Week 2 of 8

Tags, Custom Fields, and Custom Values

Tags are how you make contacts findable. Custom fields and values are how you make them useful. Both need a plan before anyone starts clicking.

A tag is a label used to describe or group a contact. A custom field is a place to store a specific piece of data on the contact record. A custom value is a reusable variable that lives at the account level and can be inserted anywhere.

If you use tags for everything, your database becomes noisy and impossible to trust. If you use custom fields for everything, your team never adopts them. The goal is to decide, in writing, what each tool is for before creating a single one.

Why This Matters

Without a naming convention, tags multiply until the team no longer trusts them. Reports drift. Automations grab the wrong audience. Cleanup becomes a project of its own.

What Usually Goes Wrong

Every team member invents their own tag names
Tags used to store data that belongs in custom fields
No difference between source tags, status tags, and campaign tags
Duplicates like 'FB Lead', 'facebook', and 'FB-Lead'
Custom fields created reactively, one at a time, with no plan
Business info (address, phone, hours) hardcoded into every email instead of custom values

Tag vs Custom Field vs Custom Value

Tag

A label used to segment or filter contacts. Best for status, source, interest, and campaign membership. A contact either has the tag or does not.

Custom Field

A stored value on a contact. Best for information you need to save, display, and personalize with, such as company name, industry, or preferred appointment time.

Custom Value

A reusable variable that lives at the account or location level. Best for business info that appears in many places, such as company name, booking link, address, or support email.

Important Clarification: Custom Fields and Custom Values Are Different

Custom fields and custom values are not the same thing.

A custom field stores information on a contact record. Examples include industry, budget, preferred contact time, referred by, appointment notes, service interest, or company size.

A custom value is an account-level reusable variable. Examples include company name, booking link, main phone number, support email, business address, business hours, logo URL, or standard footer text.

Do not confuse custom values with dropdown options inside a custom field. Dropdown options belong to the field. Custom values are reusable account-level placeholders that can be inserted across emails, SMS templates, workflows, funnels, forms, and other assets.

Tag Categories

Group every tag into one of these categories before creating it. This keeps the tag list readable and enforces a naming convention.

source-*

Where the contact came from. Example: source-facebook, source-referral, source-website.

interest-*

What the contact is interested in. Example: interest-crm, interest-website, interest-training.

status-*

The current relationship. Example: status-new-lead, status-booked, status-client, status-past-client.

campaign-*

A specific nurture or promotion. Example: campaign-14day-nurture, campaign-summer-offer.

service-*

A service or product the contact bought or requested. Example: service-onboarding, service-support-plan.

internal-*

For the team only. Example: internal-needs-review, internal-do-not-contact.

Note

Be careful with status tags. Some status should live in the pipeline instead of becoming another tag. For example, Appointment Booked may be better represented by an opportunity stage, while status-client or status-past-client may work well as tags. Do not duplicate every pipeline stage as a tag unless there is a clear reason.

Good Tag Names vs Bad Tag Names

Good examples

source-facebook
status-new-lead
campaign-14day-nurture
interest-crm
internal-needs-review

Bad examples

FB Lead
facebook
Hot!!!
Follow up
NEW

Good tag names are lowercase, hyphen-separated, and prefixed with a category. Bad tag names use mixed case, punctuation, or invented meaning that only one person understands.

When to Use Custom Fields Instead of Tags

If the answer is a value, not a yes/no, it belongs in a custom field. Preferred contact time, company name, industry, budget, referred by, and appointment notes are custom fields, not tags.

Custom fields also make personalization safe. Merging a first name from a field is reliable. Trying to personalize from a tag is not.

When to Use Custom Values

Custom values are for anything you would otherwise retype across emails, SMS templates, and workflows. Company name, main phone number, booking link, support email, physical address, and business hours are all good custom values.

The rule: if you would need to update it in more than three places when it changes, make it a custom value.

Smart Lists and Segments

Once tags and fields are planned, you can use them to create smart lists and segments.

A smart list is a saved view of contacts that match certain conditions, such as all contacts with source-facebook and status-new-lead.

A segment or filtered audience is a group of contacts you can use for review, reporting, or communication.

The important rule is simple: smart lists and segments are only as clean as the tags and fields underneath them. If the tag system is messy, the list will be messy too.

What to Build

A documented tag naming convention
Tag categories: source, interest, status, campaign, service, internal
A separate list of planned custom fields
A separate list of planned custom values
A short list of smart lists or segments you actually need
A rule for when a new tag can be created
A rule for when a custom field should be used instead of a tag
A rule for when a custom value should be used instead of hardcoded text

Before You Build in the CRM

Plan the tag, field, and value system before creating anything inside the CRM. It is easy to create tags quickly, but fast tag creation is one of the main reasons CRM accounts become messy.

Start outside the CRM. Use a document, spreadsheet, whiteboard, Figma board, or your preferred AI assistant to map the system first. Group tags by category, list the custom fields you actually need, and identify the business information that should become custom values.

Your planning document should answer:

?Which tags describe source?
?Which tags describe interest?
?Which tags describe relationship status?
?Which tags describe campaigns?
?Which tags describe services or products?
?Which tags are internal only?
?Which pieces of data belong in custom fields instead of tags?
?Which repeated account details belong in custom values?
?Which tags or fields will be used for smart lists later?
?Which tags should not be created because the pipeline already handles that status?

Note

Suggested AI prompt: “I am planning a CRM tag, custom field, and custom value system for my business. Help me create a clean structure. Separate tags into source, interest, status, campaign, service, and internal categories. Identify which information should be stored as custom fields instead of tags. Identify which repeated business details should become custom values. Point out any duplicate, vague, or unnecessary tags. Keep the system simple enough for a team to use consistently.” The best tag systems are boring, predictable, and documented. If a future team member cannot understand the tag list, the system is not clean yet.

Step-by-Step Training

1
Choose one naming convention, such as all lowercase and hyphen-separated.
2
Draft the tag categories your business needs: source, interest, status, campaign, service, and internal.
3
List example tags in each category before creating anything.
4
Identify which status items belong in pipeline stages instead of tags.
5
Identify the data that should live in custom fields, not tags.
6
Identify the repeated business details that should live in custom values, not hardcoded templates.
7
Plan the smart lists or segments you will need later.
8
Review the plan for duplicates, vague names, or tags that only one person understands.
9
Create the approved tags, custom fields, and custom values in the CRM.
10
Document the plan in a shared doc so future team members follow the same rules.

Practical Exercise

Part 1: Audit Your Current Tags and Fields

Open the tag list, custom field list, and any existing smart lists. Look for:

1
Duplicate tags with different spelling
2
Tags that store data instead of describing category, status, source, interest, campaign, service, or internal process
3
Tags with mixed naming styles
4
Old campaign tags that are no longer used
5
Status tags that duplicate pipeline stages for no reason
6
Custom fields created for one contact and never used again
7
Business info hardcoded into templates that should be a custom value
8
Smart lists or segments built from messy tags

Part 2: Build a Clean Tag Map

Create a tag map with these categories, and add 3 to 5 example tags under each:

1
source-*
2
interest-*
3
status-*
4
campaign-*
5
service-*
6
internal-*

Part 3: Build a Field and Value Map

Create two separate lists. Custom fields store contact-specific data. Custom values store reusable account-level business information.

1
Custom fields (contact-specific data)
2
Custom values (reusable account-level business information)

Done Means Done Checklist

✓The tag naming convention is documented
✓Tags are grouped by category
✓No duplicate tags mean the same thing
✓No tag stores data that belongs in a custom field
✓Custom fields are listed separately from tags
✓Custom values are listed separately from custom fields
✓Custom values exist for reused business info
✓Status tags do not unnecessarily duplicate pipeline stages
✓Smart lists or segments are planned from clean tags and fields
✓The team knows when to create a new tag and when not to
✓The team knows when to use a custom field instead of a tag
✓Old, unused tags have been archived, removed, or marked for cleanup

Common Mistakes

Watch for these

Using tags as a database instead of custom fields
Creating tags on the fly during workflow building
Mixing team-facing internal tags with contact-facing status tags
Never removing old campaign tags
Hardcoding phone numbers and addresses into every email instead of using custom values
Creating a new tag every time a new idea appears
Using status tags for everything instead of using pipeline stages
Confusing custom values with dropdown field options
Building smart lists from tags that were never standardized
Letting multiple team members create tags without a naming rule

Related SOPs

Tags and Custom Fields
Custom Values
Cleanup and Audit

Next lesson

Week 3: Communication Points and Lead Entry Map

Start Week 3