Key Concepts Overview

Before you build your first flow, let's get familiar with the key concepts that make LeadConduit tick. Think of this as learning the vocabulary of lead distribution - once you understand these building blocks, everything else clicks into place.

The Big Picture: How LeadConduit Thinks About Leads

At its core, LeadConduit is built around a simple but powerful idea: leads flow through a series of steps, and each step can validate, transform, or route the lead based on your business rules. Let's break down the key concepts you'll work with every day.

🌊 Flows: Your Lead Processing Pipelines

A flow is the heart of LeadConduit - it's a visual pipeline showing exactly how your leads move through your system.

What Makes a Flow?

Think of a flow like an assembly line in a factory:

Leads enter from the left (sources)
Move through various stations (steps)
Exit on the right (delivery)

Here's a simple flow in action:

Facebook Leads → Validate Phone → Check Duplicates → Enhance Data → Deliver to CRM

Key Facts About Flows:

Linear execution: Steps happen in order, left to right
Real-time processing: Most flows complete in under a second
Visual feedback: See exactly where leads succeed or fail
Unlimited flows: Create as many as your business needs

💡 Pro tip: Start with one simple flow and expand. You don't need to build the perfect system on day one!

🏢 Entities: Your Business Relationships

An Entity in LeadConduit represents a company or system you work with. Here's the key insight: the same company can play different roles.

Understanding Entity Roles

Think of it like a person who's both a customer and a supplier to your business:

Entity: "Solar Solutions Inc"

As a Source: When they send you California leads
As a Recipient: When you send them Texas leads

This reflects real business relationships where you might buy certain leads from a partner while selling them others.

Types of Connections:

Standard Integrations: Pre-built connections (Facebook, Google, major CRMs)
Custom Integrations: Your unique partners and systems
Account Connections: Other LeadConduit users (instant compatibility!)

🔑 Key Point: One Entity, multiple roles. This keeps your partner management clean and reflects how business actually works.

📥 Sources: Where Leads Enter

A Source is any Entity sending leads INTO your LeadConduit account. Sources are the starting points of your flows.

Types of Sources:

Default Source

Automatically created with your account
Perfect for testing and manual lead entry
Named after your account for easy identification

Standard Sources

Pre-built integrations (Facebook Lead Ads, Google Ads, etc.)
Connect in minutes with guided setup
Automatic field mapping included

Custom Sources

Built for your unique needs
Complete control over field definitions
Private to your account

Account Sources

Connect with other LeadConduit users
Instant compatibility
Real-time delivery between accounts

Source Configuration Includes:

Field mappings: How incoming data maps to your fields
Acceptance criteria: Which leads to accept
Volume caps: Daily/monthly limits
Pricing: What you pay per lead

📤 Recipients: Where Leads Go

A Recipient is any Entity receiving leads FROM your LeadConduit account. These are your delivery destinations.

Recipient Capabilities:

Multiple formats: JSON, XML, form post, or custom
Retry logic: Automatic retries for failed deliveries
Response parsing: Capture and act on recipient responses
Conditional delivery: Send only leads that match criteria

Remember: The same Entity can be both a Source (sending you leads) and a Recipient (receiving leads from you).

📊 Fields: Your Data Model

Fields are the individual pieces of information that make up a lead. Think of them as the columns in a spreadsheet.

Field Structure:

Every field has:

Name: The identifier (like first_name)
Type: What kind of data it holds
Value: The actual data

Field Types Include:

Text: Names, addresses, comments
Number: Age, income, loan amount
Phone: Automatically formatted and validated
Email: Built-in validation
Date/Time: Properly parsed timestamps
Boolean: Yes/no, true/false values

Standard vs Custom Fields:

Standard Fields: Common fields LeadConduit provides (first name, email, phone)
Custom Fields: Fields you create for your specific needs

💡 Smart Move: LeadConduit's typed fields do heavy lifting for you - phone numbers are automatically formatted, emails validated, and dates parsed correctly.

🎯 Steps: Actions in Your Flow

Steps are the individual operations that process your leads. Each step does one specific job.

Types of Steps:

Filter Steps 🚦

Use rules to stop certain leads
No external calls = lightning fast
Common uses: duplicate checking, geographic filtering, business hours

Enhancement Steps 🔍

Call external services to append data
Add demographics, scores, or verification
Examples: TrustedForm, phone validation, lead scoring

Delivery Steps 📬

Send leads to recipients
Multiple formats supported
Includes retry logic and response handling

Integration Steps 🔌

Connect to third-party services
Both inbound and outbound
Handle complex business logic

Step Execution:

Steps run in sequence (left to right)
Each step can succeed, fail, or error
Use outcomes to control flow behavior
Skip steps conditionally with rules

🧮 Rules: Your Business Logic

Rules are logical tests that evaluate lead data. They're the "if-then" logic of LeadConduit.

Rule Components:

Field to test: What data to look at
Operator: How to compare (equals, contains, greater than)
Value: What to compare against

Example Rules:

state equals "CA" - Lead is from California
age is greater than 25 - Lead is over 25
phone is valid - Phone number is properly formatted
email contains "@gmail.com" - Gmail address

Rule Sets:

Combine multiple rules with operators:

ALL: Every rule must be true
ANY: At least one rule must be true

Example: Accept leads where (state = "CA" OR state = "TX") AND age > 21

🔄 Events: Your Audit Trail

Events record everything that happens to a lead. Think of them as a detailed diary of each lead's journey.

What Events Capture:

Every step outcome (success/failure)
All data at each point
Timing information
Response data from integrations
Who did what and when

Why Events Matter:

Troubleshooting: See exactly why a lead failed
Compliance: Prove consent and data handling
Analytics: Build reports on any metric
Billing: Reconcile with partners

🔍 Power User Tip: Events are your best friend for debugging. When something goes wrong, events show you exactly what happened.

🗺️ Mappings: Data Transformation

Mappings reshape data between systems. They're how you handle different field names and formats between partners.

Mapping Use Cases:

Rename fields: fname → first_name
Combine fields: first_name + " " + last_name → full_name
Transform data: phone → remove special characters
Add static values: Always set lead_type = "solar"

Mapping Power:

Use templates in mappings for complex transformations:

{{lead.first_name}} {{lead.last_name|uppercase}}

💰 Pricing: Revenue and Cost Tracking

LeadConduit tracks the economics of every lead automatically.

Pricing Layers (in precedence order):

Entity + Type: Most specific pricing
Entity: Pricing for all leads from a source
Type: Pricing for a lead type across sources
Source: Base pricing for the source

Pricing Supports:

Fixed prices per lead
Percentage of revenue
Conditional pricing with rules
Multi-currency support

🎚️ Volume Caps: Inventory Control

Control lead flow with sophisticated capping:

Cap Types:

Daily caps: Reset each night
Monthly caps: Reset on the 1st
Total caps: Lifetime limits
Rolling caps: Based on time windows

Advanced Capping:

Nested caps (state within source)
Rule-based caps (different limits by quality)
Cap groups (shared limits across sources)

Putting It All Together

Now you understand the vocabulary of LeadConduit! Here's how these concepts work together:

Entities represent your business partners
Sources (Entities sending leads) connect to your Flows
Fields define the data structure of your leads
Steps process leads using Rules and Mappings
Recipients (Entities receiving leads) get delivered leads
Events record everything for analysis
Pricing and Volume Caps control the business side

Your Learning Path

Ready to put this knowledge into practice? Here's your next step:

→ Your First Flow: Let's build something real! We'll create a working flow that receives, validates, and delivers leads.

Remember: You don't need to master every concept before starting. LeadConduit is designed to be intuitive - you'll learn by doing. Let's build that first flow!