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The Candidates page gives you three ways to find people: the search bar for quick lookups, structured filters for precise slices of your database, and the Search tab for deep, AI-powered sourcing across the whole pool. Open the Candidates page from the left menu (shortcut: G then A; see all keyboard shortcuts).
The Candidates page with the search bar and Filters button
The search bar sits in the top left of the candidate table. Type a name or keyword to narrow the list as you type.
Looking up who owns an email address or phone number? Use global search (⌘K / Ctrl+K) instead. It finds the person an identifier belongs to across the whole database.
The search bar supports full Boolean queries with AND, OR, NOT, and parentheses. Spott switches to Boolean mode automatically as soon as your query contains double quotes:
This gives you precise control when a plain keyword search returns too much.
A Boolean query in the candidate search bar

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Apply structured filters

Click the Filters button above the table to add a filter. Filters are grouped by the kind of data they match, including:
  • Current Job Title, Years of Experience, and Keywords
  • Company, with industry and past companies
  • Location and Education
  • Compensation and Last Interaction
  • Jobs, Lists, and Source
  • Any custom fields your workspace has configured
  • Compliance filters such as consent status, when consent tracking is enabled
The filter menu with its filter groups
By default, results match all applied filters. Use the three-dot menu on an applied filter to combine filters as any instead, for example “Paris or London”. A couple of filters people look for that do not exist as such:
  • There is no region-level filter. To cover a region, add each country to a Location filter set to match any, and save it as a view to reuse.
  • There is no “has received an email” filter. Use Last Interaction to find candidates you have or have not been in touch with recently.
Location is geocoded, so a radius search works and both “London” and “Greater London” resolve to the same area.

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AI text to filters

You do not need to know where each filter lives. Keep typing a description in the filter box, for example “React developer with 5+ years of experience, living in California”, and Spott converts it into filters for you with AI Text to filters.
AI Text to filters converting a description into filters

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Deep sourcing with the Search tab

Where the search bar and filters match profile fields, Search runs an AI-ranked search across every candidate in your database, including their notes and attachments. Open it from Search under Tools in the left menu, or from the Search tab next to All candidates at the top left of the Candidates page.
The Search tab with the prompt box and recent searches
Describe your ideal profile in your own words, or use Start from to base the search on an existing job in Spott or on a pasted job description. Spott turns your input into pre-filters and criteria that you review before running the search, then ranks the results by match score. The tags under the prompt box, for example Job Title, Location, and Experience, light up as Spott recognises those details in your description. They let you check what was picked up before you run the search.

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Recent searches and history

Your recent searches sit under the prompt box, each with its pre-filters and criteria, its top match, and the number of candidates found. Click one to reopen it instead of describing the profile again. Search History, in the top right, shows the full list.

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Reading the results

Search and Matching run on the same engine and return the same result table. How the two halves of a search work together is explained in full there:

Filters vs criteria

Why pre-filters narrow the pool and criteria rank what is left.

Read a match score

Scores from 0 to 100, the thumbs rating per criterion, and the reasoning behind them.
The difference is the starting point. Matching builds the search from a job’s context automatically, so use it when you are filling a specific role. Use Search when you want to explore your database without tying the search to a job. The pre-filters and criteria chips above the results stay editable. Open either one to adjust the search and run it again, rather than describing the profile from scratch.

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Act on the results

Work through the list with the All, To Review, and Reviewed tabs. Tick the candidates you want, and an action bar appears at the bottom of the table.
The bulk action bar with Accept, Mark as reviewed, and Enrich
  • Accept moves the selected candidates into a pipeline. A stage picker opens so you choose where they land, using the stages your workspace has configured.
  • Mark as reviewed moves them to the Reviewed tab, so you can keep working through the ones you have not judged yet.
  • Candidate Actions and Communication Actions hold the bulk operations on the selected records.
  • Enrich looks up missing emails and phone numbers for the selection. See contact enrichment.
The stage picker that opens from Accept
Use Share Search, in the top right, to hand the search over to a colleague.

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Save filters into Views

Save a set of filters as a view to come back to it later. You can create as many views as you want:
  • Click the view picker (it shows All at first)
  • Set your filters
  • Click Save view
  • The saved view is now available from the dropdown
When you change filters, sorts, or columns on a view, a save / discard prompt appears at the top of the table. Changes only stick after you save them.
The view picker with saved views

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Organize results

  • By default the table is sorted by last activity, so recently active candidates come first.
  • Sort on any sortable column from its header menu. Sorts are saved as part of the view.
  • Results in the Search tab and in matching are always ranked by match score.
  • Clear all filters to return to the full candidate list.