Knowledge Base

Pipedrive has two designations for your ongoing opportunities: leads and deals. Knowing when a lead needs to become a deal, and vice-versa, is a crucial part of getting the most out of Pipedrive.

Leads vs deals

To understand when a lead should be converted, you have to know what leads and deals are.

Leads are potential sales or business opportunities that haven't been verified yet.

• The Leads inbox is where your leads are kept, as well as where you can access your LeadBooster tools.

Deals are sales or business opportunities that have been approved and moved into your sales pipeline.

• Deals can be viewed in your sales pipeline, deal list view and contacts timeline.

When should you convert?

A lead should be converted to a deal when you are confident that lead could result in a sale or other business success.

Such examples include:

• A lead comes from a company called ”Pipes and more,” and you‘re looking to sell plumbing labor
• A lead responds to the automated email you sent, expressing interest in discussing business further
• A lead comes from your Prospector tool and includes a link to their LinkedIn page, and you like their credentials

Another basic way to answer this question starts with what the first stage of your sales pipeline is.

In this case, the first stage of the pipeline is First email sent. So if an email has been sent to a lead, it could reasonably be converted into a deal, and placed in the first stage.

How to convert leads and deals

Leads to deals

To convert a lead into a deal, click on a lead in your Leads inbox to open the contextual view.

Select ”convert to deal” in the bottom left corner, fill in any desired details and click ”save.“

Deals to leads

To convert a deal into a lead, open the detail view of a deal and go the top right corner.

There, select ”...“ > ”convert to a lead.“