Contacts

How EngageApp models your end-users as contacts, the fields they carry, and the ways to add them.

A contact is one of your end-users. Contacts are the audience of every campaign, and their fields power both segmentation and template merge fields.

Contact fields

Each contact carries a standard set of fields:

  • external_id — your own stable identifier for the contact. EngageApp uses it to sync and identify the same person across imports, API calls, and SDK sessions.
  • Email and phone — used by the email, SMS, and WhatsApp channels.
  • First name and last name.
  • Custom attributes — arbitrary key/value data stored as JSON (e.g. plan, signup date, lifetime value).
  • Subscribed flag — whether the contact currently consents to receive messages.
  • Timezone — used to schedule and localize sends.

Contacts can also register one or more devices to receive push notifications.

Adding contacts

There are three ways to get contacts into EngageApp:

  • CSV import — upload and map a spreadsheet under Contacts → Import. See Importing contacts.
  • Public API — call POST /api/v1/public/contacts to batch upsert contacts from your backend.
  • In-app SDK — call the SDK's identify method to create or update the current contact.

The contact profile

Open any contact to see their full profile: current attributes, their event history, and their campaign activity (which campaigns they were enrolled in and what was sent). This is the fastest way to debug why a contact did or did not receive a message.

Next steps

Related

Importing contacts

Bulk-load or update your audience by uploading a CSV and mapping its columns to contact fields.

Segments

Group contacts by attribute and behavior rules to target campaigns and manual enrollments.

Events

Send behavioral events about your contacts to trigger campaigns, gate waits, and power segments.

Public API reference

The public HTTP API for server-side and SDK integrations — authentication headers and endpoints.