Contacts

Working with Contact Tags

Tags are flexible labels you can apply to contacts to organize, segment, and automate your data. Unlike custom fields, which store specific pieces of information, tags are labels that make it easy to group contacts based on shared characteristics, activities, or events. A contact can have as many tags as needed.

Common uses for tags

Every organization uses tags a little differently, but common examples include:

  • Board Members

  • Committee Members

  • Conference Attendee

  • Webinar Registrant

  • Sponsor

  • Volunteer

  • New Member

  • Past Event Participant

Tags can also be applied automatically by forms, workflows, or other automations.

Use tags to segment contacts

One of the most common uses for tags is creating targeted lists of contacts, such as a Smart List of everyone tagged Board Member, everyone tagged 2026 Annual Conference, or everyone tagged Volunteer.

These Smart Lists can then be used for email campaigns, text messages, reporting, or additional automations.

Because tags are easy to add and remove, they are an excellent way to create temporary groups for events, campaigns, or special projects. Apply a tag to one or more contacts from the contacts list, or let a workflow add and remove tags automatically.

Use tags to trigger automations

Tags are frequently used as workflow triggers in JourneyCARE. When a tag is added to a contact, a workflow can automatically send a welcome email, grant access to a portal group, enroll the contact in a course, send event information, notify staff, or start a follow-up sequence.

Removing a tag can trigger a different automation or remove access to resources.

The Contact Tag trigger fires when a tag is added to or removed from a contact, and the Add Contact Tag and Remove Contact Tag workflow actions change tags automatically.

Using tags as automation triggers allows you to build flexible processes without manually starting workflows for each contact.

Tag best practices

  • Use clear, descriptive tag names that everyone on your team will understand.

  • Reserve tags for labels or groupings, not permanent contact information.

  • Use custom fields for information such as membership type, renewal date, or certification status.

  • Remove temporary tags when they are no longer needed to keep your database organized.

Organize tags with categories and colors

Group related tags into categories and assign a color to each tag so your tag library stays organized and easy to scan. This is available in Labs.

  • Every tag belongs to a category. Tags without an assigned category appear under No category.

  • Create categories and move an individual tag or multiple tags at once between categories.

  • Deleting a category automatically moves its tags to No category.

  • Assign a color from the predefined list, or use the color picker to select a custom color such as a brand color. Tags without a selected color use gray.

  • Existing tags start in gray under No category and can be recolored or moved later.

  • Tag colors appear when adding tags from the contact details page and when viewing tags in Smart List columns.

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