Describe Manually Mode
How Manual Mode Works
Describe Manually lets you create an ICP entirely from free-text descriptions based on your team's knowledge. No historical data, CSV uploads, or CRM integration required. TrailSpark processes your natural language descriptions into a structured scoring model.
This is the fastest way to start and works well for early-stage companies, teams entering new markets, or anyone who prefers a qualitative approach.
Prerequisites
- Owner, Admin, or Editor role
- Available model capacity on your plan
Wizard Steps
Manual mode has four steps (no Opportunities step since there is no data upload):
| Step | Required |
|---|---|
| Accounts | Yes |
| Contacts | Optional (can skip) |
| Signals | Optional (can skip) |
| Review | Yes (unlocks after Accounts) |
The Review step unlocks after Accounts is completed.
Step 1: Accounts
Describe your ideal customer companies and account-level detractors in two text areas.
Ideal customers -- Be specific about industries, company size (employee count, revenue), geography, technology stack, business model, and growth stage. The more dimensional your description, the better the resulting model.
Example:
Mid-market B2B SaaS companies in North America with 200-1000 employees.
Use Salesforce as their CRM. Industries: technology, professional services,
healthcare technology. Have established sales processes but need better
lead qualification.
Account detractors -- Describe companies that are not a good fit: too small, wrong industry, lacking required infrastructure, etc.
Step 2: Contacts (Optional)
Describe the key personas involved in purchasing decisions and contact-level detractors.
Cover job titles, seniority, departments, responsibilities, and buying committee composition. For detractors, describe contacts without budget authority or from irrelevant departments.
If skipped, the ICP focuses on account-level characteristics only.
Step 3: Signals (Optional)
Describe positive engagement signals indicating buying intent and negative signals indicating poor fit.
If skipped, the model relies on firmographic and persona matching only.
Step 4: Review & Create
- Review the status of all steps and your descriptions
- Click Begin Analysis & Preview -- TrailSpark processes your descriptions into structured ICP criteria and generates a model preview
- Review the model preview, optionally add notes to refine it, and name the model
- Click Create Model to save and activate the model
Writing Effective Descriptions
Be specific, not generic. "Companies with 200-1000 employees and $10M-$100M annual revenue" is far more useful than "medium-sized companies."
Indicate priority. "Must be in technology or healthcare" vs. "Ideally 200+ employees, but 100+ acceptable" vs. "Prefer companies using Salesforce" -- these distinctions help the model weight criteria correctly.
Cover multiple dimensions. Each description should address size, industry, geography, technology, and business model where relevant.
Manual mode is a good starting point that you can refine later. As you accumulate data, create new ICP versions using SparkSense Agent or Upload & Analyze to validate or replace your manually-defined model.
Next Steps
- SparkSense Agent Mode -- AI-powered CRM analysis
- Upload & Analyze Mode -- Data-driven CSV approach