Set up the Lead & Partner Finder

How the finder works

The Lead & Partner Finder searches YouTube and the web for creators and websites that match your search terms. It then visits each website to look for a contact address the site publishes. It never sends email: you decide who to write to.

The finder uses your own search keys. YouTube searches use your Google Cloud project’s YouTube Data API quota. Web searches use the Brave Search API, and Brave bills them to your Brave account. You need at least one of the two to start.

Create a YouTube Data API key

1. Sign in to the Google Cloud console. Create a project for the finder, or select one you already have.
2. Open APIs & Services, then Library. Search for YouTube Data API v3 and choose Enable.
3. Open Credentials, choose Create credentials, then API key, and copy the key.
4. Set the key’s restrictions when you create it, or later by editing it under Credentials. Under Application restrictions, choose None. StackMango’s servers do not use fixed IP addresses, so an IP address or website restriction stops the key working.
5. Under API restrictions, choose Restrict key, select only YouTube Data API v3, and save.

By default, Google gives each project a quota of 100 YouTube searches a day. The quota belongs to the project, not the key, so other keys and apps in the same project share it. It resets at midnight Pacific time.

Each finder search uses one of those searches, plus 1 unit from a separate allowance of 10,000 units a day. By default the finder makes at most 50 YouTube searches a day, which leaves room for other use of the project. You can change this limit in the finder under Settings, then General.

Create a Brave Search API key

1. Create an account on the Brave Search API website.
2. Subscribe to the Search plan. Brave asks for a payment card.
3. Open the API keys page, add a key, and copy it.

Brave bills web searches to your Brave account: $5 per 1,000 requests at the time of writing, with a monthly credit. Check Brave’s current prices and your Brave billing settings before you connect the key.

By default the finder makes at most 30 web searches a day and 1,000 a month. You can change both limits in the finder under Settings, then General. These are StackMango’s own counts: requests made with the same key elsewhere also count towards your Brave bill.

Connect your keys

1. Open the Lead & Partner Finder in your workspace, choose Settings, and find Search sources.
2. Paste each key into its card, YouTube or Web search, and choose Connect.
3. Wait for the result. Choose Test whenever you want to check a connected key again.

Connecting or testing a key makes one small request to check it: 1 unit of your Google project’s daily YouTube allowance, or one Brave request. Saved keys are encrypted, and only the end of each key is shown afterwards.

Removing a key from StackMango does not revoke it. If you think a key has been exposed, delete it in Google Cloud or Brave, create a new one, and connect that instead.

Add search terms

1. Open Search terms in the finder.
2. Describe what you sell or write about to get six suggested terms built from it, such as “best …”, “… review” and “… for beginners”. Edit or remove any you do not want.
3. Add your terms, one per line, and choose whether they search YouTube, the web, or both.

A good search term is a phrase someone would type to find creators or websites like the ones you want to work with. Try two or three wordings of the same idea.

You can switch a term off, change where it searches, or remove it at any time. Removing a term keeps the leads it already found. Your plan sets how many terms you can keep.

Choose which YouTube channels to keep

Under Settings, then General, set the minimum number of subscribers a channel needs. The default is 1,000. Channels that hide their subscriber count are always kept, and 0 keeps every channel. The setting applies to future searches.

Run your first search

1. Open the finder’s dashboard and choose Find leads now.
2. Keep the page open while it works. New leads appear as they are found, and it stops when it has done what it can for now.

You can close the page at any time. While background searching is switched on under Settings, then General, the finder carries on by itself. Find leads now works even when background searching is off.

What happens in the background

Each search term is searched again every 14 days. A new search carries on where the last one stopped, so it usually brings new results rather than the same ones.

The finder visits each website it finds to look for a published contact address, following the site’s robots.txt rules. It visits a website at most once a day, so addresses usually appear over a day or two. With many new websites it takes longer: by default the finder visits up to 100 pages a day.

While many websites are waiting for a visit, the finder holds back new searches until it catches up. Some websites never show an address, for example when they only offer a contact form. Those leads stay under No address yet, where you can add an address you found yourself.