Custom Fields Setup in Follow Up Boss

What are custom fields in Follow Up Boss and why do agents use them?

Custom fields let you attach structured data to any contact or deal record beyond FUB's built-in fields. Agents use them to capture buyer criteria, seller timelines, property preferences, and relationship notes in a consistent, queryable format — not buried in conversation threads.

Common use cases include:

• Buyer price range, preferred neighborhoods, and bedroom count
• Seller move-out timeline and motivation level
• Referral source detail beyond the built-in lead source field
• Past client home purchase anniversary date for re-engagement triggers
• Pre-approval status and lender name for buyer pipeline tracking

Once a field is populated — whether by your team or an AI tool — it unlocks smart list filtering, action plan branching, and lead routing rules. That's where custom fields go from a data-entry habit to an actual system.

How do you create a custom field in Follow Up Boss? (Step-by-step)

Creating a custom field takes under two minutes. Here is the exact path inside FUB:

1. Open Follow Up Boss and click Settings in the left sidebar.
2. Navigate to Custom Fields under the Data section.
3. Click Add Field in the upper-right corner.
4. Choose whether the field applies to Contacts or Deals.
5. Select a field type from the available options (see the table below).
6. Enter a clear, descriptive field name.
7. Optionally add a field group to keep related fields together on the contact record.
8. Click Save. The field is immediately available on all records.

Fields you create appear in the custom fields panel on each contact or deal record, in smart list filter dropdowns, and in action plan condition builders.

What field types does Follow Up Boss support?

FUB offers six field types. Choosing the right type matters because it controls how you filter and sort records later.

Use dropdowns and multi-selects whenever possible over free-text fields. Consistent values filter reliably; free-text fields accumulate variations ("SFH", "single family", "Single-Family") that break smart lists.

What are the best practices for naming and organizing custom fields?

Field discipline is the difference between a searchable database and a cluttered record. Follow these conventions from the start to avoid a painful cleanup later.

Naming conventions

• Prefix by category — use "Buyer:" or "Seller:" at the start of field names so the record panel stays organized at a glance (e.g., "Buyer: Price Max", "Seller: Move-Out Timeline").
• Be specific — "Price Range" is ambiguous; "Buyer: Max Purchase Price" is not.
• Avoid abbreviations — new agents and integrations need to read field names without a decoder ring.
• Use title case consistently — mixing cases across fields looks unprofessional in smart list exports.

Field groups

FUB lets you assign fields to named groups (e.g., "Buyer Criteria", "Seller Details", "Compliance"). Group all related fields together so agents do not scroll through an undifferentiated wall of inputs.

Contact fields vs. deal fields

Contact fields follow the person across every transaction. Deal fields are transaction-specific. Store buyer preferences on the contact; store offer price and inspection date on the deal. Mixing them leads to stale data showing up on repeat clients.

Avoid field proliferation

Every field you create is a field your agents need to fill in — or leave empty. Aim for fields that will be populated on at least 30% of new contacts within the first 30 days. Fields that stay blank do not help smart lists or action plan triggers.

Where do custom fields appear inside Follow Up Boss?

Once created, a field surfaces in four places across FUB, making it a first-class data point rather than a hidden note:

• Contact/Deal record panel — the primary place agents read and update values during conversations.
• Smart lists — filter your entire database by any custom field value; build lists like "Buyers: Max $600k AND Pre-Approved" in seconds.
• Action plan triggers and conditions — branch follow-up sequences based on field values (e.g., send a different drip to "Seller: Timeline = 6–12 months" contacts).
• Lead routing rules — route incoming leads to the right agent or team based on custom field criteria set during intake.

The team inbox, calling/texting queue, and iOS/Android apps all display custom fields inline on the record, so agents have context regardless of where they work.

How do you get custom fields from the Follow Up Boss API? (the allFields parameter)

By default, the Follow Up Boss People endpoint returns a core subset of fields. Passing the fields=allFields parameter expands the response to include every custom field on the record. It works on both the single-contact endpoint and the paginated list endpoint:

# One contact, with all custom fields
GET https://api.followupboss.com/v1/people/123?fields=allFields

# A page of contacts, with all custom fields
GET https://api.followupboss.com/v1/people?fields=allFields&limit=100&offset=0

To discover which custom fields an account has — and their machine names and types — call the /v1/customFields endpoint. The response is paginated; follow the _metadata.next cursor to walk every field:

GET https://api.followupboss.com/v1/customFields
# next page, using the cursor from _metadata.next:
GET https://api.followupboss.com/v1/customFields?next=<cursor>

Authentication

Follow Up Boss uses HTTP Basic auth. Send your API key as the username with an empty password (note the trailing colon, which sets a blank password):

curl "https://api.followupboss.com/v1/people/123?fields=allFields" \
  -u YOUR_API_KEY:

This is exactly how Follow Up Ace reads your data: it pulls complete lead profiles with fields=allFields and writes its Ace fields (Win Score, Churn Risk, and more) back as standard custom fields — so anything Ace scores is immediately queryable in smart lists and visible to your own API calls. If you would rather not build against the raw API, the Follow Up Ace MCP connects Follow Up Boss to Claude and ChatGPT and exposes the same data conversationally. For webhooks and the wider API surface, see our Follow Up Boss API integration guide.

What are the 7 Ace Score fields and how are they different from manual custom fields?

Here is where Follow Up Ace changes the picture. The biggest friction with custom fields is the manual data entry — fields only help if someone fills them in. Ace solves this for lead-scoring data specifically.

Every account on any plan (including free) gets 7 Ace Score custom fields automatically created in Follow Up Boss and populated nightly. Agents do not enter these values — Ace writes them based on contact activity, inbound signals, and communication history.

Because these fields are standard custom fields inside Follow Up Boss, you can build smart lists against them immediately — "Ace Tier = Hot AND Ace Days Since Inbound < 3" gives you a real-time priority dial-list without any manual scoring.

Manual custom fields vs. Ace-populated fields: what's the difference in practice?

Understanding where manual fields end and Ace fields begin helps you design a field strategy that actually gets used.

The practical takeaway: use manual fields for criteria your agents know at intake (price range, timeline, property type) and rely on Ace fields for anything that requires observing behavior over time (engagement intensity, preferred channel, lead temperature). Combining both gives you a complete picture with a minimum of data-entry overhead.

How does the Ace Trove use custom fields for account-level analysis?

For teams that want deeper analysis beyond individual contact scoring, the Follow Up Ace’s Ace Trove reads both your manual custom fields and the Ace Score fields as inputs for account-wide intelligence. The Ace Trove is available in tiers from Starter (up to 5,000 contacts) through Enterprise (up to 500,000 contacts).

At the account level, the Ace Trove can surface patterns like which lead sources produce contacts with consistently high Ace Scores, or which buyer criteria segments have the longest Ace Days Since Inbound — the kind of pipeline-health insight that is invisible when you look at records one at a time. The agentic tools built on top include a pipeline health check that flags stalled deals and a lead nurture optimizer that identifies contacts overdue for contact.

Can I use custom fields to trigger action plans or route leads automatically?

Yes. FUB's action plans and lead routing both read custom field values as conditions. Here are two common patterns teams build once their custom fields are populated consistently:

Action plan branching on Ace Tier

1. Create an action plan for new leads in your database.
2. Add a condition step: if Ace Tier = Hot, branch to an aggressive 3-day call sequence.
3. Add a second branch: if Ace Tier = Warm or Cool, route to a longer nurture drip.
4. Leave Dormant contacts on a low-frequency monthly check-in plan.

Because Ace updates the tier nightly, contacts automatically move to the appropriate plan as their engagement changes — no manual re-sorting required.

Lead routing on buyer price range

1. Set a "Buyer: Max Purchase Price" number field on your intake form or via action plan questionnaire.
2. In lead routing, create a rule: if "Buyer: Max Purchase Price" is greater than your luxury threshold, assign to your luxury specialist team.
3. Route all other buyers to the general buyer's agent pool.

Both patterns depend on fields being consistently populated — which is exactly why the distinction between manual fields (you fill) and Ace fields (auto-filled) matters for your routing design.

What should I avoid when setting up custom fields?

Most field setups go wrong in the same few ways. Avoid these:

• Too many text fields — every free-text field is a data quality liability. Use dropdowns for anything categorical.
• Duplicate fields for the same concept — "Timeline", "Move Timeline", and "Seller Timeline" in the same database produce split smart lists and agent confusion. Pick one name and enforce it.
• Skipping field groups — without groups, the custom field panel on a contact becomes a scroll of 30+ unrelated inputs. Group from day one.
• Recreating what Ace already tracks — do not build a manual "Lead Temperature" dropdown if you have Ace Tier. Duplicate fields for the same concept create maintenance overhead and contradictory values.
• No agent training — a field that nobody fills in is wasted schema. Brief your team on which fields are mandatory at intake and which are optional enrichment.

For teams thinking about compliance-safe communication practices, it is also worth noting that Ace's compliance tools scan message content before it goes out — a separate layer from custom field data, but equally important for a well-run FUB setup.

How do I get started with Ace's automatic custom fields?

The 7 Ace Score fields are available on every account, including the free tier. You do not need to configure them — they are created in your Follow Up Boss account automatically when you connect Ace. From there, they populate on the nightly scoring run and are immediately available as smart list filters.

If you want to extend that intelligence with the full Ace Trove — pipeline health analysis, lead nurture optimization, and account-wide behavioral insights — that is a separate add-on starting at the Starter tier. See the Guides section for a walkthrough of what the Ace Trove adds on top of the base Ace Score fields.