# How Reply works

> The system-level flow — prospect data becomes contacts and lists, sequences execute through accounts on schedules, replies land in the inbox, analytics closes the loop.

**Prospect data from Reply Data search, CSV imports, Findy, or CRM integrations becomes deduplicated contacts and lists; sequences combine email, LinkedIn, call, SMS, WhatsApp, task, Zapier, and condition steps; execution runs through connected mailboxes inside schedules and limits; replies land in the consolidated inbox with AI-assigned categories; Stats and Reports close the loop. Jason AI drives the same machine.**

_Status: Reviewed — human-edited, facts not yet confirmed against the product._

## The flow

```text
Prospect data          Reply Data live search · CSV import · Findy extension
      │                CRM integrations · manual entry
      ▼
Contacts and lists     deduplicated by the import identifier · accounts (companies)
      │                stages · custom fields · lists
      ▼
Sequences              email / LinkedIn / call / SMS / WhatsApp / task / Zapier /
      │                condition steps · A/B variants · variables
      │                (built from template, scratch, AI prompt, or Jason AI SDR)
      ▼
Execution              connected email + LinkedIn accounts · schedules · daily limits
      │                MailToaster warm-up · plain-text default · tracking toggles
      ▼
Replies and inbox      reply detection · stopping · AI-assigned categories · AI drafts
      │
      ▼
Analytics              sequence Stats · Reports dashboards (Emails, LinkedIn, Calls,
      │                Tasks, Team Performance, Channel Efficiency, Agency, Trends)
      └──────────────► iterate: fix the ICP, the copy, or the timing
```

## Each stage in one sentence

1. **Prospect data** — [Live Data search](/capabilities/prospect-search) finds contacts from LinkedIn data by your filters, [enrichment](/capabilities/data-enrichment) and email verification fill gaps, and [CSV imports](/how-to/import-contacts) (UTF-8, up to 10,000 rows per file) bring your own records.
2. **Contacts and lists** — every import row [deduplicates](/behavior/contact-deduplication) on the contact identifier you choose (Email, Last Name, or Phone) into one base, segmented by [lists](/specifications/lists) and grouped into [accounts](/specifications/companies).
3. **Sequences** — [steps](/specifications/sequence-steps) define what happens across channels, with A/B variants and per-step delays; [enrollment](/behavior/contact-enrollment) decides who it happens to.
4. **Execution** — [sequence execution](/behavior/sequence-execution) walks contacts through steps inside [schedules](/behavior/sending-schedules) and [limits](/reference/limits) (400 emails per account per day on paid plans), selecting accounts per the [mailbox rule](/behavior/mailbox-selection).
5. **Replies** — [detection](/behavior/reply-detection) stops the contact and routes the [conversation](/specifications/conversations) to the consolidated inbox, where [reply management](/capabilities/reply-management) applies AI-assigned categories and Jason AI can draft answers.
6. **Analytics** — the sequence Stats tab counts key metrics per prospect (a contact counts once across steps), and the Reports dashboards break performance down by channel and team on [shared definitions](/reference/calculations).

## Where the AI SDR sits

[Jason AI](/capabilities/ai-sdr) is not a separate pipeline — it drives this same machine:
it defines the ICP from your website, finds contacts in real time, generates the
multichannel sequence, personalizes each message, adds new contacts daily on Autopilot,
and handles replies as drafts for review or automatic sends — with approval wherever you
keep humans in the loop.

## Related

- [Product map](/start/product-map) — the same system as a module inventory
- [Build an AI SDR](/workflows/build-an-ai-sdr) — this flow as a build guide
- [Entity relationships](/reference/entity-relationships)

## Build with Reply

- REST API: [docs.reply.io](https://docs.reply.io) · Agent surfaces: [agents.reply.io](https://agents.reply.io)