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How contacts are prioritized

How the AI Sales Dialer decides who to call next: priority tiers, source ranking by drag order, and the Prioritize fresh contacts setting.

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Written by Valeriia Volobrinskaia

Learn how the AI Sales Dialer decides who to call next, and how to control the order with source ranking and the Prioritize fresh contacts setting.

User Level: Admin


The AI Sales Dialer decides who to call next using a clear priority order. This article explains the full system: the tier order, source ranking, and the settings that influence it.

The priority tiers

Every contact in a campaign belongs to one tier. The dialer works through them in this order:

  1. Favorite contacts

  2. Rescheduled contacts whose callback time has arrived

  3. Retry contacts (already called at least once, cooldown elapsed)

  4. Fresh contacts (never called)

The dialer exhausts each tier before moving to the next. Due callbacks and retries always come before new names, so nothing important waits behind a long fresh list.

If a callback comes due while the agent is working through retries, it jumps to the front on the next contact serve. See Scheduled callbacks for more on how callbacks are handled.

Source ranking within tiers

In the Contact step of the campaign setup (or when editing an existing campaign), you add your audience using + Add contacts by tags and + Add CRM contact list. Each source you add appears in a single ranked list.

The rule: the list at the top is dialed first within each group. Drag to reorder.

For example, if your campaign has three sources:

  1. "Enterprise leads" (tag)

  2. "HubSpot hot list" (CRM list)

  3. "Cold outreach" (tag)

All retry contacts are dialed first (Enterprise leads retries, then HubSpot hot list retries, then Cold outreach retries). After retries are exhausted, fresh contacts are served in the same source order (Enterprise leads fresh, then HubSpot hot list fresh, then Cold outreach fresh).

Setting the order

  1. Open a campaign and go to Edit campaign (or create a new one).

  2. In the Contact section, add your tags and/or CRM lists.

  3. Drag the sources up or down to set the order. The source at the top has the highest priority.

  4. Save.

💡 You can reorder at any time, even on an active campaign. The new order takes effect on the next contact allocation.

Mixing tags and CRM lists

Tags and CRM lists sit in the same ranked list. You can interleave them however you want. A CRM list at position 1 outranks a tag at position 2 within the same group, and vice versa.

How it interacts with other priority settings

The dialer follows tier first, then source ranking:

  1. Retries are always dialed before fresh contacts, regardless of which source they come from.

  2. Within retries, the drag order decides priority. A retry from source #1 is dialed before a retry from source #3.

  3. Within fresh contacts, the same drag order applies. A fresh contact from source #1 is dialed before a fresh contact from source #3.

  4. Favorite and rescheduled contacts keep their priority above both retries and fresh.

In short: the drag order controls priority within each group, not across groups. You're ranking your sources, but retries always go first.

Prioritize fresh contacts

By default, retry contacts are served before fresh ones. If you'd rather your team get through new contacts first, turn on Prioritize fresh contacts in the campaign's Calling setup (Step 3).

When ON, the order flips: fresh contacts are served before retries. Favorite and rescheduled contacts keep their priority regardless.

How it all fits together

Say your campaign has 200 fresh contacts across three sources, 15 retries due for a second attempt, and 3 scheduled callbacks coming up in the next few minutes:

  1. The 3 callbacks are served first (rescheduled tier).

  2. Next, the 15 retries, ordered by source ranking (Enterprise leads retries first, then HubSpot, then Cold outreach).

  3. Then the 200 fresh contacts, in the same source order.

If multiple callbacks come due at the same time, higher-priority ones (from source ranking) are served first. Among equal priority, the earliest-scheduled callback wins.

If Prioritize fresh contacts is ON, steps 2 and 3 swap: fresh contacts before retries, still in source order within each group.

Good to know

  • Drag to reorder works on both create and edit. You can set the priority when creating the campaign or adjust it later.

  • CRM lists stay in sync. If a contact is added to the CRM list after you've set up the campaign, they join at that source's priority level automatically.

  • Hours between attempts controls how long a retry contact waits before becoming eligible again. This is set per campaign in the Calling setup. See Setting up a campaign in the AI Sales Dialer.


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