Custom Fields
Add your own questions to leads, clients, and individual service types — then use the answers as list columns, filters, report columns, and message wording.
Video walkthrough coming soon
Want this one filmed next? Request it
What it is
Joby comes with the usual boxes — name, phone, email, address, service type, status. Custom Fields let you add your own boxes on top of those, so your team can record the details that matter to your business: gate code, warranty end date, referred by, number of rooms, door color.
There are two separate places to build custom fields, and they behave differently. Picking the right one is the whole trick.
1. Company-wide fields
Built at Settings›Custom Fields. Two tabs: Clients and Leads. These always show on the form, and they can also become table columns, filters, report columns, and import targets.
2. Service-type fields
Built at Settings›Service Types›Custom Fields. These only appear on a lead once that exact service type is chosen — perfect for questions that only make sense for one kind of job.
💡 Tip: If you want the answer to show up as a column on the Leads page or as a filter, it has to be a company-wide field. Service-type fields only ever live on the lead form itself.
When to use it
- You keep writing the same thing in the notes box. Gate code, unit number, referred by, warranty date — turn it into a real field so it is searchable and filterable instead of buried in free text.
- You want to report on it. Company-wide lead fields can be switched on as columns in the Leads list and the Lead Report, and they come along in the CSV export.
- One service needs its own questions. A garage door job needs door color and spring type; a moving job needs number of rooms and distance. Use service-type fields so office agents only see what is relevant.
- You are importing a spreadsheet with extra columns. Import Leads and Import Clients let you park those columns into custom fields instead of throwing them away.
When not to use it: do not build a custom field for something Joby already tracks — status, ad source, service area, service type, or the money boxes on an estimate. Duplicating those splits your reporting in half.
Before you start
- Company-wide fields need an admin. Settings → Custom Fields is only reachable by admin accounts. Office agents can fill the fields in but cannot create them.
- Service-type fields need the Settings permission and at least one service type already created at Settings›Service Types.
- Decide the wording first. The label you type is what every office agent reads for years. "Gate Code" beats "GC".
- For a dropdown, write out the choices first. You must enter at least one choice before a dropdown will save.
- Go easy on required fields. A required company-wide field blocks the Save button on every new lead or client until it is filled.
Step-by-step
A. Add a company-wide field (leads or clients)
- Go to Settings›Custom Fields.
- Pick the Clients tab or the Leads tab depending on where the answer belongs.
- Click New Field.
- Fill in the New Field box:
- Field label — the wording your team will see, for example "Account Number" or "Referred By".
- Field type — Text, Long text, Number, Dropdown, Date, or Checkbox (Yes/No).
- Dropdown options (one per line) — only appears for Dropdown. Put each choice on its own line.
- Placeholder (optional) — faint example wording inside the empty box. Available for Text, Long text, and Number.
- Help text (optional) — a short note printed under the box.
- Required — Save is blocked until this field is filled.
- Show column — makes the field available as a column on the Leads or Clients list.
- Show filter — makes the field available in the filters.
- Click Save.
- Drag the handle on the left of each field card to set the order your team sees on the form. The new order saves by itself.
B. Add a field for one service type only
- Go to Settings›Service Types.
- Open the Custom Fields tab. (You can also click Manage Fields on a service type row — it opens the same tab with that service already picked.)
- Choose the service from the Service Type dropdown. The Add Field button stays greyed out until you do.
- Click Add Field.
- Fill in the Add Custom Field box:
- Field Name — the wording your team will see, for example "Door Color".
- Field Type — Text, Number, Select (Dropdown), or Text Area.
- Options (comma-separated) — only appears for Select. Separate the choices with commas, for example Red, Blue, White, Custom.
- Required field — marks the field with a red asterisk on the lead form.
- Display Order — a number. Lower numbers show first. There is no dragging here; type the number you want.
- Click Save.
⚠️ Note: Service-type fields offer four types only — Text, Number, Select (Dropdown), and Text Area. There is no Date and no Checkbox here. If you need a date or a yes/no, build it as a company-wide Leads field instead.
How to check it worked
- Go to Leads and start a new lead.
- Company-wide client fields appear inside the Client Details card. Company-wide lead fields appear inside the Lead Details card, under Lead Description.
- Pick the service type you edited. Its fields appear in a separate Additional Information card further down.
- Type a test answer and save. Reopen the lead and confirm the answer is still there.
- For a company-wide lead field with Show column on: go to Leads, click Columns, and tick your field. It should now show in the table.
- For a company-wide client field: go to Clients, click New Client, and confirm the field is on that form; then check the Clients column picker the same way.
If the field does not appear at all, the most common cause is that the Active switch on its card is turned off, or you are looking at the wrong service type.
Common mistakes
- Building it in the wrong place. A service-type field will never become a Leads column, a filter, or an import target. If you need any of those, build a company-wide Leads field.
- Expecting a service-type field before the service is picked. The Additional Information card is hidden until the lead's service type matches.
- Making a field required after the fact. Old leads and clients keep their blank answer, but the next person who edits one is forced to fill it in before they can save.
- Turning off Show filter and then hunting for the filter. Show column and Show filter are two different switches — a field can be a column and still not be filterable.
- Saving a dropdown with no choices. A company-wide Dropdown refuses to save until you add at least one line of options.
- Deleting instead of deactivating. Flip the Active switch off to retire a company-wide field. Deleting hides every answer already recorded — the answers are kept, but nobody can see them any more.
- Using two fields for the same thing. "Referred By" on clients and "Referral" on leads will split your reporting. Pick one home for each question.
More detail (4)
Field types, side by side
| Type | What it gives you | Company-wide | Service type |
|---|---|---|---|
| Text | One short line of typing | Yes | Yes |
| Long text / Text Area | A bigger box for several sentences | Yes (called "Long text") | Yes (called "Text Area") |
| Number | Digits only | Yes | Yes |
| Dropdown | Pick one from a list you write | Yes (one choice per line) | Yes, called "Select (Dropdown)" (choices separated by commas) |
| Date | A date picker | Yes | No |
| Checkbox (Yes/No) | A simple tick box | Yes | No |
Number fields accept any number — there is no minimum or maximum setting.
Where the answers show up
Company-wide fields travel a lot further than service-type fields. Here is the full list of places they reach.
Lists and columns
With Show column on, the field is offered in the Columns picker on the Leads page, in the Clients column picker, and on Pipeline cards.
Filters
With Show filter on, the field joins the advanced filters on the Leads page and the filter panel on the Clients page.
Reports, export, and import
Lead fields become columns in the Lead Report. The Export CSV button on the Leads page exports whichever columns are currently visible. Import Leads and Import Clients let you point a spreadsheet column at a custom field — or create a brand-new one mid-import.
Automations and lead ads
In Settings›Automations you can branch on a lead or client custom field, and the AI Phone Call step can capture one during the call. In Settings›Integrations›Facebook Lead Ads you can send a form answer straight into a lead custom field.
Service-type fields in message templates
Service-type fields can be dropped into SMS and email wording. Go to Settings›Communication Templates, open a template, and look for the Custom Fields group in the variable list. Clicking a field inserts a placeholder that looks like {{Lead.custom_Door Color}}, which is swapped for that lead's answer when the message goes out.
The variable list only shows service-type fields, grouped by service. Company-wide lead and client fields are not available as message placeholders.
Editing, reordering, and retiring fields
Company-wide fields
At Settings›Custom Fields, each field is a card. On the card you can:
- Reorder — drag the handle on the left. The order you set is the order on the form.
- Turn off temporarily — flip the Active switch. The field disappears from forms, columns, and filters, but every answer already recorded is kept.
- Edit — the pencil icon reopens the same box you used to create it.
- Delete — the bin icon. Joby asks you to confirm and warns that existing answers are kept but no longer shown.
The card also shows small labels so you can see the setup at a glance: Required, Hidden column (Show column is off), and No filter (Show filter is off).
Admins get a shortcut: on the Clients page there is a Custom fields button (and a Manage custom fields link at the bottom of the column picker) that jumps straight to the Clients tab of this page.
Service-type fields
At Settings›Service Types›Custom Fields, pick the service type and the fields appear in a table with Field Name, Type, Required, and Order. Use the pencil icon to edit and the bin icon to delete. To change the order, edit the field and type a new Display Order number — there is no dragging on this tab, and there is no on/off switch, so deleting is the only way to retire one.
If you have an old bookmark
Custom Fields used to sit at its own Settings page. That link still works: it now sends you to Settings›Service Types›Custom Fields. The separate Client Fields and Lead Fields pages have also been merged into the single Settings›Custom Fields page with its two tabs.