CRM Contacts
Categories, industries, lead sources and tags
The four ways a contact gets classified, what each is for, and how to stop them being used interchangeably.
Last updated September 2, 2026
The Classification card holds four different labels. They look similar and they are not, and a team that treats them as interchangeable ends up unable to report on any of them.
| Label | Answers | Managed |
|---|---|---|
| Category | What kind of contact is this? | A fixed list, set up once for the organisation. |
| Industry | What does their business do? | A fixed list, shared across the organisation. |
| Lead source | Where did they come from? | A shared catalogue — the basis of every ROI number you will produce. |
| Tag | Anything else worth remembering. | Free text, created as you type it. |
How to choose
- If you will want to filter a list by it every week, it is a category.
- If it describes their business rather than your relationship, it is an industry.
- If it explains why you know them at all, it is a lead source — and there should be exactly one.
- If it is a moment — an event, a campaign, a promise — it is a tag.
LEAD SOURCE IS THE ONE THAT MATTERS MOST
It is the only field that can tell you which marketing is worth repeating. Set it while you still know the answer — nobody has ever successfully reconstructed lead sources six months later.
Applying them in bulk
Tick rows on the contacts list and use Bulk Edit to add or remove categories and tags across a whole selection. An import can also set them, and will match names loosely, so "vip customers" in a spreadsheet finds your "VIP Customer" category.
TAGS MULTIPLY QUIETLY
Tags are created the moment somebody types one, so "expo", "Expo" and "expo-2027" can all end up in the same database. Agree a couple of conventions early — they are far easier to keep tidy than to clean up.