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Setting Up Deal Stages In HubSpot

The Spark of Realization​

Picture this: it’s a dreary Wednesday morning. Tim, our star salesperson, and I are hunched over a steaming pot of coffee—our fortress against the encroaching fog of an unproductive day. Tim turns to me, a twinkle of both desperation and ingenuity in his eyes, and says, "How do we close deals faster? The pipeline feels like it's moving through molasses." It was that moment of caffeinated clarity that set us on a quest to transform our deal stages in HubSpot.

Setting the Stage for Success​

Now, I know what you're thinking – "Ugh, deal stages…?" But bear with me. HubSpot isn’t some nebulous, impenetrable fortress of sales sorcery. It’s a sandbox, and boy, did Tim and I have some castles to build. First, we needed to understand the lay of the land.

  1. Navigate to Contacts, Then Deals
    Our first step was to emerge from our coffee haze and dive into HubSpot. Under the 'Contacts' menu, we found 'Deals.' Clicking this was akin to opening an old, dusty book—oddly comforting.

  2. Customize Your Pipeline
    There's a small gear icon, top right, like a keyhole beckoning. Click on it, and behold—the portal to ‘Pipeline Settings’. We selected our primary pipeline and clicked 'Edit Stages.' This was where the magic, or the mess—we’ll see—would happen.

  3. Define Your Stages
    Here’s where our brewing ideas took shape. Think of each stage as a milestone in the grand expedition that is the sales process. We sat for eons (read: ten minutes) and brainstormed specifics. From "Initial Contact" to "Negotiation" to "Closing"—we needed stages that were as dynamic as our tactics.

The Art of Details​

Tim had this wild idea about adding probabilities to each stage. At first, I thought: why complicate things? But, as it turns out, it added this radar-like precision to our forecasts. Here’s how we did it.

  1. Edit Probabilities
    In the same 'Edit Stages' section, each stage has a 'Win probability' field. For 'Initial Contact', we deemed it a wobbly 10%. In contrast, 'Proposal Sent' became a solid 75%. This would be our north star, guiding us to realistic expectations.

  2. Fields and Properties
    Tim, in his infinite wisdom, suggested tweaking the fields we captured at each stage. We headed over to ‘Customize Properties’ under each deal stage to add crucial fields. More fields at later stages meant more data, more accuracy—a sales Sherlock Holmes scenario.

Bringing the Team Onboard​

Now, no system survives without the tribe being on the same wavelength. We needed everyone clued in and committed. A team huddle was in order.

  1. Training and Demonstration
    I took Tim’s insights and concocted a training session. We gathered the gang, heads bobbing like eager meerkats. There, we walked through the new deal stages, bit by bit, answering questions and accepting Tim’s occasional jabs of “Told you so.”

  2. Feedback Loop
    Over the coming weeks, we kept an open line for feedback. It was essential. Through it, we heard what worked, what didn’t, and we tweaked—a tale as old as iteration itself.

The Surprising Payoff​

Weeks sped by; deals started moving faster. Our pipeline wasn’t molasses anymore—more like a smooth, rich maple syrup, pouring freely. And it all started with that shared moment of frustration and ingenuity—the cradle of our HubSpot revelation.

So here we are, veterans of customizing deal stages. We built, we triumphed, we had a blast. Who knew a midweek coffee and a few clicks could create such transformation? That’s the charm of discovery, isn’t it?