Shared inbox contacts with custom fields, groups and CSV import
Sektra's contacts are the address book behind the shared inbox, built from the people who write to your team and kept current by the mail itself. Custom fields of your own, with per-inbox visibility, show in the Lens relationship panel beside every conversation. Groups keep lists of people together, and a CSV import brings an existing list across with a mapping step and a review. An export writes the book back out, and a duplicate finder merges two records with undo for seven days.
Shared inbox contacts are the people a team writes to, with enough about each of them to answer well: who they are, where they work, how to reach them and what the team has agreed. A CRM holds that in fields someone has to fill, which is why it drifts. An address book that only stores email addresses holds too little to help with the reply in front of you.
Sektra starts from the mail. A contact is created from the conversations the team has, with the name, company, addresses and phone numbers found there, and the memory layer adds what was promised and asked. The custom fields, groups and import described here add the parts that mail does not carry, such as an account number, a renewal date or a tier. They appear where the team reads, which is Lens beside the thread.
Custom contact fields shown in Lens
A field has a label and a type, which is text, number, link or date, and a value is checked against its type when it is saved. Each field is shown in every inbox or only in the inboxes you choose, so a billing inbox sees the account number and a sales inbox sees the plan tier. The fields appear on the contact's page and in the Lens relationship panel beside the conversation, where a teammate reads them while writing the reply. Deleting a field keeps its values, and a field added again under the same name gets them back.
Contact groups for the lists a team filters and exports
A group is a named list of contacts, such as VIP accounts or Newsletter, with a short description of who belongs in it. Contacts are added to a group one by one, by selecting them in the list, or by sending everyone an import creates into it. The contacts list filters by group, the export writes a group on its own, and a group's count follows the contacts the person can see.
CSV import with a mapping step and a review
Import contacts takes a CSV file of up to 5 MB and 20,000 rows, reads the first row as the column names, and suggests a target for each column, including your custom fields. Rows are matched to existing contacts by any address first and by phone number second, and later rows about the same new person fold into one record. A review step shows what would be created and updated before anything is written, with the rows that have a problem listed. An option decides whether existing values are overwritten or only empty ones filled. The import can add everyone to a group, and it runs as one step that either completes or leaves nothing behind.
Find duplicates and merge with undo
Merge duplicates lists likely pairs: the same name and email domain, the same name and company, or the same phone number. Merging keeps one record and moves the other's addresses, numbers, notes, field values and group memberships onto it, which also moves its conversations and what the memory layer knows about the person. Undo restores both records for seven days after the merge. A contact who is a teammate on the account is never merged, and an export writes the whole book or a group to CSV with one column per field.
What your team gets
Built from the mail
Contacts are created from the people who write in, with their addresses and numbers, and kept current by the conversations.
Fields where the team reads
Custom fields with per-inbox visibility show in Lens beside the thread and on the contact's page.
An import you can check first
Map the columns, read the review, then write the rows, with existing contacts matched by address and phone.
Merge you can take back
Likely duplicates are listed, and a merge can be undone for seven days.
Contacts setup in four steps
The steps follow the order a new workspace takes them in, and they use the names of the screens as they appear in the app.
- 1
Add the fields you need
Under Settings, open Contacts, choose New field, pick its type and choose the inboxes it is visible in.
- 2
Import an existing list
Open Contacts, choose Import contacts, drop the CSV file, map each column and read the review before the import runs.
- 3
Make groups
On the Contacts page, create a group, then select contacts and use Add to group, or send an import into it.
- 4
Clean up duplicates
Choose Merge duplicates, review each pair and merge the ones that are the same person, with undo for seven days.
Common questions
These are the questions teams ask before they set this up. If yours is not covered here, send it to us.
Does a shared inbox need a CRM to keep contacts?
Not for the contacts themselves. Sektra builds a contact for each person who writes in, with the addresses, numbers and company found in the mail, and the memory layer records what was promised and asked. Custom fields, groups and import cover the details mail does not carry. A CRM kept for pipeline can still show its records beside the thread.
Can I import contacts from a CSV file?
Yes. Import contacts takes a CSV of up to 5 MB and 20,000 rows and suggests a target for each column. It matches rows to existing contacts by address and phone, and shows a review before anything is written. Imported contacts can be sent to a group, and an export writes the book back out as CSV.
What happens when two contacts are merged?
One record is kept, and the other's addresses, numbers, notes, field values and groups move onto it, along with its conversations. The merged record is removed from the list, and Undo restores both records for seven days. A contact who is a teammate on the account cannot be merged.
Who can see a contact and its fields?
A contact marked Shared with team is visible to everyone on the account, and one marked Only me is visible to its owner alone. Custom fields are shown in every inbox or only in the inboxes chosen when the field was created. Field definitions are managed by people who can manage inboxes, and any member can edit a contact's values.
Other parts of the same inbox
Sektra compared with the tool you use now
Each page states what the other tool is built for, what it costs and what changes when a team moves to Sektra.
Articles on this subject
CRM hygiene and why CRM data quality decays under manual logging
CRM hygiene fails because manual logging asks busy people to retype work that already happened for a benefit that lands on someone else. This article explains why CRM adoption stalls, how to audit CRM data quality on twenty accounts, and which records belong in fields.
Read the articleProductWhat is relationship intelligence? How the software works and its limits
Relationship intelligence software maps who knows whom across a firm and scores each connection by contact frequency. This explainer covers what it is used for, what it cannot record, and how relationship memory, a per-client record of commitments and open questions, fills that gap.
Read the articlePlaybooksSales to customer success handoff: how to keep client context
An account handoff loses context whether sales hands a closed deal to customer success or a departing account manager's book is redistributed. This guide covers what gets lost, why mailbox access does not recover it, and a six-step checklist for the transition.
Read the articleTry it on your own inbox
Connect a Gmail, Outlook or IMAP mailbox and the trial runs on your own mail, with nothing to migrate and no card required.