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Pro plan. Smartlead works through a connection and HTTP steps, which are part of Pro and Agency (and the free trial). Anything you already have keeps working on every plan. See Plans and billing.
With Smartlead connected, a campaign step adds the contact to one of your Smartlead campaigns. Smartlead sends the emails, with its own inboxes and warm-up. Another step pauses the contact in Smartlead, so they don’t get another cold email.
1

Connect Smartlead

In Smartlead, open Settings and copy your API Key. In Kerux, go to Integrations > Connections, click Connect on the Smartlead row (under Email and calendar), paste the key in Smartlead API key and click Save. The panel then shows your Smartlead connection: click Test connection. One Smartlead connection serves both Smartlead steps.
2

Add the contact to a Smartlead campaign

In your campaign, click +, open the Automations tab of Add a step and choose Smartlead: add the contact to a campaign. In its panel, pick your Smartlead connection in Account, then the Smartlead campaign from the list. The contact’s email, first and last name, company, title and LinkedIn profile go with it.
3

Pause the contact in Smartlead

Add Smartlead: pause the contact where the contact should stop getting Smartlead emails, and pick the same Smartlead campaign. Kerux finds the contact in Smartlead by email and pauses their emails there.
A common flow: invitation and LinkedIn messages first; if they don’t accept or don’t answer, add them to Smartlead with Smartlead: add the contact to a campaign so they get your email sequence.
When a contact replies on LinkedIn, the campaign stops for them (the When the contact replies box), so a pause step later in the flow isn’t reached. That box can’t pause them in Smartlead, so if they are in a Smartlead campaign, pause them in Smartlead yourself.

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Common problems

Smartlead needs an email. A contact without one waits with Paused: this step needs data the contact doesn’t have instead of being sent. Add the email (or find it with enrichment) and the contact continues.
The contact waits with Paused: the other service rejected the key, and the connection shows Smartlead’s words (for example “HTTP 401: Plan expired!”). Renew the plan or paste a new key, click Test connection, and waiting contacts continue within 15 minutes. Test connection only reads your campaign list, which can still work while the plan is expired, so renew the plan first.
Smartlead skips a contact it already has in the campaign (or one on its block list or unsubscribed). The step still succeeds; nothing is sent twice.