Adding Leads: CSV & Google Sheets
Every campaign starts with a lead list — a set of prospects with their website URL and email address. Swokei accepts CSV files and live Google Sheet connections, and includes optional fields to boost email personalization.
What information you need
Every lead requires at minimum:
- Website — the prospect's website URL (can be
https://example.com,example.com, or justexample.com— Swokei normalizes them) - Email — the recipient's email address in standard format (
[email protected])
Beyond these two required fields, you can include optional fields that Swokei uses to personalize emails and store context:
| Field | How it's used |
|---|---|
| First name | Used in email greetings ("Hi Sarah") |
| Last name | Used for full-name references in the email |
| Full name | Alternative to first/last name if you have one combined field |
| Company name | Used when referencing the prospect's business in the email |
| Job title | Allows Swokei to tailor phrasing for specific roles |
| Industry | Used for industry-specific context in the email |
| Location | City or country, used for local context |
| Phone | Stored with the lead for your CRM notes |
| Stored for reference during follow-up |
Uploading a CSV file
During campaign creation, you'll see an upload area on the Leads step. Click it or drag your CSV file onto it. Swokei then displays a column mapping screen where you match your CSV's columns to Swokei fields. At minimum, map Website and Email. You can leave optional fields blank if they're not in your CSV. After confirming the mapping, Swokei shows a preview of the first few rows — confirm and continue to the next step.
CSV formatting guidelines
- Use comma-separated values with UTF-8 encoding (standard CSV format)
- Include a header row in the first row — column names don't need to match Swokei field names exactly; you'll map them manually
- Websites can include or omit
https://— Swokei normalizes them automatically - Email addresses should be correctly formatted
- Maximum file size is 10 MB. For very large lead lists (several thousand), split them into batches of 500–1000 leads each
Connecting a Google Sheet
If your leads are in Google Sheets, click "Connect Google Sheet" during campaign creation. Swokei will ask for authorization to access your Google Drive (read-only), then ask you to paste the URL of your spreadsheet. Select which sheet tab you want to use if your file has multiple tabs, then map columns the same way as you would with a CSV file.
How many leads can you add?
There's no hard limit on leads per campaign, but here are practical factors to consider:
- Each lead in Smart Outreach costs 1 credit — verify you have enough credits before launching (you can see your credit balance at the top of the app)
- Larger campaigns take longer to process. Analysis and email generation happen in parallel, but processing 500+ leads can take an hour or more depending on server load
- For best email deliverability, Swokei automatically spreads sending across multiple days based on your mailbox's daily sending limit, so don't worry about overwhelming your sender reputation
Verifying email addresses (free)
A bad address costs you more than a wasted send — bounces are what teach inbox providers to distrust your domain. Swokei can check every address before it sends, and the check costs nothing. It uses no credits and no third-party verification service.
Turn it on with the Verify emails toggle in campaign setup. It is off by default. The review step shows the setting as Email verification: Enabled before you launch, so you can confirm it at a glance.
Verification runs at send time rather than on upload, so it always reflects the state of the mailbox on the day the email actually goes out. Each address is checked once and the result is cached for 30 days, so re-running a campaign over the same list costs nothing extra in time.
Every address comes back as one of four results:
- Valid — the mailbox exists and accepts mail.
- Invalid — the domain does not accept mail at all, or the mailbox does not exist. These are skipped, not deleted; the lead stays in your campaign so you keep the record.
- Risky — the domain accepts every address it is offered (a catch-all), so a valid-looking answer proves nothing.
- Unknown — the provider will not answer honestly. Google Workspace domains and Microsoft-hosted mail accept everything at the point of check, so Swokei marks these unknown and sends anyway rather than guessing.
Adding leads to a running campaign
After a campaign has launched, you can add more leads from the campaign detail page. Click the "Add leads" button, then upload a new CSV or connect another sheet. These new leads go through the same analysis → email generation → send queue as the original batch. Credits are charged for the new leads when you confirm.
Don't have a lead list yet?
Swokei includes a built-in lead finder. Go to Prospects in the sidebar, select a city and industry, and Swokei will automatically discover local businesses in that category. You can browse the results, select the ones you want, and add them directly to a campaign. This is a fast way to build a targeted list without needing to source leads externally.