three users selected as potential assignees—Jane, John, and Josephine—but John's work schedule indicates he is not available today, work will only be allocated to Jane and Josephine.
No matter which rule you use—balanced, even, or random—each user's availability is taken into account.
Note that if no availability info is entered for a user, they will be considered available at all times.
Learn more about Insycle's Availability feature.
Preview Changes in the CSV Report
With the filters and assign action set up, you can preview the changes in a CSV file. It's important to verify that your changes are working as expected before they are pushed to your live database.
Under Step 3, click the Review button, then select Preview in the popup.
On the Notify tab, add any additional recipients who should receive the CSV (and make sure to hit Enter after each address). You can also provide additional context in the message subject or body.
On the When tab, click Run Now and select which records to apply the change to (in most cases this will be All, but if you have a large number of records, you may just want to do a chunk for a test), then click the Run Now button.
Open the CSV file from your email in a spreadsheet application. The columns include (Before) and (After) values for the selected assign field; (Assignees) shows the users chosen; (Available) indicates which assignees are currently available according to the availability settings.
If the results don't look the way you expected, go back to your filters and assignment rules and try making some adjustments, then preview again.
Apply Changes to the CRM
If everything in your CSV preview looks correct, return to Insycle and move forward with applying the assignments to the live CRM data.
Under Step 3, click the Review button again, and this time select Update mode.
On the When tab, you should use Run Now the first time you apply these changes to the CRM.
After you've seen the results in the CRM and are satisfied with how the operation runs, you need to save your configuration as a template. This will let Insycle keep track of the assignment history and availability.
Return to the Template menu at the top of the page and click the + to give the new template an informative name and then click the Save button.
To set up automation so this routing operation runs on a set schedule:
Under Step 3, click the Review button, and select Update mode.
On the When tab, select Automate, and configure the frequency you'd like the template to run. When finished, click Schedule.
By automating with a template, you'll save time and ensure that your records are assigned in a consistent way on an ongoing basis.
Create a template for every segment and combine them all into a recipe for routing and assigning.
When you have a solid set of templates that reliably assign your leads, you can put them together into a longer, ordered sequence as a Recipe. Then, you can schedule that Recipe to run on a consistent, set schedule. Your templates will run one after another in the order that you set.
HubSpot users can also insert their recipes directly into HubSpot Workflows.
Advanced How-Tos
When using the Even or Random assignment rules, you can set limits to prevent team members from becoming overloaded. The Advanced tab offers two parameters that can be used individually or in combination:
- Assign Per Rep - Enter a number to set the maximum number of new items that can be assigned to each owner per operation.
- Cap Per Rep - Enter a number to limit the total number of items an owner can have assigned overall. Before assigning new items, Insycle checks each rep's current assignments to ensure they don't exceed this cap.
You can set either or both of these parameters as needed.
As an example, let's say you have selected three owners: Skyler, who currently has 6 items, Chris also has 6, and Jessica has 3. Your Assign Per Rep is set to 8, and Cap Per Rep is set to 12.
When the assignment operation runs:
- Skyler will be assigned 6 more items (reaching the cap of 12)
- Chris will be assigned 6 more items (reaching the cap of 12)
- Jessica will be assigned 8 items (as per Assign Per Rep, totaling 11)
In this scenario, 20 items will be assigned. Any additional items won't be assigned until the next operation runs (they'll show as "Not assigned" in the CSV).
Remember: The tool will respect both the Assign Per Rep and Cap Per Rep limits, assigning the lower number when both are set.
If you don't see the user you need in the list of assignees, you can add any of your CRM users. Navigate to Settings > Availability and make sure you have the appropriate CRM selected. Then click Add Assignees and select the users to add.
Learn more about using the Availability feature to enter schedule info for assignees.
If one of your assignees will be away for a few days, weeks, or more, you can easily prevent new items from being assigned to them from the Availability feature using the Unavailable toggle. This will make the assignee completely unavailable when your saved Assign app operations run, without needing to remove them from your templates. When they are available again, just switch the toggle to available (yellow), and all workflows will resume as before.
To preview what Insycle is looking at when distributing items, open the Group & Update module. Under Step 1, group by the owner field, then click Analyze. Scroll down to the Record Viewer and sort by the Count column to see which users have the most on their plates.
This can help you decide who to include in an assignment template. You can save this view as a template and return periodically to keep an eye on the distribution.
HubSpot users can schedule their lead routing and assignment recipes directly into HubSpot Workflows. Instead of—or in addition to—a schedule-based approach, you could use the HubSpot Workflows integration to trigger a routing Recipe to run when a new contact is created or some other event occurs.
Learn more about adding Insycle Recipes to HubSpot Workflows.
Frequently Asked Questions
Yes, you can segment data with the filter and assign contacts based on any field in your database.
Under Step 1 of the Assign module, set the segment criteria using the filter.
For example, by region:
Industry:
Or revenue:
Under Step 2, assign the matching leads to the team members who handle this segment.
You can create a template for each segment and then have them run together automatically by creating a recipe.
As long as the user has an account in your CRM, you can add them as an assignee from the Availability tool and enter their work schedule information. This does not affect the cost of your Insycle plan.
See the Assignee Availability article for more info.
When you run your Assign operation in preview mode, nothing really gets assigned to anyone, so Insycle won’t track these sample assignments. As long as you are using a template, the next time you run the operation in Update mode, it will continue from where you were the last time you ran in Update mode, whether this is done manually or by automation.
Yes. HubSpot waits for Insycle to complete all templates in the Recipe before moving on to the next action. In this example, HubSpot won't send the welcome email until the association Recipe is complete.
You can add up to 50 reps in Step 2 so that items can easily be distributed across a large team.
Additional Resources
Related Help Articles
- Assignee Availability
- Integrate Insycle with HubSpot Workflows
- App Overview: Assign
- Recipes
- Activity Tracker: Audit Trail and History
Related Blog Posts