# Quickstart: signup to your first ranked lead URL: https://useembers.com/help/getting-started/quickstart/ Category: Getting started Updated: 2026-10-31 Last verified: 2026-10-31 > Create an account, give Embers your website, confirm the ICP it drafts, pick what to watch, and reveal the first ranked queue from public LinkedIn activity. Embers gets you from signup to a ranked list of people worth messaging in one sitting. This walkthrough covers every screen up to your first queue, and the next day. ## Before you start - Your company website, or a few sentences about who buys from you. - The public LinkedIn URL of at least one profile or company page whose audience your buyers are in: your own, a competitor's, or an influencer's. Not sure yet? You can start from a keyword instead. Your [free trial](/help/account-and-billing/free-trial/) starts with the account: your first 2,000 engagers or 7 days from the first time you open your leads, whichever comes first, on Solo limits and with no card. The 7 days start when you first see them, at the end of setup or on the **Leads** page, so setup does not use them up. If you never open your leads, the trial ends 30 days after signup. ## Set up your account Setup has three steps, **Website**, **Your ICP**, and **Monitors**, and saves as you go, so a refresh or another device resumes in the same place. **Skip setup**, at the top right, appears once your ICP is ready, and opens the dashboard. The **Website** step has none, and neither does **Your ICP** while the draft is still being written or has failed: without an ICP there is nothing to match leads against. ### Create an account On the register screen, enter an email address and a password of at least eight characters and choose **Create account and scan**, or use **Continue with Google**. No card is asked for. Setup does not wait for the verification link Embers emails you; if it fails, see [sign-in and verification problems](/help/troubleshooting/sign-in-problems/). ### Give Embers your website Paste your company website and choose **Analyze**. A personal LinkedIn profile or a post is not a company website: the field says so as soon as you paste one, and **Analyze** does not send it. Your company's LinkedIn page works, though the website usually says more about what you sell. With no website, choose **No website yet? Describe your buyers instead** and write up to 4,000 characters about your ideal buyer. Embers drafts your ideal customer profile from it. If you answer **Where are your buyers?**, those places become the ICP's locations as given, and **Anywhere** means no location filter; skip it and Embers works the locations out from your website and description. See [define your ICP](/help/getting-started/define-your-icp/). ### Confirm your ICP The **Your ICP** step opens on "Is this you, Acme?" with the company Embers read from your website, or "Your ideal buyers, ready to refine." when it worked from your description. If it read your website as a different business, choose **This isn't my business** to describe your buyers in a sentence instead, and Embers drafts the ICP again. The step shows **Who you sell to**, with a **Left out** list of the people Embers will not count, plus job titles, locations, company sizes in employees (such as 51-200), and industries as chips. **Who we'd call a buyer** shows up to three real people who posted on LinkedIn this week and match the ICP, with their headline and, when Embers has one, why they fit, so you see who it would count before any scan. It checks again after you edit; when nobody matched, it says so and suggests widening the titles or industries. Edit anything that is wrong, then choose **Use this ICP**; on a phone it stays at the bottom of the screen. Embers finds business buyers in LinkedIn engagement, so when your buyers look like people buying for themselves, or like employers for a job search, a note under **Who you sell to** says why and to expect fewer leads. Go back and describe business buyers if you have them, or continue anyway. The rest of the criteria live on the ICP page; see [define your ICP](/help/getting-started/define-your-icp/). ### Choose what to watch Add LinkedIn profiles, company pages, keywords, or single posts, and tag each profile with who it is, such as **Myself** or Competitor. The first scan reads a profile or company page you add. With nothing to add, **Not sure who to watch yet?** offers **Skip, just find me leads**: the first scan searches recent LinkedIn posts for a keyword from your ICP, the authors of relevant posts become your leads, and Embers starts tracking that keyword, scanned every 24 hours once you go to your dashboard. It is not offered when your ICP gives no usable keyword, or when your plan has no keyword slot (Free without a trial). **Suggested for you**, under the field, lists pages and keywords picked for your ICP. The first three pages arrive ticked: they run in your first scan without you adding anything, and you can clear any of them. Keywords are added with their own **Add**. Then choose **Finish & start**, which adds the ticked pages and runs the first scan over them and anything you added. [Add the profiles, pages, and keywords to watch](/help/getting-started/connect-your-linkedin-profile/) covers every option and plan limit. ### Reveal your queue While the first scan runs the screen reads **Finding your first leads**. It lists four stages (sources verified, activity collected, buyers matched, queue ranked) and shows what each one found. Under them, **Checking people who engaged** shows Embers checking people against your ICP as you watch: each arrives as **Checking fit**, a match stays with **Matches your ICP**, and anyone else reads **Not a fit** and leaves the list. Only the matches become leads, and your ranked queue replaces the list when the scan finishes. The scan usually takes 2 to 5 minutes. You do not have to stay on this screen. Choose **Keep exploring** to open the dashboard and browse the app, and keep the tab open: wherever you are when the scan finishes, a notice says **Your first leads are ready** with a **View leads** button, and the Leads count in the sidebar updates. If you would rather close the tab, choose **Email me when it is ready**. When the queue is ready the screen says how many people match your ICP, shows a few of their faces and where they came from, for example "From 114 people who engaged with 5 posts in the last 12 months."; choose **Reveal my queue**. The dashboard shows the top match, why that person surfaced, and the rest of the ranking. On Solo and above, your trial included, choose **Write reply** on the top match: Embers writes a connection note (or a direct message) from what they engaged with, in a box you can edit. Choose **Copy and open LinkedIn** to copy it and open their profile in a new tab, then send it yourself: Embers never sends anything on LinkedIn. When you come back, **Sent it?** asks whether it went: **Mark contacted** moves them to the Contacted tab in Leads, **Not yet** keeps the message open, and **Undo** takes a Mark contacted back. See [generate and edit a DM draft](/help/outreach/dm-drafts/) for the draft itself. Choose **Inspect this lead**, or any other lead in the ranking, and answer **Is this the kind of buyer you want?** to tell Embers whether the match is right. A lead you open from the ranking offers its own **Write reply** under that question, with the same message box, **Sent it?**, and **Mark contacted**; after you answer **No**, it is not offered. On a plan that cannot draft messages (Free, with no trial running), the top match and each lead you open offer **Open on LinkedIn** instead, which opens their profile so you can reach out yourself. **All leads** opens the full list. Until you have acted on a lead (had a message written, marked someone contacted, or sent a lead to a connected tool), **Write reply** is the screen's blue button. After that, **Go to my dashboard** is. ### Go to your dashboard Choose **Go to my dashboard**. It ends the preview, completes setup, and turns on any agent still waiting, so your sources are scanned every 24 hours from here. See [choose your agents](/help/getting-started/choose-your-agents/) for what runs. > **Note: The older setup view** > > Until October 31, 2026, **Use the previous setup instead** on the setup screen switches to the older four-step version, which also asks how you will use Embers. Both save the same answers. ## When the first scan comes back empty An empty first run is a result, not a failure, and Embers names which kind of empty it hit: - **No public posts to read** in the lookback window, 365 days by default. - **Nobody engaged** with the public activity it found. - **No buyers cleared your ICP.** - **Buyers matched but could not be verified**, because their profile was missing a name, role, company, or photo. - **Buyers matched, but none of their posts described a need you solve.** Only a keyword scan ends this way: people who fit your ICP posted about the keyword, but to sell, recruit, or chat rather than to describe a problem. After an empty run Embers tries one narrower source on its own, such as a keyword drawn from your ICP or a competitor you watch. Retrying a failed run does not use up that attempt. Once it is spent, the screen points you at recurring scans. [No leads yet](/help/troubleshooting/no-leads-yet/) goes through each cause, and [how far back the first scan reads](/help/signals/history-lookback/) explains the window. ## Finish the setup checklist While the workspace is still being set up, the workspace owner sees **Finish setup** at the foot of the sidebar: how many of its six steps are done, such as "2 of 6 done", **Next:** with the next step as a link, and **See every step**, which opens the **Setup** page (`/setup`). Select its title to fold it. It starts folded if you chose **Skip setup** during onboarding (offered once your ICP is ready), and it goes away once setup is complete. While your first scan is still running, **Next:** reads **See your first scan** and opens it, since there are no leads to act on yet. On a phone, which has no sidebar, the same card sits at the top of the dashboard. The six steps are **Define your ICP**, **Watch a profile**, **Start recurring scans**, **Add a second signal source**, **Act on a lead**, and **Set up delivery**, which is optional. The Setup page turns the one-off preview into a daily routine with the last four, and each ticks itself when you do the work: 1. **Start recurring scans.** At least one agent live. Your agents start on their own once your first scan finishes, so this usually ticks itself. **Configure agent** opens Agents. 2. **Add the preferred extra signal source.** A keyword or another watched profile. **Choose a source** opens Agents. 3. **Act on a lead.** Generate a [DM draft](/help/outreach/dm-drafts/), mark one lead contacted, or let Embers send a lead to a connected tool such as an outreach tool, your CRM, a sheet, or a webhook. A Slack alert does not count. **Open leads** opens Leads. 4. **Configure delivery or collaboration.** Optional: email delivery, a signed webhook, or a teammate. **Review delivery** opens Webhooks. Until your first scan finishes, the page reads "Your agents start once your first scan finishes." **Start my agents now** starts them straight away. It needs a plan, and your trial counts; on Free the page offers **Start with Solo** instead. If your first scan failed, **Start my agents anyway** on the scan screen does the same. ## What to do on day two Come back the next day, once the agents have run: - Open the [Priority Queue](/help/leads/priority-queue/) at `/priority-queue` and work the top of it. Message two or three people by hand. - On anyone clearly wrong, answer **Is this a lead?** with **No** in the lead's ICP fit section. If a whole role keeps coming up wrong, [edit the ICP](/help/leads/change-your-icp/) instead: an answer only pins that one person. - Add the source you skipped: a competitor or influencer on the watchlist, or the keywords your buyers actually type. ## Related - [Define your ICP](/help/getting-started/define-your-icp/): What Embers matches people against, and how to correct it. - [Find your way around](/help/getting-started/find-your-way-around/): The sidebar, search, and keyboard shortcuts. - [No leads yet](/help/troubleshooting/no-leads-yet/): What to check when the queue stays empty. ## Frequently asked questions **Do I have to verify my email before I start?** No. Embers sends a verification link, but setup does not wait for it. Settings, then Profile shows your address as not confirmed, with a resend button, until you confirm. **Can I leave while the first scan runs?** Yes. Setup is saved on the server, so a refresh, a second tab, or another device picks up in the same place. Embers also emails you once when your first leads are ready. **Does setup start my trial?** Creating the account does, and its 7 days start the first time you open your leads. Your trial covers your first 2,000 engagers or 7 days from that first look, whichever comes first, with no card. If you never open your leads, the trial ends 30 days after signup. Someone who joins through an invitation uses that workspace's plan and gets no trial of their own.