Power Dialer: Build a List

What it is

The Power Dialer calls a list of phone numbers for you, one after another, so nobody has to sit and type numbers all afternoon. If a call is not picked up within the time you set, it hangs up and moves on to the next person by itself.

Before any of that can happen you need a list. That is what this guide covers: creating the list, filling it with contacts, and getting it ready to dial.

You open it from the left menu: More›Power Dialer. On some accounts the menu group is called Products instead of More — the item is named Power Dialer either way. The page header reads Power Dialer with the line "Build contact lists to run progressive outbound calling campaigns."

The page has up to three tabs across the top:

There are four ways to get contacts into a list, and you can mix them all in one list:

Whichever way contacts arrive, the same rules apply. Only US and Canada numbers are accepted, because that is all the dialer can call. A number can only be in a list once. And a number on your Settings›Blocked Numbers list is added marked Do not call and is never dialled.

When to use it

• Following up a batch of old jobs. Pull every job closed in the last 90 days into a list and work through it in one sitting.
• Chasing estimates that went quiet. Filter leads by the status you use for unanswered estimates and call them all back.
• Ringing round your existing customers. Pull clients in with Add from Clients — everyone in one city, or everyone of a particular customer type — for a seasonal offer or a service reminder.
• Working a purchased or partner list. Upload the spreadsheet and dial straight from it — those numbers never have to become leads first.
• Seasonal or maintenance campaigns. A list per service type, per city, or per month, kept and re-run whenever you want.
• Re-dialing the people who did not pick up. Set the list to move no-answer contacts into a "try again" list automatically, then dial that list tomorrow.

Use something else when:

• You want to send messages, not make calls. Bulk SMS is the tool for texting a group.
• You only need to ring one customer. Call them from the lead or client record — building a one-person list is more work than it is worth.
• You want the whole call log for the business. The Power Dialer's Call History tab only covers dialer calls. Everything else is in Calls — although every dialer call is listed there too.

Before you start

• Power Dialer has to be switched on for your company. It is a paid add-on, not part of the standard account. If it has not been enabled, the menu item does not exist at all and the address goes nowhere. Ask Joby support to turn it on.
• Your role needs Power Dialer access. An owner or admin turns it on under Settings›Team Roles, in the permission group called Industry Modules, where it is listed as Power Dialer. Without it the menu item stays hidden even though the company has the add-on.
• At least one caller ID must be enabled, or nobody can dial. Out of the box, no numbers are allowed. An owner or admin opens Power Dialer›Settings›Allowed Caller IDs and clicks Add number. You can still build lists without this — you just cannot start a session.
• The company needs phone numbers first. If the Settings tab says no phone numbers exist for this organization yet, add one under Settings›Phone Numbers before coming back.
• Only owners and admins see the Settings tab. Everyone else sees Lists and Call History only. Opening the settings address directly just drops you back on Lists.
• Only US and Canada numbers are accepted. A plain 10-digit number is fine — Joby adds the +1 for you — and so is 11 digits starting with a 1. Anything else (an international number, a short number, a typo) is treated as invalid and left out, whether you type it in, upload it, or pull it from a lead or client. The dialer cannot call those numbers, so there is no point importing them.
• Blocked numbers come in marked Do not call. A number on your Settings›Blocked Numbers list is still added to the list, so you can see it, but with the status Do not call. The dialer skips it every time.
• Your company may use different words. "Lead" and "Office Agent" can be renamed for your account, so the wording around the page follows suit — the empty-list hint reads "pull from your jobs or clients" if that is what you call them, and the Call History tab labels its filter with your name for an agent. The Add from Leads button itself always reads Add from Leads whatever you renamed things to.

Step-by-step

Create a list

1. Open More›Power Dialer from the left menu.
2. Stay on the Lists tab and click New List at the top right. (On a brand-new account the page instead shows "No lists yet" with a Create List button in the middle — same thing.)
3. In the New Power Dialer List window, fill in Name. The example shown in the box is "e.g. April follow-ups" — name it after the campaign, not the month you happen to be in.
4. Add a Description (optional) if other people will use the list. The box asks "What's this list for?".
5. Click Create List. You get a "List created" message and Joby takes you straight into the empty list.

Add one contact by hand

1. Inside the list, click Add Contacts at the top right, then Add one manually.
2. In the Add Contact window, fill in Name (optional) and Phone. Only the phone is required, and the note under the box reminds you: US and Canada numbers only.
3. Click Add. You get "Contact added", and the new contact goes on the end of the list. The dialer works through a list in the order contacts were added, so somebody you add now is rung after everyone already there.

Three things can happen instead of "Contact added":

• "That phone number is already in this list" — nothing is added; the same number can only be in a list once.
• "Only US/Canada numbers can be dialed" — the number is not a valid North American number and nothing is added.
• "Added as Do not call — this number is on your blocked list" — the row is created, but with the status Do not call, and the dialer will skip it.

Upload a spreadsheet (CSV)

1. Save your spreadsheet as a CSV file with the column names in the first row. A .tsv or .txt file with one contact per line works too. Not sure what the columns should look like? The upload window has a Download sample CSV link that gives you a two-row example with every column Joby understands: phone, first name, last name, email, city, state, ZIP, company and notes.
2. In the list, click Add Contacts›Upload CSV. The Upload Contacts from CSV window opens.
3. Drag the file onto the dashed box that says Drag a CSV here, or click to choose a file, or click the box and pick the file. Joby reads it and shows the file name and how many rows it found. Big files take a moment — the box reads Reading… while it works. Change file starts over.
4. Check the Map columns row. Joby matches your headings automatically ("Phone Number", "phone_number" and "Mobile" all count as the phone column) and remembers your choices for the next file with the same headings. Phone is the only required field — its drop-down is outlined in red until it is set. The rest — First name, Last name, Full name, Email, City, State, ZIP, Company and Notes — can be left on Not imported. A column can feed only one field, so picking it for a second field un-assigns it from the first. If you map both first/last name and a full name, first/last win and Full name only fills the gap.
5. Read the badges: N valid, N invalid (not US/Canada numbers) and N duplicates (the same number appearing more than once in the file). The preview table underneath shows the first 100 rows with their Phone, Name, Email, Location and a Status of Valid, Invalid phone or Duplicate in file, with a note telling you how many more rows there are.
6. Optionally tick some labels under Apply tags to imported contacts. Every contact this import creates gets them. (If there are no tags yet, create some first with Manage Tags on the list page.)
7. Click Import N Contacts. Contacts are saved in batches of 1,000 with a progress bar — Importing 2,000 of 8,412… — so a big list keeps moving. Cancel import stops after the current batch and keeps everything already saved.
8. Read the summary: Added, Skipped duplicates (split into "already in list" and "repeated in file"), Invalid (not US/Canada numbers) and On Do-Not-Call list (added as Do not call — won't be dialed). If anything was left out, Download skipped rows (N) hands those rows back as a CSV with a Reason column, so you can fix them and import just those. Finish with Import another file or Done.

If Joby cannot find any rows you see "No rows found — check that the first line holds column headers" — nearly always a spreadsheet exported without its heading row. If the phone column you picked has nothing usable in it, the Import button stays greyed out; pick a different column and the preview updates — you do not need to re-upload the file.

Pull contacts in from your leads

1. In the list, click Add Contacts›Add from Leads.
2. Narrow the list with the filters: the search box (Search by name or phone…), Status, Service Type, Ad Source, City and State. Each drop-down starts on "Any". Rows per page (50 to 1,000) only changes how much you see at once.
3. Set the date range. Filter by chooses which date is used — Created Date, Scheduled Date or Closed Date — then set From and To, or use the 7d, 30d, 90d and All time shortcuts. It opens on Closed Date and the last 30 days, to match what Lead Reports shows by default.
4. Optionally tick labels under Apply tags to imported contacts. As the note beside it says, in this window tags apply to Add selected only — Add All Matching brings leads in without tags.
5. Watch the N matching badge as you filter. That is the number you are about to work with.
6. Now choose how much to take:
   • Tick individual rows, or use Select page to take everything on screen. Your ticks survive as you move between pages with Prev and Next, and the N selected badge keeps the running total. Then click Add N Selected.
   • Or click Add All Matching (N) at the bottom left to take everything the filters found, including the pages you never looked at. A confirmation window appears first; on very large sets it takes a few seconds to finish.
7. Read the confirmation message. Add N Selected reports everything — Added 40 contacts (3 duplicates skipped, 1 invalid, 2 on Do-Not-Call list) — while Add All Matching reports how many were added and how many duplicates were skipped.

Only leads that actually have a phone number are offered, so the count here will usually be smaller than the same filters on the Leads page. Contacts brought in this way carry their city, state, service type and lead status with them, and they keep a link back to the lead — which is why calls made to them also show up in that lead's timeline. Like manual contacts, they are added to the end of the list.

Pull contacts in from your clients

1. In the list, click Add Contacts›Add from Clients. The window is headed Add from Clients and only offers clients that have a phone number.
2. Narrow it down with the search box (Search by name, company, email or phone…) and the drop-downs: City, State, Customer Type, Client Type and Lead Source. Each starts on "Any". The values on offer are the ones that actually appear on your clients.
3. Set Created from and To if you only want clients added in a certain period, or use the 30d, 90d and All time shortcuts. Unlike the leads window this one opens on All time, because "everyone" is the usual answer for a client book.
4. Optionally tick labels under Apply tags to imported contacts. Here the tags apply to both Add selected and Add all matching.
5. Watch the N matching and N selected badges. Tick rows, or use Select page / Deselect page; your ticks survive as you page through the results.
6. Click Add N Selected, or Add All Matching (N) to take everything the filters found. The confirmation for Add All spells out the rules: clients already in the list are skipped, numbers on your Do-Not-Call list are added as "Do not call", and anything that is not a US/Canada number is left out.
7. Read the confirmation message — the same Added N contacts (…) summary as the leads window.

Contacts from clients keep a link to the client record: their name in the list is a link that opens the client. Their city and state fill in the Location column; Service Type and Lead Status stay empty because those are lead fields. Where a client has both a person's name and a company name, the person's name is used, with the company name as a fallback.

Find contacts inside a list

Lists can hold thousands of contacts, so the table shows one page at a time and the filters run on the server across the whole list, not just the rows on screen.

1. Type into the search box above the table (Search name or phone…). Despite the placeholder it also matches city, state, service type, email and company name.
2. Click a status chip under the toolbar to see only those contacts. There is an All chip with the total, then one chip per status that has anybody in it — Pending, Calling, Answered, No answer, Voicemail, Busy, Failed, Do not call, Skipped — each with its count. Click the chip again to clear it.
3. Once you have tags, a Any tag drop-down appears beside the search box. Pick a tag to see only contacts carrying it.
4. Read the counter on the right: N total, or N matching while a filter is on. The drop-down next to it sets the page size — 50, 100, 200 or 500 rows — and remembers your choice.
5. Page with the arrows under the table, next to Showing 1–100 of N contacts and Page 1 of 12. If nothing matches you see "No contacts match your filters" with a Clear filters button.

Tag your contacts (optional)

1. Tick the contacts you want to label — individual rows, or the tick box in the table heading to take the whole page. A blue bar appears showing N selected. To label more than one page at once, click Select all N matching in that bar (it appears once every row on the page is ticked).
2. Click Tag in that bar. (The Manage Tags button in the page header opens the same window with nothing selected, which is how you tidy up the tag list itself.)
3. To make a new label, type into Create new tag, pick one of the colour circles underneath, and click the + button.
4. Tick a tag to apply it and untick an applied one to take it off. Rows are marked Will add or Will remove so you can see what is about to happen.
5. Click Apply Changes.

You can also work one row at a time: click + Add tag in the Tags column, or click a tag already on a row to get a small window with Remove, plus buttons to add another tag or swap this one for a different one. And every import window — CSV, Leads and Clients — lets you tag contacts on the way in, which saves a round of ticking afterwards.

Set up automatic moves between lists (optional)

1. Create the lists you want contacts to end up in first — for example "Hot Leads", "Voicemails to Re-dial" and "Retry Tomorrow". The rules can only point at lists that already exist.
2. Back in your main list, click Automation in the header.
3. The List Automation window has one row per call outcome: Answered, Voicemail, No Answer, Busy and Failed. For each one, choose the list the contact should move to, or leave it on Do nothing.
4. Click Save. You get an "Automation saved" message, and a small dot appears on the Automation button whenever any rule is set. From then on, contacts move themselves the moment each call finishes.

With no rules set you see the line "No rules set — contacts stay on this list regardless of outcome", which is the safe default while you are still experimenting.

Hand the list to the dialer

1. With at least one contact in the list, click Start Dialing. The button stays greyed out while the list is empty.
2. In Start Dialing Session, pick Call from — the number customers will see. Only numbers an admin enabled in the Settings tab appear here, and a number reserved for call masking is never offered.
3. Set No-answer timeout (5, 10, 15, 20, 30, 40, 50 or 60 seconds — how long to let it ring before giving up and moving on) and Wrap-up time (No wrap-up or 3 to 60 seconds — your breathing space between calls).
4. Decide about Re-dial contacts that didn't answer last time. It is ticked by default and puts everyone marked No answer, Busy, Failed, Voicemail or Skipped back in the queue. Untick it to only ring the contacts nobody has tried yet.
5. Click Start. You get "Session started" and the dialing screen opens. Before the first call goes out it checks that your microphone is allowed and your browser phone is connected, and calls only go out between 8:00 AM and 9:00 PM in your company's time zone. The Run a Session guide takes it from there.

If the Call from box reads No caller ID enabled, an owner or admin has not enabled any caller IDs yet. See Allowed caller IDs below.

How to check it worked

• The list exists: it appears as a row on the Lists tab with today's date in Created, and the counter at the right of the toolbar goes up.
• Contacts arrived: the line under the list name reads "N contacts" — the real total, even when the list holds thousands — the counter above the table reads N total, the footer reads Showing 1–100 of N contacts, and the Contacts column on the Lists tab matches.
• The import behaved: the summary after a CSV upload (Added, Skipped duplicates, Invalid, On Do-Not-Call list) or the message after a leads or clients import gives you every number. Skipped duplicates are normal and are not an error; invalid rows are numbers the dialer could not have called anyway.
• Data came across: for contacts pulled from leads, the Location, Service Type and Lead Status columns are filled in. For contacts pulled from clients — or any number that matches a client you already have — the name is a link you can click to open that customer's record. CSV contacts show whatever city and state you mapped.
• Tags applied: the confirmation names how many contacts were updated, and the coloured labels show in the Tags column right away. Contacts tagged on import arrive with their labels already on.
• Automation saved: you see "Automation saved", a small dot appears on the Automation button, and re-opening it shows your chosen lists still selected instead of "Do nothing".
• Ready to dial: the Start Dialing button is no longer greyed out.
• After you have called: a row of totals appears above the table — Total calls, Answered, Voicemail, Connect rate and Last session — the status chips gain Answered, Voicemail and No answer counts, and each contact's Dial Status and attempt count fill in. The clock button at the end of a row opens that person's own call history, with recordings where they exist.

Common mistakes

• Expecting a duplicate to update the existing row. A phone number can only appear once in a list. Importing it again is skipped silently — it does not overwrite the name or the tags already there.
• Importing international numbers. Only US and Canada numbers are accepted, everywhere. They are counted as Invalid and left out, and the "skipped rows" download tells you which ones. The dialer could not have called them anyway.
• Removing contacts and expecting the lead to go too. The bin icon and the Remove button take the contact out of the calling list only. The lead, client and their call history are untouched.
• Building automation rules before the target lists exist. The drop-downs only offer lists that already exist, and show "No other lists yet" if there are none. Create the destinations first.
• Trusting the Source column to describe the contents. Every list you make with New List is labelled Manual, and that label does not change when you upload a CSV or pull leads or clients into it. It describes how the list was created, not what is in it.
• Deleting a tag to remove it from contacts. Deleting a tag takes it out of the tag list, but contacts already carrying it keep the label until they are next edited. To strip a tag off people, select them and untick it in the tag window.
• Searching the contact table for something it does not hold. The search box inside a list matches name, phone, city, state, service type, email and company — not tags, and not dial status. Use the Any tag drop-down and the status chips for those.