Quickstart
Go from a new workspace to a routed, explained call: sign up, buy a number, add a buyer and a target, build a routing plan, go live and read the waterfall.
This takes about fifteen minutes, most of it waiting for your own phone to ring. You need somewhere to send a test call — your mobile is fine — and a way to fund the workspace wallet.
- Two phones — one to call from and one to answer as the buyer. A mobile and a desk phone will do.
- A way to fund the wallet. Platform usage is drawn from it, and an unfunded workspace does not route. See Wallet.
- Nothing else. No code, no DNS, no integration. Numbers, campaigns, buyers and targets are all created in the console.
Set up and route a call
- 1
Sign up and open your workspace
Open a call tracking workspace and pick a plan — you can change it later. That creates your workspace — the account that owns your numbers, campaigns, buyers and wallet — and takes you to the console.
Two things to do straight away, both under Settings and Wallet & billing:
- Set the workspace time zone. Reports, daily caps and hours of operation all use it.
- Fund the wallet. Platform usage is drawn from it, and a workspace with an empty wallet is not routed — calls end with the reason
workspace_unfunded. See Wallet.
- 2
Buy a tracking number
Open Numbers, search by area code or by the digits you want, and buy one. The number is yours within a few seconds and is rented monthly from the wallet.
Leave it unassigned for now — it needs a campaign, which comes in step 4. More in Buying numbers.
- 3
Add a buyer and a target
A buyer is a company you sell calls to; a target is one place that buyer can receive them. Under Buyers, add one and give it a name. Then, under Targets, add a target that belongs to that buyer:
- Destination — a phone number in international format, or a SIP address.
- Revenue per call — what this buyer pays you for a call that converts.
- Duration threshold — how many seconds the buyer's leg must last for the call to convert.
- Caps and hours — optional for now. A cap of
0means unlimited.
Press Test on the target to check the destination before traffic depends on it — see Testing a target.
- 4
Create a campaign and build its routing plan
Under Campaigns, create a campaign. On its Routing plan tab, add the target you just made. With one target the plan is trivial; with several, each row has a priority (lower is tried first) and a weight (its share of traffic among targets on the same priority).
Pick a routing mode for the campaign — priority, weighted or highest bid. Routing plans explains each one and how failover walks the list.
- 5
Assign the number and go live
On the campaign's Numbers tab, assign the number you bought. Then, before you switch anything on, open Simulate and enter a caller number: the simulator returns the exact waterfall a real call from that caller would take, without placing a call or charging anything.
When the simulation ends at your target, set the campaign Live.
- 6
Call the number, then read the waterfall
Call your tracking number from another phone and answer the target. When you hang up, open Calls and click the call.
The waterfall shows what happened in order: the context that was gathered, each gate the call passed, each target that was considered, the dial attempt and how it ended, and the revenue and payout written to the books. Now call again and do not answer — the waterfall will show the attempt timing out and the campaign's unrouted action taking over.
If the call did not route
The call still appears under Calls, with a reason. These are the ones a first call usually meets:
| Reason | What it means | Fix |
|---|---|---|
workspace_unfunded | The workspace wallet is empty. | Add funds under Wallet & billing. |
campaign_not_live | The number's campaign is not live. | Set the campaign live. |
no_targets | The routing plan has no active targets. | Add a target to the plan, or activate the row. |
all_targets_failed | Every eligible target was dialled and none answered. | Check the destination with Test, and the target's hours. |
no_eligible_target | Every target on the plan was skipped. The waterfall gives a reason for each. | Read the reasons: closed, capped, state and tag_filter are four different fixes. |
campaign_closed | The call arrived outside the campaign's hours of operation. | Leave the hours empty while testing — no schedule means always open. |
Either way, Simulate a call answers the same question without a phone: enter your own number and read every gate and every target, with the reason beside each one.
What that call cost, and what it earned
Open the call and look at its money. Two different things are recorded, and keeping them apart is the whole of books-only money:
- Revenue and payout are records. If the call lasted past the target's duration threshold it converted, and the revenue you set is stamped on it as what that buyer owes you. Nothing moved between wallets, because your buyer pays you directly.
- Usage is what the platform charged you: connected talk time, counted per started minute at your plan's rate, plus the monthly rent for the number. A call that never connected costs nothing at all, and no ping is ever charged. Rates are on the pricing page.