Knowledge Base

Topics
Leads
Deals
People (contacts)
Organizations (contacts)
Activities
Projects
Products
Mail
Data relationships

How is Pipedrive data organized?

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Breandan Flood, July 25, 2024
Note: Some features require a specific subscription to access. You can find a breakdown of our features by plan in this article.

Organizing your leads, deals, contact people, projects, organizations, activities, products and emails is essential to your sales process. Pipedrive helps you organize all your items and link them together for better visibility.

To help you become familiar with Pipedrive, we offer sample data for you to try and test. Learn more about sample data in this article.

If you’re just getting started with Pipedrive, you can check out our Get started with the basics” Pipedrive Academy course.

Leads

At the beginning of your sales process, you may have potential deals in your account that you’re not ready to start working on.

Pipedrive's Leads Inbox is a separate inbox to keep your prequalified leads in before they become deals. Once you decide which leads are ready, you can convert them to deals and add them directly to your pipeline. You can read more about our Leads Inbox in this article.

  • You can use the Add lead” button to add leads individually or by spreadsheet import, or use LeadBooster
  • When adding a lead through the add lead dialog, all fields are optional except either the organization name or the person name
  • When you’ve qualified a lead and are ready to pursue it as a deal in your pipeline, you can click Convert to deal”. This will open a new dialog where you can define the pipeline, visibility and value of your new deal.

Deals


Ongoing transactions you’re pursuing with people or organizations in Pipedrive are tracked as deals, which are processed through the stages of your pipeline until they’re either won or lost.

Deals contain all of the actions taken while closing a sale. Deals will also pull all the information from the person or organization they’re associated with, which you can find in the detail view of that deal. In this article, you can read more about deals in Pipedrive.

  • Deals can be linked to a person, organization or project. They can also have products added to them
  • Deals track all events and movements that take place throughout your sales process
  • Since a deal is connected to a contact, any actions you perform on the deal will also be reflected in the person/organization linked to it
  • Deals can be imported from a previous CRM or a CSV or XLS file
  • The progress of the deals in your account is tracked as progress in your account

People (contacts)


People contacts are the specific customers you’re selling to, and any information relating to each contact such as scheduled activities or emails will be tracked in the detail view of that person.


Organizations (contacts)


Organizations are the companies where contact people work. All people related to an organization will be listed in its detail view, along with any notes or activities linked to any people, leads, deals or projects related to the organization.


Activities

An activity represents any action taken toward closing a sale. It can be a phone call, a lunch meeting, or any other event you schedule with a contact. You can schedule activities in relation to a person, organization, project, lead or deal. You can read this article for more information on activities in Pipedrive.


Projects

A project represents one or more deals under the umbrella of a larger goal. This can include both won and open deals, although projects are commonly created after a deal has been won.

  • Projects can be linked to deals, people and organizations
  • You can create tasks, subtasks and activities for your projects. Activities created for projects will be reflected in any linked people, organizations or deals
  • Progress in a project is reflected in two ways:
    • The progress bar, located in the detail view of a project, is based on completed tasks, subtasks and activities
    • The kanban board, which shows the progression of the project through your company’s workflow

Products

Note: For more information about price variations, check out this article.

Products are items you sell or trade, and are often linked to ongoing deals. Products have specific fields like product code, price and tax.

Mail

Note: Email sync is available for Advanced, Professional or Enterprise plans. For more information on email sync, check out this article.

The mail tab holds all emails you decide to keep a record of in Pipedrive. Emails can be brought into your account using either the email sync tool or the Smart Bcc based on your plan.

  • Emails can be linked to people, deals, leads or projects
  • If the person you’ve emailed exists in Pipedrive, the email will be associated with them. If not, the email will create a new person and link that email thread to them
  • Replies from your contacts are forwarded to your Pipedrive mailbox, and Pipedrive will document them in the same email thread as the original email
  • Attachments in emails are available everywhere the email is linked and in the files tab of any detail page
  • If the recipient contact is linked to a deal, the email will also be reflected there
Note: If multiple deals are open for a person who sent an email, Pipedrive will provide a list of all open deals for that person, and you can choose which deal to associate it with.

Data relationships

Here’s a basic rundown of how the different data types relate.

LeadsDealsLeads represent potential deals that have not been fully vetted. Once a lead is vetted, it can be converted into a deal and added to your deals pipeline.
ContactsLeads/deals/activities/mailContacts are those with whom you conduct deals, schedule activities, and send emails. They can be represented as individual people (e.g., Steve Johnson) or collective organizations (e.g., The Steve Factory).
ActivitiesLeads/deals/contacts

Activities can be linked to a lead, deal, or contact, but it’s not required as they can also be created without being linked to other data.

MailLeads/deals/contacts

Emails can be sent from or linked to leads, deals, or contacts if email sync is enabled. An email sent to an address already linked to a contact will automatically be saved there if the email address is only linked to one contact. If you don’t have email sync, you can still link emails to your leads, deals, and contacts using the Smart BCC link.

Note: Learn more about Pipedrive terms and relationships in our glossary.
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