Two features to power portals in Zapier

I pulled a staple out of my son’s finger this morning. 

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No, no I didn’t. My wife did. I was busy dancing around as if I was the one with the staple. I was trying not to pass out. My son’s doing great— it was a tiny staple, thankfully. 

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I don’t particularly enjoy thinking that anything exists underneath my skin. Given the choice, I would choose to be hollow. I would choose to be a log. 

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Bottom line: there are some things I want to see and some things I don’t (like a staple in a finger). It turns out, an app is all about seeing (or not seeing) things, too.

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Today, I’m going to teach you the two things you need to build an app in Zapier Interfaces: managed users and dynamic filtering.

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Let’s portal up.

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What makes an app?

You want to build out a client portal once but be able to use it for all of your clients. So, to “build once and use twice” your portal needs to behave like an app. 

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You don’t want a document that you’ll have to duplicate each time you have a client. You want an app that flexes and filters depending on who is looking at it. You can start with this client portal template if you want to follow along today.

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There are two Interfaces features that make Interfaces behave like an app:

• Managed users
• Dynamic filtering

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Let's take a closer look.

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Managed users in Zapier Interfaces

By default, Interfaces is publicly accessible. But for your client portal, you need to give it a lock. You want your clients to login using their email address. That way you can tell the app who is looking at it in order to only show client-specific content.

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Go to your interface settings > access & users and choose “managed users only.” You’ll then be able to add the names and emails of your clients. Managing users can also be done with a Zap so that you can automate the adding and removing of clients as needed.

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Dynamic filters with Zapier Tables and Interfaces

You’ll need two things to actually show client-specific information in your portal: a table and a table component in Interfaces. Zapier Tables will house all the project related data for your clients and then a table component will display it within your interface. 

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In your table, ensure there’s a field for the client’s email address since that’s what will tell the filter to look at. Then, add a data filter to only show content where the email address “is current user.”

That’s it!

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When the client logs in, they’ll only see records from the table that pertain to them. 

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With both managed users and dynamic filtering, the app possibilities within Zapier explode.

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To recap:

• Build your client portals like apps: build once, use multiple times
• Managed users and dynamic filtering allow to show and hide content based on the logged-in user
• Try this client portal template to get started 

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That’s all for this week!

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Happy Building,

Bryce