Capturing Email Replies

Overview

When an email sent through SmartLead receives a reply, our system triggers a webhook notification containing detailed information about the correspondence. With our enhanced webhook system, you can now accurately track replies from different contacts within the same organization.

Use Cases

Account-Based Marketing: Accurately track all stakeholders who engage with your campaigns
CRM Integration: Update contact records with precise engagement data
Follow-up Automation: Create personalized follow-up sequences based on who actually responded
Analytics: Generate accurate response attribution reports
Team Collaboration: Route responses to the appropriate team members based on who replied

Webhook Payload

Below is an example of our enhanced webhook payload structure:

{
  "campaign_status": "COMPLETED",
  "stats_id": "a891fe37-c45d-21e8-67ba-fcd44e9c33a8",
  "sl_email_lead_id": "1482956",
  "sl_email_lead_map_id": 1438627,
  "sl_lead_email": "[email protected]",
  "from_email": "[email protected]",
  "cc_emails": [],
  "subject": "Some more conversions?",
  "to_email": "[email protected]",
  "to_name": "James Parker",
  "time_replied": "2025-03-28T09:35:01+00:00",
  "event_timestamp": "2025-03-28T09:35:01+00:00",
  "message_id": "<BDD5kUwc77maSjLRv2gmq35VkzEF9K4L3csPPCVx8e5kWbUnrsD@mail.gmail.com>",
  "preview_text": "webhook reply\n",
  "campaign_name": "email sent",
  "campaign_id": 9181,
  "sequence_number": 1,
  "secret_key": "4f7c8d23-a619-58c2-93g6-72936ee16f38",
  "app_url": "https://app.smartlead.ai/app/master-inbox?leadMap=1438627",
  "ui_master_inbox_link": "https://app.smartlead.ai/app/master-inbox?leadMap=1438627",
  "description": "[email protected] replied to Email 1 for campaign - email sent ",
  "metadata": {
    "webhook_created_at": "2025-03-28T08:14:40.843Z"
  },
  
  // NEW: Enhanced Lead Correspondence Information
  "leadCorrespondence": {
    "targetLeadEmail": "[email protected]",  // Original recipient
    "replyReceivedFrom": "[email protected]",      // Actual responder
    "repliedCompanyDomain": "DifferentCompany"       // Domain relationship
  },
  
  "webhook_url": "https://webhook.site/35def789-4c28-3951-ef12-7abc9d3254cd",
  "webhook_id": 799,
  "webhook_name": "user",
  "event_type": "EMAIL_REPLY"
}

Key Changes in the Webhook Payload

The most significant enhancement to our webhook system is the addition of the leadCorrespondence object, which contains the following properties:

Property	Description
`targetLeadEmail`	The email address of the original recipient who was targeted in your campaign
`replyReceivedFrom`	The email address of the actual person who replied to your email
`repliedCompanyDomain`	Indicates the relationship between the responder and the original recipient. Values can be "SameCompany", "DifferentCompany", or "Unknown"

Response Scenarios

Our enhanced webhook system can now accurately handle various response scenarios:

Scenario 1: Direct Reply

When the original recipient replies directly to your email, both targetLeadEmail and replyReceivedFrom will contain the same email address.

Scenario 2: Colleague Reply (Same Company)

When a different person from the same company replies to your email, the webhook will:

Identify the original recipient in targetLeadEmail
Identify the actual responder in replyReceivedFrom
Set repliedCompanyDomain to "SameCompany"

Scenario 3: Different Company Reply

When a person from a different company replies (perhaps due to email forwarding), the webhook will:

Identify the original recipient in targetLeadEmail
Identify the actual responder in replyReceivedFrom
Set repliedCompanyDomain to "DifferentCompany"

Implementation Steps

To leverage this enhanced webhook functionality:

Update Webhook Endpoints: Ensure your webhook endpoint is prepared to process the additional leadCorrespondence object
Modify Your Integration Logic: Update your code to check who actually replied to your emails
Enhance Your Follow-up Logic: Create more personalized follow-ups based on who responded
Update Your Analytics: Include the actual responder in your attribution reporting

Backward Compatibility

For existing integrations, all previous webhook fields remain unchanged. The new leadCorrespondence object is simply an addition to the payload. This ensures all existing integrations will continue to function without modification.

Error Handling

Our enhanced webhook system includes improved email parsing logic to handle various email clients and reply formats. In cases where the responder cannot be confidently determined, the system will default to the original recipient information but will indicate this in the repliedCompanyDomain value as "Unknown".

Testing Your Integration

We recommend testing your webhook integration with various response scenarios:

Direct replies from the original recipient
Replies from colleagues of the original recipient
Replies from email forwards to different companies
Replies with unusual formatting or from different email clients