Saved searches

Overview

A saved search is a named snapshot of every filter you set in the Search Contacts panel - industries, job titles, headcount ranges, locations, seniority, and any other criteria you have configured. Instead of rebuilding the same audience from scratch for each campaign, you save it once and load it from a dropdown the next time.

Saved searches are a workspace-level asset. Every member of your workspace can see, load, and run every saved search that belongs to that workspace. Saves are shared by default - there is no private-only mode.

Where to find it: open any campaign, navigate to the Search tab (the full path is /campaigns/build/handoff/search). The saved-search dropdown appears at the top of the left column, above the filter fields.

Before you start

• You must be a member of an active workspace. Saved searches are scoped strictly to your workspace - you cannot access searches from another client or tenant.
• There are no special roles required to create, load, or update a saved search. Any workspace member can do all of these.
• All saves default to shared. There is no option to create a private search visible only to you.

How to save, load, and update a search

Save a new search

1. Open a campaign and click the Search tab.
2. Set your filters in the left column - titles, industries, locations, headcount, and so on. The live results preview on the right updates as you work.
3. Click Save Search below the filter fields.
4. A dialog titled Save Search appears. Type a name for the search in the Search name field.
5. Click Save Search to confirm.

The search is immediately available to all workspace members in the same dropdown.

Load an existing search

1. Open the Search tab on any campaign.
2. Click the Select a saved search dropdown at the top of the left column.
3. Pick the search by name. If two searches share a name, the dropdown appends a creation date and short ID to each duplicate to disambiguate them.
4. The filters load into the panel. A confirmation message reads "Loaded from saved search [name]."
5. Adjust filters if needed, then click Import to Campaign to pull leads.

Update an existing search

1. Load the search you want to update (see above).
2. Adjust one or more filters.
3. Click Update Search.
4. A confirmation dialog titled Overwrite saved search? appears. It confirms what will be replaced. If you have also edited the name field, the dialog shows the new name too.
5. Click Update Search to confirm. A brief undo window (approximately 10 seconds) appears as a toast so you can reverse the change if you acted by mistake.

Save a variation without changing the original

1. Load an existing search.
2. Adjust filters.
3. Click Save as New instead of Update Search.
4. Name the new search in the Save Search dialog and confirm.

The original search is left unchanged.

How it works

When you save a search, Ken serializes every active filter into a JSON payload and stores it against your workspace ID. The system records the backend key for each filter value - not the human label you see on screen. For example, when you pick "VP Sales" from a title suggestion, the stored value is the internal identifier for that title, not the text "VP Sales." On load, the display label is reconstructed from the stored key. This means a search saved today still loads the exact same query months later, even if display names in the UI have changed.

Listing is scoped by workspace at the server: your browser never fetches saved searches outside your tenant. If the system cannot resolve your workspace, the request fails rather than silently returning a cross-tenant list.

When a teammate loads your saved search, they get a full live result set. The filters stored on the record are not modified unless someone explicitly clicks Update Search.

Troubleshooting and debugging

Symptom: "Failed to load saved searches." error in the dropdown

• Likely cause: the request to the Ken Search backend failed, or your workspace context could not be resolved.
• What to check: confirm you have an active workspace set. Reload the page and retry. If the error persists, click Retry next to the error message. A structured error response from the backend includes the workspace ID that was rejected - check that the ID matches your current workspace.

Symptom: The dropdown shows "Loading saved searches..." and never resolves

• Likely cause: a slow or stalled network request to the search service.
• What to check: open browser devtools and look for a pending request to /v1/search/saved. A timeout or TLS hang on the search host will stall this indefinitely. Refreshing the page clears the stall.

Symptom: A saved search loads but the filter chips show the raw ID instead of a readable label

• Likely cause: the search was created before the label-reconstruction fix shipped. The reverse mapper rebuilds labels from the stored DTO name, so this should be self-correcting. If chips still show raw IDs, the stored filter value may predate the key-vs-label storage fix (searches saved under the old code stored the human label as the value, which the query engine cannot map to a backend key).
• What to check: update the search - adjust any affected filter, re-select the correct option from the suggestion dropdown, and click Update Search. The resaved version will store the backend key correctly.

Symptom: A search was updated by a teammate and the filters are now different from what you saved

• Likely cause: because saved searches are shared and editable by all workspace members, any member can click Update Search on a search they did not create. There is no lock or owner-only write guard at the UI level.
• What to check: review what changed (compare against your memory of the filter set). If the change was unintended, the person who made it can reload the original filter set and click Update Search again within the undo window. After the undo window closes, you would need to manually re-enter the previous filters and save.

Symptom: "No saved searches yet" even though teammates have saved searches

• Likely cause: your workspace ID did not match the one used when those searches were saved, or the backend scoping parameter was not sent correctly.
• What to check: confirm all users are logged in to the same workspace/client. Check that there is no mismatch between a staging and a production environment. A structured 403 from the backend echoes the workspace ID that was rejected - compare it to your current active workspace.

Symptom: Clicking "Save Search" does nothing or shows "Search name is required"

• Likely cause: the name field in the Save Search dialog was left empty.
• What to check: type a name before clicking the button. The confirm button is disabled until the name field has at least one non-whitespace character.

FAQ

Are saved searches private or shared? Every saved search is shared with your whole workspace by default. There is no option to create a private search visible only to you. This is intentional - an audience filter set is institutional knowledge, and sharing it by default means colleagues do not have to rebuild the same ICP from scratch.

Can I rename a saved search? Yes. Load the search, edit the name in the name field next to the Update Search button, then click Update Search. The overwrite dialog will confirm both the filter and name change before saving.

Does running a saved search affect the filters of the person who created it? No. Loading and running a saved search is read-only from the perspective of the stored record. The saved filters remain exactly as last saved until someone explicitly clicks Update Search.

What happens if I load a saved search and then adjust the filters without saving? Your live filter changes affect only the current session. The saved search itself is not changed until you explicitly click Update Search or Save as New.

Can I delete a saved search? Deletion is not currently available from the Search tab UI. Contact your workspace admin or support if you need a saved search removed.

Why does the dropdown show a date and ID after a search name? When two or more searches share the same name, the dropdown appends a creation date and a short ID suffix to each duplicate so you can tell them apart. The actual saved name on the record is unchanged - only the display label in the dropdown is modified.

Related articles

• Search filters and counts