Quickstart

About fifteen minutes, start to finish. At the end your line has answered a real call, and you have heard it yourself.

Setup is nine steps, one question each, and a fresh account walks them in this order. You can leave at any screen with Finish later, and setup picks up where you left off, on any device, because your progress is saved on our side. An account that has already paid skips the sample call and the plan screen once its business is confirmed. Forwarding appears only if you keep your own number.

Sign in

Go to leadbind.org and sign in with Apple, Google, or your email. See Signing in. A new account goes straight into setup.

1. What is your business called?

Type the name and city, and pick your business from the list. We fill in the phone, address, hours and what you do from its public listing.

If it is not listed, choose My business is not listed (or Add it yourself) and fill in Business name, what you do, and optionally your business phone, then Continue.

2. Is this your business?

The screen is titled with your business name, as Is this followed by the name. Check every line and change anything that is wrong. Mani answers your calls with exactly this. When it is right, choose Looks right.

3. Hear Mani answer

Hear Mani answer for your business is a short call, either in your browser or to your cell, answering as your business. Choose Start the call, and talk back like a customer would. It ends on its own in under a minute. A call to your cell is one call, placed between 8 AM and 9 PM your time. When live calls are not available, you hear a recorded call instead and choose Continue.

4. Put Mani on your line

Pick a plan, then Continue to payment. There is no free plan. See Plans, minutes, and billing. Your line is built the moment your payment is confirmed. Confirming your payment can take a few seconds, and if it takes longer the screen tells you where to write.

5. Which number should Mani answer?

Two choices:

• Keep your business number, which is the recommended one. You forward it to Mani, and callers dial the number they already know.
• Get a new number. A new local number for your business. Enter an area code, choose Find numbers, pick one, and choose Get followed by the number.

The screen explains call forwarding if you are not sure: it is a standard feature from your phone carrier, it sends calls you do not answer to another number, callers cannot tell, and you turn it on with one call and off the same way.

When your number is ready, the screen says Your LeadBind number is ready. and shows it.

6. Forward your calls to Mani

Only if you kept your own number. The screen is titled Forward followed by your business number, to Mani. Pick your carrier. On a computer you see a code and a QR code to scan with your phone. On a phone, choose Call to turn it on. You can also Copy code. You hear a short tone or a spoken confirmation, then hang up, and choose I turned it on. If a code does not take, ask your carrier to forward unanswered calls to your LeadBind number. To turn forwarding off later, dial the off code shown on the screen.

7. Hear your line answer

Hear your line answer asks you to call your LeadBind number from your cell, or your business number from a different phone if you kept it. The screen shows each step as it happens: Rang at the carrier, Answered, I heard you and Saved to your calls. Send me a test call is there if you would rather it called you. Only a call placed after you opened this page counts, and nothing turns green on a timer: it is read from a real call. When it has seen one, it says Your line is live and Continue opens. If you cannot call right now, Skip for now moves on, but the line is not marked live until a call has been answered.

8. Where should Mani book jobs?

Your LeadBind calendar uses the hours you confirmed and works now. If Google Calendar is available, the screen offers to connect it in Availability so Mani checks it before booking. See Availability and calendar.

9. Your line is live

The last screen says Your line is live. and that your business now answers at your number. Every call lands in Today. Choose Go to Today. Three rows offer what to do next: Turn on texting (carrier review takes a few days), Get the app, and See each setup step.

You also now have a project called Meet LeadBind, which checks the first steps off as you do them. See Projects and Meet LeadBind.

After setup

Set your hours

Open Availability. This is the single most important screen in the product, because the assistant will book anything you tell it it can book.

Set:

• Your working hours, per day. Not "9 to 5" if Fridays you stop at noon.
• Appointment length. How long one meeting takes.
• Buffer. Time between appointments so you are not walking in late. Fifteen minutes is a good default.
• Minimum notice. How far ahead someone must book. If you need an hour to get across town, put an hour here.
• Maximum per day. The cap that stops a good day from becoming an impossible one.

Tip: The mistake almost everybody makes is setting no minimum notice, then getting a booking for eleven minutes from now while they are on a ladder.

If you did not connect Google Calendar in setup, do it here. Without it, LeadBind only knows about the appointments LeadBind made. With it, it reads your existing busy times and will not book on top of them. Full detail: Availability and calendar.

Tell it about your business

Open Front desk and use Teach your front desk to add files or your website. You are not writing a script, because the script is kept up for you. You are giving it facts to answer from. Full detail: Front desk: voice, how it feels, what it knows.

Call it again, like a customer

You heard it answer in step 7. Now try to break it: ask a normal question, try to book, interrupt it, mumble, ask something it was never told. Listen for whether it gets your business right, offers times that work for you, puts the appointment on your calendar, and sends you the confirmation. Full checklist: Test before you go live.

Turn on speed to lead

Once the calls sound right, go to Automations and turn on speed to lead. Now a new lead gets called back automatically, in seconds.

Start with a short delay rather than zero. A few seconds feels attentive. Instant sometimes feels like a robot caught the form submit, because it did.

Full detail: Speed to lead.

What to do next

What to do next, roughly in the order it pays off:

• Reminders and confirmations if no-shows cost you money. This is the highest-return thing left.
• Follow-up sequences for the leads who did not answer the first call.
• Your booking page so you can send a link and let people book themselves.
• AI Access if you use Claude or ChatGPT and want to just ask about your day.

Important: Before you send a single text to anyone, read Consent and opt-outs. Texting rules carry real penalties, and LeadBind can only enforce part of them for you.