Audiences and Leads

In YESS AI SDR, you define your target audience using criteria, and the system finds and enrolls leads that match. This page explains how targeting works and how leads move through your campaigns.

What is a Lead?

A lead is an individual prospect in your campaign. Each lead represents a real person at a company who matches your targeting criteria.

Every lead has:

Contact information: Name, email, LinkedIn profile
Company details: Company name, industry, size
Role information: Job title, seniority level
Engagement status: Where they are in your outreach sequence

Defining Your Audience

Your audience is defined by your Ideal Customer Profile (ICP) criteria. The system uses these filters to find matching leads.

ICP Criteria

Criteria	Description	Examples
Job Titles	Roles you want to reach	VP of Sales, Sales Director, Head of Revenue
Seniority	Level in the organization	C-Level, VP, Director, Manager
Industries	Business sectors	Software, Healthcare, Financial Services
Company Size	Number of employees	50-200, 201-1000, 1000+
Location	Geographic regions	United States, California, New York
Keywords	Specific terms to match	"SaaS", "B2B", "Enterprise"

How Matching Works

When you set your ICP criteria:

Search: The system searches for prospects matching your filters
Preview: You see an estimate of available leads
Enrollment: After launch, matching leads are added to your campaign
Deduplication: Leads already in other active campaigns are excluded

The more specific your criteria, the more targeted your outreach. Start narrow and expand if needed.

Lead Enrollment

When your campaign is active, leads are enrolled automatically based on your ICP criteria.

Enrollment Pacing

Leads aren't enrolled all at once. The system paces enrollment at approximately 20 leads per day until your monthly quota is reached.

Why pacing matters:

Creates natural, non-spammy outreach patterns
Gives you time to respond to replies
Spreads engagement evenly across the month

Monthly Quota

Your monthly quota limits how many leads can be enrolled per billing period. This quota is based on your subscription plan.

Example:

Monthly quota: 500 leads
Daily enrollment: ~20 leads
Time to fill quota: ~25 days

Lead Statuses

Once enrolled, each lead has a status showing their progress through your sequence:

Status	Description
In Progress	Lead is actively moving through the sequence
Paused	Lead's sequence is temporarily stopped
Completed	Lead has finished all steps in the sequence
Replied	Lead has responded to your outreach
Blocked	Lead cannot be contacted (missing info, opted out, etc.)

Understanding the Lead Journey

Managing Leads

Viewing Enrolled Leads

From any campaign, click the Leads tab to see all enrolled leads. You can filter leads by:

Status (in progress, paused, replied, etc.)
Company
Search by name or email

Pausing Individual Leads

Need to stop outreach to a specific lead? You can pause them:

Find the lead in your campaign
Click the Pause button
The lead's sequence stops immediately

Pending messages for that lead won't be sent. You can resume anytime.

Resuming Leads

To restart outreach to a paused lead:

Find the paused lead
Click Resume
The sequence continues from where it left off

Bulk Actions

You can perform actions on multiple leads at once:

Pause All: Stop all in-progress sequences
Resume All: Restart all paused sequences
Retry Failed: Attempt to send failed messages again

Lead Information

What the AI Knows About Each Lead

For personalization, the AI accesses:

Public profile information: Name, title, company, LinkedIn data
Company information: Industry, size, recent news
Professional context: Role responsibilities, team structure

What Gets Personalized

Using this information, each message is tailored with:

References to the lead's specific role
Company-specific details or news
Industry-relevant talking points
Personalized opening lines (icebreakers)

Lead Quality

Ensuring Accurate Data

The system validates lead data before enrollment:

Email verification: Checks that email addresses are valid
LinkedIn verification: Confirms LinkedIn profiles exist
Deduplication: Prevents the same person from being contacted multiple times

Handling Missing Information

If a lead is missing required information:

Missing Data	What Happens
No email	LinkedIn-only outreach (if LinkedIn available)
No LinkedIn	Email-only outreach (if email available)
Neither	Lead marked as blocked

Best Practices

Start Specific

Begin with tight criteria to test messaging, then broaden your audience.

Use Multiple Criteria

Combine job titles, industries, and company size for precise targeting.

Monitor Reply Rates

If replies are low, your audience might be too broad or too narrow.

Exclude Current Customers

Make sure your targeting excludes existing customers to avoid awkward outreach.