Work with your Needle leads from your AI assistant

• “Who should I reply to today?”

  The assistant calls get_leads. By default it returns only actionable leads (hot leads and posts worth engaging) that are still in your inbox, newest first.

• “Draft replies for my top 5 leads”

  It reads each lead with get_lead, then calls draft_reply. You get two drafts per lead, a best and an alternate, in your brand voice. Each draft call uses one of your daily reply drafts.

• “Find people switching from <competitor> this week”

  get_leads filters by intent type, including switching, and by date. For a competitor you do not monitor yet, search runs a fresh live search.

• “Summarise this week’s pain points with quotes”

  It pulls this week’s pain leads and their full post text, and can add get_trending_problems for problems people are discussing across communities.

• “Search Reddit and Hacker News for “crm for freelancers””

  search takes 1 to 5 keywords and returns up to 10 leads per network and 40 in total. It can take a few minutes, so the assistant checks back with get_search.

A search can take a few minutes. search returns a search_id straight away, and the assistant calls get_search about every 30 seconds until the leads are ready. Full parameters and errors are in the MCP docs.

1. 01

   Choose Growth or Scale

   The API and MCP server come with Growth and Scale. Solo does not include API access.

2. 02

   Create a key

   In Needle, open Settings → API & MCP and create a personal API key. It starts with ndl_live_.

3. 03

   Add Needle to your client

   Paste one of the snippets below and replace ndl_live_… with your key.

claude mcp add --transport http needle https://api.useneedle.net/mcp --header "Authorization: Bearer ndl_live_…"

{
  "mcpServers": {
    "needle": {
      "url": "https://api.useneedle.net/mcp",
      "headers": {
        "Authorization": "Bearer ndl_live_…"
      }
    }
  }
}

• One personal key per use

  Create keys in Settings → API & MCP. You can have up to 10 active keys, so each tool or script can get its own.

• Scopes per key

  Choose what each key may do. A key for reporting can stay read-only.

• Optional expiry

  Set a key to expire after 30, 90, or 365 days, or keep it until you revoke it.

• Revoke anytime

  A revoked key stops working within seconds. Create a new one when you need it.

• Headers, never URLs

  Send the key as Authorization: Bearer or x-api-key. Never put it in a URL, where it can end up in logs and browser history.

• Same account, same limits

  The assistant works with your brands and leads. Searches and drafts share your daily limits with the dashboard.

• Growth $49/mo

  1,000

  API calls a month

• Scale $149/mo

  10,000

  API calls a month

• Each successful tool call counts as one. get_usage and get_search are free.
• Rate limits: 60 requests a minute per key, 300 a minute per account.
• Searches and reply drafts also use your plan’s daily limits, shared with the dashboard.
• Up to 10 active keys per account.

Compare plans

• Keys are hashed

  Needle stores a hash of each key, never the key in plain text.

• Needle never posts

  No tool posts, replies or messages anyone. Drafts are text for you to review and post yourself.

• Read-only keys

  Scope a key to read-only tools when the assistant only needs to look.

• Instant revoke

  If a key leaks or a laptop goes missing, revoke the key and it stops working at once.