Custom modules in Pepper Cloud CRM: How to build a CRM around the way you work

Pepper Cloud Marketing

Aug 20, 2026 • 8 min read

Every business tracks something the standard CRM doesn’t. An insurance agency needs to track policies and claims. A tuition centre needs courses and enrolments. A travel agency needs bookings and itineraries. With custom modules in Pepper Cloud, you can create your own data structures inside the CRM — without spreadsheets, without workarounds, and without waiting on a developer. This guide walks you through everything, from creating your first module to managing records, associations, pipelines, and permissions.

What is a custom module?

Pepper Cloud comes with standard modules — Leads, Accounts, Contacts, Opportunities, and Tickets — that cover most sales and support workflows. But no two businesses are identical, and some of your most important data simply doesn’t fit those boxes.

A custom module is a data structure you define yourself to track business-specific information. You decide what it’s called, what fields it holds, how it connects to your contacts and deals, and who can see it. Instead of forcing your business into a rigid template, you model the CRM around how you actually work.

In short: A custom module lets an admin create a brand-new record type — like Policy, Course, Booking, or Property — complete with its own fields, pipeline, and permissions, and link it to the leads, contacts, and deals you already manage.

How businesses can use custom module - A few real-world examples

Insurance agency

Standard CRM tracks the client and the deal — but there’s nowhere to record the policies themselves, claims, or renewals. A single client can hold several policies — motor, life, health — each with its own premium, renewal date, and claim history. With custom modules, you create Policy, Claim, and Renewal modules linked to the contact, so agents can see every policy a client holds, get ahead of upcoming renewals, and track each claim through to resolution — all without leaving the CRM.

Tuition centre

For a tuition centre, contacts are parents and students — but courses, class enrolments, and fee payments don’t fit the standard modules. With custom modules, you create Course, Enrolment, and Payment records linked to each student and parent. Staff can instantly see which classes a student is enrolled in, track attendance and outstanding fees, and trigger automated reminders for renewals or unpaid invoices.

Travel and tourism

A travel agency manages travellers as contacts, but each booking, itinerary, and trip carries details the standard CRM can’t hold — destinations, travel dates, package cost, supplier, and passenger count. With custom modules, you create Booking and Itinerary modules linked to the contact, giving agents a full history of every trip a customer has taken, a clear view of upcoming departures to follow up on, and a foundation for automated pre-trip and post-trip messages.

The same idea applies to property listings, loan applications, equipment rental, event management, subscriptions — anything unique to your industry.

How to set up custom module

Before you begin

• Custom modules are created by a Admin. If you don’t see the option to create custom module, ask your CRM administrator.

• You can create up to 5 custom modules.

• Each module supports a primary display property plus up to 2 secondary display properties.

• Plan your fields before you start — the property type cannot be changed once a property is created.

Creating a custom module (step by step)

Log in to your CRM.
Go to settings > Customisation > Custom module
Click “Create new”.
Name your module: Choose an icon, enter singular and plural name and add description. Click “Save & Next”.

⚠ Note: Pepper Cloud auto-generates an internal name from the singular name (lowercase with underscores). It’s shown read-only and is used in integrations. The

internal name cannot be changed after creation. Module names may contain letters, numbers, and spaces only — no special characters.

Setting up a custom module

Fill in the basic details.

Create a primary field (Mandatory): The primary display property is the main field that identifies every record — it acts as the record’s title across the CRM (like a Policy Number or Booking ID). For this, click “Create new”. Choose property type. Add custom name, default value, and help text.
Add secondary fields (Optional): Add up to two secondary properties that appear beneath the title on record cards and list views (e.g. a Renewal Date or Client Name). You can skip this and add fields later from the module’s settings.
Add other fields (Optional): These are custom fields. You can add as many custom fields as you need.

Property	Editable after creation?	Deletable?
Primary display property	Label only — type is locked	No — it’s the record title
Additional / secondary property	Label anytime; type is locked	Yes
System fields (Assigned to, Created at, etc.)	No	No — always present

Choose a pipeline (optional)

If your records move through stages (e.g. a Claim going from Submitted → Under Review → Settled), define a pipeline with its stages here.

Configuring associations, forms, and views

You can do this from listing screen of custom modules. Here are the steps: Go to Settings > Customisation > Custom module > Click on 3 dots.

Configure associations (optional)

Select “Update associations”.
Choose the modules (Leads, Accounts, Contacts, Opportunities, or another custom module) that should link to your new custom module.

How associations behave

Each association card shows the linked records, a “+ Associate” button to link an existing record, and an option to create a new record inline.
Clicking a linked record name opens that record’s detail page.
Relationships are one-to-many — one custom module record can link to multiple records of an associated object, and vice versa.
Deleting a parent record only removes the link — the custom module record itself is never cascade-deleted.

⚠ Lead conversion: When a Lead is converted to a Contact/Account/Opportunity, its custom module associations stay on the Lead record and are not carried forward — consistent with standard CRM behaviour.

Configure form layout (optional)

Select “Update form”.
Edit the form layout as required.

Configure default view (Table or Kanban) (Optional)

Select “default view”.
Choose the option.

ℹ Defaults: Table view uses 5 columns — Primary property, Assigned to, Tags, Created at, and Updated at. Kanban uses Primary property, Assigned to, and Tags.

Set profiles and permissions

Define which user profiles can read, create, update, delete, import, and export records for this module. (You can also manage this later from Manage Users › Profiles.)

Each custom module adds a new section to every user profile with six independent permissions. For a brand-new module, all six are OFF by default across all existing profiles — no one gains access automatically until an admin enables it.

Permission	Controls	Requires
Read	See records, lists, search results, association cards	—
Create	Create new records	Read
Update	Edit existing records	Read
Delete	Delete records	Read
Import	Import via CSV/Excel	Create
Export	Export to CSV/Excel	Read

• Turning off Read also turns off Create, Update, and Delete for that module.

• Cloning a profile copies its custom-module permissions exactly.

• If a module is deleted, its permissions are removed from every profile automatically.

Adding and managing records

Create a record

1. Open your module from the top navigation and click “+ Create new”.

2. Fill in the primary property (autofocused), then any secondary and additional fields in the order your admin defined.

3. Set Assigned to (defaults to you) and, if a pipeline exists, pick a pipeline and stage.

4. Click Save — or “Save and create another” to add records back-to-back. Required fields are marked with a red asterisk.

The record list page

• Records are sorted by Created at (newest first) by default.

• Switch between List view and Kanban view, and save your own custom views.

• Filter by any property, assignee, stage, or date range; search across the primary and secondary properties.

• Show 25, 50, or 100 records per page.

• Quick filters: Assigned to, Created at, Updated at, Tags. Advanced filters: primary/secondary properties, pipeline, stages, associations, and other custom fields.

Inline edit, tags, and bulk actions

• Inline edit — click any field on a record to edit and save it in place.

• Tags — apply tags to organise records. Default tags include New, In progress, Pending, Completed, and On hold.

• Bulk actions — select multiple records to create a Note, Task, Event, Log, or Email; add tags; bulk edit fields; or delete.

Importing and exporting records

• Import from CSV or Excel (.xlsx), up to 25,000 records at a time — associations can be imported too.

• After upload, map your columns to module properties. Required fields must be mapped before the import can run.

• Duplicates are skipped and shown in an error report you can download.

• Export up to 25,000 records per day, including their associations.

The record detail page

Every record opens into a familiar three-panel layout, consistent with Leads and Opportunities:

• Left — record title, quick-action icons (Note, Task, Log, Email, Document, Event), all custom fields in a key-value layout, and system fields.

• Centre — the pipeline stage bar (if configured) and the activity timeline with tabs for each activity type.

Activities and tagging to other records

You can log Notes, Tasks, Logs, Emails, Documents, and Events on any custom module record — exactly as you do on a Lead. The standout feature is activity tagging: when you create an activity on a custom module record, you can optionally link it to an associated record (such as a Lead), so the activity appears on both timelines.

How to tag an activity

1. Open a custom module record (e.g. a Policy) and click an activity type from the icon bar.

2. At the top of the panel, use the “Associate to record” section to search for a Lead by name or email.

3. Select the record and save. The activity now appears in the activity feed of both records.

ℹ Permissions respected: Search only returns records within your permission scope. If a tagged Lead is later deleted, the activity is preserved and the link shows as a “Deleted record”. Users without Lead access see the activity but the linked name appears as a “Restricted record”.

Pipelines and stages

From a module’s settings, open the Pipelines tab to create one or more pipelines. Each needs a name and between 1 and 12 stages. On a record, the pipeline shows as a horizontal stepper — click a stage to move the record (moving backwards asks for confirmation).

⚠ Deleting stages: You can’t delete a stage or pipeline that still holds records — Pepper Cloud asks you to move those records first.

Navigation and global search

• Custom modules appear in the top navigation bar by plural name, in the order they were created.

• Records and their activities show up in global search, tagged with a custom-module badge and a dedicated “custom module” filter pill.

• Users without Read permission don’t see the module in navigation or search.

• Custom modules also appear in Pepper Cloud’s workflow automation — trigger on record created, updated, or deleted, and act with find, update, create, or associate steps.

Editing and deleting a module

Editing a module

From Settings › Customisation › Custom Modules, click the edit icon on a module to rename the primary property, adjust the pipeline and layout, or update permissions. If you try to remove an association that’s in use, Pepper Cloud blocks the change and shows where it’s used (layouts, workflows) so you can clear those first.

Deleting a module

⚠ This cannot be undone. Deleting a custom module permanently removes all its records, properties, and associations.

When you click the delete icon, Pepper Cloud checks where the module is used:

• In use (workflows, records, create-modal associations): deletion is blocked and every usage is listed so you can remove them first.

• Has records but not in use: you’ll confirm via a checkbox acknowledging records will be permanently removed.

• No records, not in use: a simple confirmation removes the module and its schema.

Frequently asked questions (FAQs)

How many custom modules can I create?

Up to 5 per portal (may vary by plan).

How many fields can a module have?

Up to 20 fields — one primary and up to two secondary display properties, plus additional fields.

Can I change a field’s type later?

No. You can rename a field, but its type is fixed at creation.

Can I link a record to more than one Lead?

Yes — activities and records support one-to-many links.

Are custom modules visible in the Chrome and Outlook extensions?

Yes, associations and fields are available in the extensions and email templates.

Ready to model your CRM around your business?

Custom modules turn Pepper Cloud into a CRM shaped by your industry — not the other way around. Log in to try building your first module, or book a demo.