All documentation · Customers & deals

Lead routing rules

Assign new leads automatically. Build a percentage split or a score-band hierarchy, set a fallback, and check the Deviation column to see whether the split is holding.

7 min read · Reviewed 2026-07-13

A lead that lands in an unassigned pile goes cold while everyone assumes someone else has it. Routing rules decide, at the moment a lead arrives, whose name goes on it. This guide covers the two routing methods, the fallback, and how to tell whether your rule is actually doing what you told it to.

Where routing lives

Go to /settings/lead-assignment. Three tabs:

Routing only runs if the org switch is on: A perfect rule does nothing unless Automatically route new leads is enabled in Admin Settings. If new leads keep arriving unassigned, check that switch first — see organization-settings.

Creating a rule

The Create routing rule sheet asks for a Rule name — the placeholder is e.g., Round robin for sales team, and something that plain is exactly right. Then you choose one of two methods.

Method 1 — Split by percentage

Split by percentage allocates a share of incoming leads to each team member. Use it when your reps are roughly interchangeable and you're balancing load, or when you want to deliberately tilt volume toward someone with capacity.

The total must be exactly 100%: Clyentra will not let you save an allocation that doesn't add up: "Total allocation must be 100% before saving". If you remove someone from the split, redistribute their share before you try to save.

Method 2 — Hierarchy-Based

Hierarchy-Based routing does something a percentage split cannot: it reads the lead's score. The helper text is the whole idea in one line — "Assign leads by score band and team order."

You define levels. Each level has a score minimum and maximum on a 0-100 scale, plus the team members who work that band. Within a level, leads are handed out round-robin. If a level can't take the lead, it falls through to the next one.

This only works as well as your scoring does. The score bands here line up with the Cold lead range and Hot lead range you configure in Lead Score Rules — set those up first, in leads-and-customers.

The point of hierarchy routing: Percentage splits treat a lead worth $200 the same as one worth $200,000. Score-band routing does not. If you have one rep who closes enterprise deals, hierarchy routing is how you make sure the enterprise leads reach them.

The fallback

Every rule has a checkbox, on by default: "Use even distribution if this rule cannot assign the lead" — with the explanation "If no team member matches this rule, assign the lead evenly."

Leave it on. It is the difference between an unmatched lead being spread evenly across the team and an unmatched lead sitting in nobody's queue. A hierarchy rule with a gap in its score bands, or a percentage rule whose members are all unavailable, will otherwise drop the lead on the floor.

Building your first rule

1. Turn on automatic routing. In Admin Settings, enable Automatically route new leads. Without this, nothing you build here runs — see organization-settings.
2. Open `/settings/lead-assignment` and hit `Create routing rule`. Give it a Rule name you'll recognize in three months.
3. Pick a method. Split by percentage for load balancing, Hierarchy-Based if lead score should decide who gets what.
4. Allocate. For a percentage split, hit exactly 100%. For hierarchy, set each level's 0-100 score band and add the members who work it.
5. Leave the fallback on. "Use even distribution if this rule cannot assign the lead" catches everything your rule doesn't.
6. Activate it. You'll see "Configuration activated". The rule now appears under Active Routing Rule and starts assigning.

Checking that it works

This is the tab people skip and shouldn't. Routing Performance shows every team member with their Total, Today, and This Month assignment counts — and a Deviation column.

Deviation is the honest number: it tells you whether the split you designed is the split you're getting. If Dana is allocated 50% but her deviation is running well under, something is interfering — she may be inactive, or the fallback may be absorbing more leads than you expected. A rule that looks correct in the editor and wrong in Deviation is wrong.

Check Deviation after any team change: Someone joins, someone leaves, someone goes on holiday — the allocation you wrote three months ago is now describing a team that no longer exists. Deviation is where you notice.

Turning a rule off

Rules are switched, not deleted. Clyentra confirms with "Turn off rule?" and then reports "Rule turned off". Because only one rule is the Active Routing Rule at a time, activating a different one is usually what you actually want — you build the replacement first, then switch.

Routing and the rest of the stack

Routing sits between capture and work. Leads arrive from forms-and-booking, from WhatsApp, from e-commerce, or from a bulk import. Routing puts a name on them. Then a workflow can email the lead and task the owner within seconds of assignment — see workflow-automation. Who can be routed a lead at all depends on their role: see manage-your-team.