Custom Lead Status in HubSpot: Your Ultimate Guide to a Smoother Sales Process

Quick tip to truly master your sales process in HubSpot, you’ve got to customize your lead statuses. If you’re looking to turn more prospects into loyal customers, understanding and tweaking this one powerful feature can make a huge difference. Many folks get tangled up in the default settings, missing out on a massive opportunity to streamline their sales team’s efforts and get everyone on the same page. By the end of this, you’ll know exactly how to set up your HubSpot CRM to work perfectly for your business, turning those leads into opportunities faster and more efficiently. We’ll walk through everything from what lead status actually means to how to automate it, so you can stop wrestling with your CRM and start closing more deals.

What Exactly Is HubSpot Lead Status?

Alright, let’s break it down. When you hear “HubSpot Lead Status,” think of it as a specific label or category for where a potential customer a “contact” in HubSpot terms currently stands in your sales process. It’s basically a dropdown menu right there on their contact record. Your sales team uses it to track their interactions and next steps, helping them know exactly what to do with each lead at any given moment.

Imagine you’ve got a bunch of leads. Some just filled out a form, others you’ve called a few times, and some you’ve actually had a good chat with. Without lead statuses, it’s like trying to navigate a bustling city without a map – pure chaos! Lead status acts as your sales team’s internal compass, showing them the direct path to convert those prospects. It’s super useful for managing those active leads before they become actual customers.

HubSpot even gives you some default options to start with, like “New,” “Open,” “In Progress,” “Attempted to Contact,” “Connected,” “Open Deal,” “Unqualified,” and “Bad Timing”. These are a solid starting point, but trust me, customizing these to fit your unique sales journey is where the real magic happens.

Lead Status vs. Lifecycle Stage: Clearing Up the Confusion

This is where a lot of people get mixed up, and it’s totally understandable. Both “Lead Status” and “Lifecycle Stage” are crucial in HubSpot, but they serve different purposes. Think of it like this: LinkedIn Recruiter HubSpot Integration: Your Guide to Smarter Hiring

• Lifecycle Stages: The Big Picture Journey
  Lifecycle stages are about the contact’s overall relationship with your business, from being a complete stranger to becoming a loyal customer and beyond. These stages track their progression through your entire customer journey. HubSpot’s default lifecycle stages typically include:

  • Subscriber: Someone who’s opted in to hear from you, like signing up for your newsletter.
  • Lead: A contact who’s shown more interest than just a subscription, maybe by downloading an ebook or filling out a contact form.
  • Marketing Qualified Lead MQL: Your marketing team has determined this person is ready for sales engagement based on their behavior or lead scoring.
  • Sales Qualified Lead SQL: Your sales team has vetted and qualified them as a potential customer. This is where Lead Status really kicks in!.
  • Opportunity: They’re associated with a potential deal.
  • Customer: They’ve made a purchase and have at least one closed-won deal.
  • Evangelist/Other: A customer who advocates for your brand or other custom stages.

  Lifecycle stages typically move forward and shouldn’t generally go backward to maintain data integrity.

• Lead Status: The Granular Sales Activity
  Now, Lead Status lives within certain lifecycle stages, primarily the Sales Qualified Lead SQL stage. It’s more granular and specific to the actions your sales team is taking with that contact. It helps your reps track their immediate next steps and current engagement level. For instance, an SQL might have a lead status of “Attempted to Contact” or “Demo Scheduled.”

  Think of it this way: Lifecycle Stage is the big highway map showing the entire journey, while Lead Status is the turn-by-turn GPS navigation within a specific leg of that journey. The lifecycle stage tells you where they are in the overall customer journey, and the lead status tells your sales rep what they need to do next with them in the sales process.

  Many companies find that 79% of marketing leads never convert into sales because of poor lead status management. This stat alone highlights why getting a clear handle on these definitions and their differences is so incredibly important for your bottom line. LinkedIn Helper HubSpot Integration: Your Ultimate Guide to Supercharging Outreach

Why You Absolutely Need Custom Lead Statuses

While HubSpot’s default lead statuses are a decent starting point, they’re kind of like off-the-rack clothing – they might fit okay, but they won’t be perfect. Your business has its own unique sales process, its own jargon, and its own steps. That’s why customizing your lead statuses is a must. Here’s why it’s not just a nice-to-have, but a must-have:

• Tailor It to Your Business: Every sales process is a little different. Maybe you have a specific “Discovery Call Scheduled” or “Proposal Under Review” stage that isn’t covered by the default options. Custom statuses let you map HubSpot precisely to your team’s workflow, making it easier for everyone to understand where a lead is and what the next action should be. This means less confusion and more efficient selling.
• Better Lead Segmentation for Targeted Efforts: With detailed, custom statuses, you can slice and dice your leads based on their exact engagement stage. This means your marketing team can send ultra-personalized nurturing campaigns, and your sales team can prioritize outreach to leads that are truly “hot.” For example, you could create a custom view of all leads with the status “Demo Scheduled” to easily prepare for upcoming meetings.
• Improved Sales and Marketing Alignment: When marketing and sales both understand and use the same language to describe a lead’s progress, things just click. Custom lead statuses create a bridge between these departments, providing clear visibility into each contact’s current state. This helps both teams work cohesively, ensuring no lead falls through the cracks and everyone is working towards the same conversion goals.
• Data-Driven Decisions and Reporting: Imagine being able to quickly see how many leads are stuck in “Awaiting Proposal” versus “Follow-Up Required.” Custom lead statuses make your reporting much more insightful. You can identify bottlenecks in your sales process, measure the effectiveness of your stages, and make smarter decisions about where to focus your resources. HubSpot’s reporting tools allow you to create custom reports based on these statuses, giving you a comprehensive view of your pipeline.

Ultimately, customizing your lead statuses isn’t just about tweaking a dropdown menu. it’s about optimizing your entire sales pipeline, making your teams more productive, and boosting your conversion rates.

A Step-by-Step Guide to Creating and Customizing Lead Statuses in HubSpot

Ready to take control of your lead management? Customizing your lead statuses in HubSpot is pretty straightforward. Here’s how you do it, step-by-step: Can You Connect LinkedIn to HubSpot? Absolutely, and Here’s How to Maximize It!

1. Accessing the Settings:

   • First things first, log into your HubSpot account.
   • Look for the gear icon ⚙️ in the upper right corner of your main navigation bar. This is your “Settings” button. Click it!.

2. Finding the ‘Lead Status’ Property:

   • Once you’re in Settings, head over to the left-hand menu. Under the “Data Management” section, click on “Properties”.
   • Now you’ll see a search bar. Type “Lead Status” into it and hit Enter. You should see the “Lead Status” property appear in the results. This is a default HubSpot property, so it’s always there.

3. Editing the Lead Status Property:

   • Click on the “Lead Status” property from the search results.
   • You’ll now see the property details, including all the existing default options. To start making changes, click the “Edit” button.

4. Adding New Custom Options:

   • Scroll down to the “Radio select options” or “Options” section.
   • You’ll see a button that says “+ Add an option” or similar. Click that!.
   • A new field will appear. In the “Label” or “Option name” field, type in the name of your new custom lead status e.g., “Demo Scheduled,” “Proposal Sent,” “Budget Confirmed”.
   • You can also add an “Internal value” often automatically generated and an “Option Description” to clarify its purpose for your team. This is super helpful for maintaining clarity.
   • Repeat this for all the custom statuses you want to add.

5. Editing and Organizing Existing Statuses: Can’t Login to HubSpot? Here’s How to Get Back in Action!

   • If you want to rename one of the default statuses e.g., change “New” to “Uncontacted”, simply click on the label and edit the text.
   • You can also rearrange the order of your lead statuses by dragging and dropping them using the little “six-dot” icon next to each option. This helps keep your most common or earliest stages at the top.

6. Deleting Old/Unused Statuses with a Caution!:

   • To remove a status that no longer fits your process, click the “X” or “Delete” icon next to the option.
   • Important Note: Before deleting a lead status, make sure no active contacts are currently assigned to it. If contacts are still using that status, you’ll want to update them to a new, relevant status first to avoid losing data or causing reporting issues.

7. Saving Your Changes:

   • Once you’re happy with all your additions, edits, and reordering, don’t forget the most important step: click the “Save” button at the bottom. Your changes will then go live!

That’s it! Your HubSpot CRM is now better equipped to handle your specific sales journey. Your sales team can now manually update the lead status on individual contact records or for multiple leads in bulk from the contacts view.

HubSpot Lead Status Best Practices: Don’t Just Set It, Perfect It!

Setting up custom lead statuses is one thing, but making sure they actually work wonders for your team is another. Over the years, I’ve seen teams struggle when they don’t follow a few key best practices. Here’s how you can make sure your lead statuses are truly effective: Importing Landing Pages into HubSpot: Your Go-To Guide for a Smooth Transition

• Keep it Clear and Concise: This might sound obvious, but avoid vague or overly complex names for your lead statuses. Each status should have a clear, unambiguous meaning that every member of your sales and marketing team understands at a glance. For instance, “Demo Scheduled” is much clearer than “Stage 3.” This helps with consistent communication across departments.
• Don’t Overcomplicate Things Less is Often More!: It’s easy to get carried away and create a dozen different statuses, but too many can cause confusion and make it harder for reps to choose the right one. If you find yourself with 20+ lead statuses, you might be trying to make this one property do too much work. Remember, lead status is for the sales process, not for every single campaign or tiny interaction. If you need to segment by campaign, consider a separate custom property for “Campaign Name” instead of bloating your lead statuses.
• Align with Your Actual Sales Process: Your lead statuses should mirror the actual steps your sales team takes. Sit down with your sales managers and reps to map out their journey from initial outreach to closing a deal. Where do they qualify a lead? When do they send a proposal? What happens after a demo? Each significant step should ideally have a corresponding lead status.
• Consider ‘Unqualified’ and ‘Bad Timing’ Reasons: It’s inevitable that some leads won’t be a good fit or the timing just isn’t right. Make sure you have statuses like “Unqualified” and “Bad Timing”. Even better, consider adding a separate custom property called “Unqualified Reason” a dropdown with options like “No Budget,” “Not a Fit,” “Lost Interest,” etc.. This helps you analyze why leads are dropping out, providing valuable feedback to your marketing team.
• Regular Review and Refinement: Your sales process isn’t static, and neither should your lead statuses be. Schedule regular reviews quarterly or bi-annually with your sales and marketing teams to ensure your lead statuses are still relevant and effective. Are there new steps in your process? Are certain statuses never used? Are some leads getting stuck in a particular status for too long? This continuous improvement cycle is key to maintaining an optimized CRM.
• Train Your Team: Once your custom lead statuses are defined, make sure everyone who uses HubSpot understands them. Provide clear definitions, examples, and training on when and how to update each status. Consistent usage is vital for accurate reporting and effective lead management.

By following these best practices, you won’t just have custom lead statuses. you’ll have a finely tuned lead management system that empowers your sales team and drives better results.

Bringing Automation to Your Lead Statuses: Work Smarter, Not Harder

Manually updating lead statuses can quickly become tedious, especially as your lead volume grows. This is where HubSpot’s automation capabilities, specifically workflows, come in like a superhero for your sales process. The goal here is to work smarter, not harder.

• Why Automate Lead Statuses?

  • Save Time & Reduce Manual Work: Your sales team should be focused on selling, not on administrative tasks like updating fields. Automation frees them up.
  • Improve Data Accuracy & Consistency: When lead statuses update automatically based on specific triggers, you reduce human error and ensure data is always up-to-date.
  • Faster Lead Progression: Automated status changes can trigger subsequent actions like assigning tasks or enrolling in a sequence, keeping leads moving through your pipeline without delay.
  • Better Reporting: With consistent and accurate status updates, your reports will be more reliable, giving you clearer insights into your sales funnel.

• Common Automation Triggers:
  Workflows in HubSpot let you set up actions based on specific triggers. For lead statuses, these triggers often revolve around contact activity or property changes: The Ultimate Guide to LinkedIn, HubSpot, and Zapier Integration

  • Form Submissions: A new form submission can automatically set a lead status to “New” or “Uncontacted.”
  • Email Engagement: If a lead opens a sales email or clicks a link, their status could update to “Engaged” or “Attempted to Contact Responded.”
  • Meeting Booked: When a meeting is scheduled, the lead status can instantly change to “Demo Scheduled” or “Meeting Confirmed”.
  • Property Changes: When another property, like “Last Activity Date” or “Lifecycle Stage,” changes, it can trigger a lead status update.

• Workflow Examples for Lead Status Automation:
  Here are a few practical examples of how you can set up workflows to automate lead status changes:

  1. New Lead Assignment/Status:

     • Trigger: A new contact is created AND “Last Contacted” is unknown.
     • Action: Set “Lead Status” to “New Lead” or “Uncontacted.” Assign to a sales rep.
     • Why it’s great: Ensures every new lead is immediately recognized and has a clear starting point for sales outreach.

  2. Attempted to Contact:

     • Trigger: A sales email is sent from a specific sequence or 1-to-1 email AND the lead status is currently “New Lead”.
     • Action: Set “Lead Status” to “Attempted to Contact.” Create a task for a follow-up call.
     • Why it’s great: Sales reps can quickly see who they’ve reached out to and who needs another touchpoint. You can even automate sequences based on this status.

  3. Connected/Engaged:

     • Trigger: Contact replies to a sales email OR a meeting is booked.
     • Action: Set “Lead Status” to “Connected” or “Engaged.”
     • Why it’s great: Clearly identifies leads that are actively responding and ready for deeper conversation, allowing reps to prioritize.

  4. Open Deal: Finding Your Place: LinkedIn HubSpot Jobs

     • Trigger: A new deal is created and associated with the contact.
     • Action: Set “Lead Status” to “Open Deal.”
     • Why it’s great: Automatically reflects when a lead has progressed to a formal opportunity, signaling higher urgency for the sales team.

  5. Unqualified/Bad Timing:

     • While some “Unqualified” statuses might be manual e.g., after a discovery call, you could have automation like:
     • Trigger: Contact has not engaged with any sales outreach emails, calls for X days AND Lead Status is “Attempted to Contact.”
     • Action: Set “Lead Status” to “Cold” or “Re-Nurture.” This could then trigger a different workflow to send them to a long-term nurture campaign or for a review by a sales manager.

Implementing these automations means your HubSpot CRM is constantly working in the background, keeping your data clean and your team focused on what they do best: building relationships and closing deals.

Reporting and Tracking Your Lead Statuses

Having well-defined and automated lead statuses is only half the battle. The real power comes when you use them to gain insights into your sales performance. HubSpot offers robust reporting tools that help you visualize your lead pipeline and make informed decisions.

• Creating Custom Reports: Learn HubSpot Fast: Your Ultimate Crash Course!

  • In HubSpot, navigate to “Reports” and select “Create custom report”.
  • Choose a “Contact-based” report, as lead status is a contact property.
  • Filter your contacts based on the “Lead Status” property. This is where your custom statuses become incredibly valuable.
  • You can also set specific date ranges to track status changes over time.
  • Visualize your data using bar charts, line graphs, or funnel reports to see how leads progress through your custom statuses.

• Identifying Bottlenecks:
  By regularly reviewing these reports, you can quickly spot potential issues in your sales process. For example:

  • Are a lot of leads getting stuck in “Awaiting Response” for too long? Maybe your follow-up strategy needs tweaking, or your sales reps need more training on consistent follow-up.
  • Is there a high number of leads going from “New” directly to “Unqualified”? This could signal that marketing is generating low-quality leads, or your qualification criteria need refinement.
  • Are leads spending an excessive amount of time in “Proposal Sent” but not moving to “Closed-Won”? This might indicate issues with your proposal content, pricing, or sales closing techniques.

These reports help you understand where your sales team is most effective and where they might need additional support or process adjustments. It’s all about continuous improvement!

Common Mistakes to Sidestep

Even with the best intentions, it’s easy to stumble when setting up and using custom lead statuses. Avoiding these common pitfalls will save you a lot of headaches down the road:

• Confusing Lead Status with Lifecycle Stages: This is probably the biggest one. Remember, lifecycle stages are for the overall journey, and lead status is for the granular sales activity within that journey. Don’t try to make lead status track the entire customer lifecycle. that’s what lifecycle stages are for. Keep them distinct and they’ll work together beautifully.
• Too Many or Too Few Statuses: We talked about this in best practices, but it’s worth repeating. Too many options overwhelm your team and lead to inconsistent data. Too few, and you lose the granular insight you’re trying to gain. Aim for a manageable number that clearly represents your key sales steps.
• Lack of Clear Definitions and Team Training: If your team doesn’t know what “In Progress” really means or when to use “Connected” versus “Engaged,” your data will be a mess. Every status needs a clear definition, and everyone on the sales team and relevant marketing folks needs to be trained on it.
• Not Using Automation: Relying solely on manual updates for lead status is a recipe for inconsistency and wasted time, especially as your business grows. Embrace HubSpot workflows to automate status changes whenever possible. Your team will thank you, and your data will be far more accurate.
• Forgetting to Map to Deal Stages: While distinct, lead status and deal stages often go hand-in-hand. Once a lead becomes an “Opportunity” a lifecycle stage, a deal is typically created and moves through its own “Deal Stages” e.g., “Appointment Scheduled,” “Qualified to Buy,” “Proposal Sent”. Ensure a smooth transition between these properties to maintain a holistic view of your sales process.
• Not Reviewing and Updating Regularly: Your business evolves, and so should your processes. If you set up your lead statuses and forget about them, they’ll quickly become outdated and less effective. Make it a point to review and refine them periodically.

By being mindful of these common mistakes, you can set your team up for success and ensure your custom lead statuses are a powerful asset, not a source of frustration. Mastering Lead Scoring in HubSpot: Your Ultimate Guide

Frequently Asked Questions

What’s the main difference between HubSpot Lead Status and Lifecycle Stage?

The main difference is their scope. Lifecycle Stage tracks a contact’s overall journey with your company, from visitor to customer, giving a high-level view of their relationship. Lead Status, on the other hand, provides more granular detail about where a contact is within your sales team’s specific process, especially once they become a Sales Qualified Lead. Think of Lifecycle as the macro journey and Lead Status as the micro-steps within that journey.

Can I customize the default Lead Status options in HubSpot?

Absolutely, yes! HubSpot’s “Lead Status” is a customizable contact property. You can easily add new statuses, rename existing ones, or delete options that don’t fit your sales process. This flexibility is key to aligning your CRM with your unique business operations.

How do I add a new custom lead status in HubSpot?

To add a new custom lead status, you’ll need to go to your HubSpot Settings gear icon > Properties > search for “Lead Status” > click on the property to edit it > then select “+ Add an option” to create your new custom status. Don’t forget to save your changes. Learn HubSpot CMS: Your Ultimate Guide to Building and Growing Online

Should I create a separate Lead Status for every single interaction?

Generally, no. While customization is great, creating too many lead statuses can lead to confusion and inconsistent usage by your team. It’s best to keep your statuses clear, concise, and representative of the key stages in your sales process. If you need to track every tiny interaction, consider using tasks, notes, or specific activity logging rather than creating a new lead status for each.

Can Lead Statuses be automated in HubSpot?

Yes, definitely! HubSpot workflows are perfect for automating lead status changes. You can set up triggers based on various activities like email opens, form submissions, meeting bookings, or specific property changes, and then automate an action to update the contact’s “Lead Status” property. This helps save time, ensures data accuracy, and keeps your leads moving through the pipeline efficiently.

What are some examples of effective custom Lead Statuses?

Effective custom lead statuses are those that directly reflect your sales process. Some common and useful examples include: “Discovery Call Scheduled,” “Demo Completed,” “Proposal Sent,” “Awaiting Feedback,” “Negotiation,” “Contract Sent,” “Nurture Long-Term,” or “Unqualified – No Budget”. The best ones will be specific to your unique sales funnel.

Is Lead Status available in HubSpot’s free CRM version?

Yes, the “Lead Status” property is available in HubSpot’s free CRM version. While paid plans offer more advanced features like extensive reporting and workflow automation, you can still access and customize your lead statuses, and update them manually in the free version to help organize your leads.

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