Building deal stages in your HubSpot deal pipeline might seem straightforward, but the process can make or break your sales team’s success. Deal stages are more than just labels—they’re the backbone of a functional and efficient sales pipeline. Get them right, and your team will close deals faster and with less confusion. Get them wrong, and you’ll face a chaotic pipeline, misaligned sales processes, and lost revenue opportunities.
In this article, we’ll explore three deadly mistakes you must avoid when building your HubSpot deal pipeline—and how to fix them.
First Mistake: Deals Going in Any Direction in Your HubSpot Deal Pipeline
A well-structured deal stage is like a map—it guides deals logically from one step to another until they close. Your pipeline becomes a mess if deals can move in any direction without clear rules.
This might seem obvious, but many businesses struggle with messy processes in their HubSpot deal pipeline, where deals move back and forth inconsistently. Remember, setting up the right deal stages is essential to the health of your business. Keep in mind: that deals should always progress from left to right. When a deal is created, it appears on the far left of your pipeline, in stage 1. As you nurture it, the deal should move through the stages, eventually reaching either “Closed Won” or “Closed Lost”—hopefully the first one!
Additionally, the likelihood of closing the sale increases as a deal moves to the right through the stages. Based on the specifics of your business and sales process, the probability of success typically grows with each step forward in the pipeline.
That’s why it’s crucial to design a clear and logical sales pipeline with well-defined deal stages—or to adjust your process if your sales team keeps moving deals from right to left. This should never happen under any circumstances!
Why having deals going from right to left is a problem:
- Inconsistent tracking: When deals move backward, it becomes nearly impossible to analyze pipeline health.
- Reporting chaos: Key metrics like close rates or deal velocity are inaccurate.
How to avoid it:
- Set clear criteria for each stage: Define the specific actions or outcomes needed to move deals forward (e.g., “proposal sent” or “demo completed”).
- Use automation: HubSpot allows you to automate deal progression based on criteria. For example, automatically move a deal to “Contract Received” once the proposal is sent.
- Train your team: Ensure everyone understands the purpose and flow of the pipeline stages.
Second Mistake: Too Many Deal Stages in Your Pipeline
It’s tempting to overcomplicate your pipeline with detailed deal stages that account for every possible scenario. But having too many deal stages can do more harm than good.
Many deal stages confuse your sales team, no one understands what they mean and in the end makes you lose those leads and sales.
To tackle this problem is necessary to understand the two causes that are making your sales pipeline look like a mess:
First cause: Early deal stages badly established
The first cause that you might be facing is that the first leads landing in your, let’s say 18 stages pipeline, “deal stages” are too early, and you’ll see that the “deal” in your stage 1 has 0,05% chances of becoming a close won… Let me tell you something pal, that’s not a deal, that’s a very early and misqualified lead, a lead that your marketing team has to nurture to send it to an efficient pipeline of the sales team for them to make the close won.
When a lead gets into a well-implemented sales pipeline it should at least be very well qualified by your marketing team, and if possible sales qualified.
Second cause: Deal stages made based on tasks
Your deal stage pipeline is not meant to be a simple checklist of tasks. While tasks like sending follow-up emails, scheduling sales calls, or setting appointments are part of the sales process, the pipeline itself serves a different purpose.
In HubSpot, your pipeline should focus on guiding leads through clearly defined stages with specific exit criteria, ensuring an efficient and structured approach to converting them into customers. It’s about maintaining proper standards and practices, not just managing tasks.
Now, you might wonder, “Where do the sales team’s tasks go, then?” Great question! HubSpot lets you create tasks within each deal stage of your pipeline. At BluePaperclip, we implement pushed tasks, a game-changer for sales efficiency.
With pushed tasks, your sales team doesn’t need to hunt around the CRM to figure out what needs to be done each day. Tasks are neatly organized and ready to go, saving time and increasing the chances of closing deals. This ensures a more efficient and productive workflow.
Why too many deal stages are a problem:
- Slower deal progression: Your sales team spends more time updating stages than actually closing deals.
- Overwhelming data: Too many stages dilute the focus and make your pipeline harder to analyze.
- Decision fatigue: Sales reps get bogged down trying to decide which stage fits best.
How to avoid it:
- Limit stages to the essentials: Stick to 5-7 stages that represent the most critical milestones in your sales process.
- For an effective pipeline, your CRM deal stages must be required, buyer-centric, factual, and inspectable. Read our article on creating the right CRM deal stages to learn more.
Third Mistake: Not Valuing Your HubSpot Deal Pipeline
Your sales pipeline isn’t just a list of deals; it’s a predictive tool that reveals the health of your business and its revenue potential. Calculating the value of your HubSpot CRM pipeline—by considering the average ticket size, product value, and the likelihood of conversion—allows you to stay ahead of potential challenges and opportunities.
When you value your pipeline, you’re no longer guessing whether you’re crushing it or falling behind. Instead, you get actionable insights to adjust your approach before it’s too late.
If it’s falling below expectations, it’s a signal to tweak your sales strategy or generate more leads. If it’s far exceeding expectations maybe you’re crushing it, so it might be time to shift focus to marketing, operations, or other areas to handle the growth effectively.
Why You Should Value Your HubSpot Deal Pipeline
Failing to calculate and monitor your pipeline’s value comes with risks:
- Delayed Insights: Without proactive monitoring, you may only discover problems once deals stop closing, putting your business in a reactive state.
- Missed Opportunities: When you don’t know the health of your pipeline, you risk letting high-value deals slip through the cracks.
- Unreliable Forecasting: If your pipeline isn’t valued, it’s hard to predict future revenue or identify areas needing immediate attention accurately.
A valued pipeline gives you clarity on whether your business is thriving, struggling, or in need of adjustment before it’s too late.
How to Avoid This Mistake
- Regularly Calculate Pipeline Value: Use deal likelihood percentages and average ticket size to assess your pipeline.
- Use HubSpot Reports: Leverage HubSpot’s reporting tools to analyze deal velocity, win rates, and other metrics to measure your pipeline’s performance.
- Act on the Data: If your pipeline’s value drops below expectations, tweak your sales strategy or increase focus on lead generation. If it’s exceeding expectations, direct your energy toward optimizing operations or marketing efforts.
Quick Recap
Here’s a quick recap of the mistakes to avoid when setting up your HubSpot sales pipeline and deal stages:
- Deals Moving in Any Direction
- Allowing deals to move backward or skip stages creates chaos and confusion.
- Solution: Define clear criteria for each stage, use HubSpot’s automation features, and train your sales team to maintain a logical flow.
- Too Many Deal Stages
- Overcomplicated pipelines slow down progress and overwhelm your team.
- Solution: Stick to 5-7 essential stages, consolidate similar ones, and regularly refine your pipeline.
- Not Valuing Your Pipeline
- Treating your pipeline as just a list of deals means missing critical business insights.
- Solution: Calculate pipeline value regularly, leverage HubSpot’s reporting tools, and adjust strategies based on data.
Want a deeper dive into these 3 deadly HubSpot mistakes? Watch this video to learn more:
And if you need a helping hand setting up your HubSpot sales pipeline and deal stages the right way… Don’t hesitate—contact us today!
