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Contact Stages

Contact Stages help you track, organize, and act on leads throughout your sales funnel

Updated this week

iClosed Contact Stages provide a structured way to track, manage, and act on every lead as they move through your sales process. They represent the current status of a contact and help teams stay aligned on where each lead stands at any given moment.

In iClosed, Contact Stages are fully customizable and tightly integrated with Global Data, Smart Views, and booking workflows, making them a core building block for organizing leads, triggering actions, and preventing opportunities from slipping through the cracks.


Intro

Contact Stages section appears in the left-side menu of the Global Data as a dynamic variation of the Contacts view, where contacts are automatically grouped and filtered based on the Contact Stages you define in Settings → Tracking → Contact Stages.


Contact Stage Hierarchy

Contact Stages represent where a lead currently is in your sales workflow. Each contact can belong to one stage at a time, and all stages are grouped into three high-level categories:

  • Active

  • Won

  • Lost

This structure keeps your pipeline clear while allowing full flexibility inside each group.


Active Stages

Active stages are used for contacts that are still in progress and require action from your team. Default Active stages include:

  • New Lead – A contact that has just entered your system

  • Approved – A qualified lead that is ready to book a call, approved by Appointment setter

  • Nurturing – A lead that needs follow-ups or more context before moving forward

  • Contacted – Initial outreach has been made

  • Follow-Up Scheduled – A follow-up interaction is planned

  • Engaged – Ongoing, two-way communication with the lead

These stages are most commonly used by appointment setters and sales reps to manage day-to-day outreach.

Pro tips

Default Stage – Admins can select one stage under Active as the default stage (New Lead by default) for all new contacts to be placed under automatically.


Lost Stages

Lost stages are used when a contact does not convert. Default Lost stages include:

  • Ghosting – The contact stopped responding

  • Rejected – The lead was intentionally rejected

  • Budget Issue – The lead couldn’t afford the offer

  • No Decision – The lead did not commit

  • Not a Fit – The lead does not match your ideal customer profile.

These stages are critical for understanding drop-off points and improving qualification criteria.


Won Stages

Won stages represent contacts that successfully converted. Default Won stages include:

  • Customer – The contact has converted into a paying customer

  • Onboarded – The customer has completed onboarding

  • Premium Client – A high-value or upgraded customer

Won stages help separate revenue-generating contacts from active leads while still keeping them visible for reporting and retention workflows.


Customizing Contact Stages

All Contact Stages are customizable and here are available options:

  • Add new stages within Active, Won, or Lost groups

  • Rename existing stages to match your internal terminology

  • Reorder stages to reflect the exact flow of your sales process

  • Remove unused stages to keep your pipeline clean and focused

  • Assign icons and colors to stages for faster visual recognition across Global Data

This flexibility allows each team to tailor Contact Stages to their offer, market, and operating model.

Pro tips

Stage Movement: You cannot drag and drop the stage out of it's category to another category (e.g. from Active to Lost).


Contact Stages Icons & Colors

Each Contact Stage can be visually customized to improve clarity and speed across the app.

  • Icon selection for quick visual identification

  • Color assignment to highlight priority or outcome at a glance

Stage icons and colors are reflected consistently across:

  • Global Data tables

  • Appointment Setting

  • Contact Cards

  • Smart Views and stage-based navigation

Visual customization helps teams instantly recognize lead status, reduce cognitive load, and maintain consistency across large pipelines.

Icon Categories Available

Status & Progress

  • Check

  • Dashed circle

  • Cross

  • Minus / Plus

  • Hourglass

  • Block

Actions & Movement

  • Arrow

  • Send

  • Phone

  • Message

  • Mail

People & Ownership

  • User Check

  • User Plus

  • User Minus

Documents & Workflow

  • Notes

  • Document

  • Checklist

  • Calendar Check

Financial & Outcomes

  • Cash

  • Currency Dollar

  • Currency Euro

  • Diamond

Signals & Indicators

  • Sparkles

  • Trending

  • Flame

  • Snowflake

Lifecycle & Growth

  • Seedling

  • Plant

Emotions & States

  • Happy

  • Sad

  • Ghost

Best Practices for Icon Usage

  • Use action-oriented icons (Phone, Calendar Check) for stages that trigger next steps.

  • Use status icons (Check, Cross, Hourglass) to indicate progress or blockers.

  • Use growth or signal icons (Flame, Trending, Plant) for qualification or engagement levels.

  • Keep icon meaning consistent across Active, Won, and Lost stages to avoid confusion.

Icons are optional, but when used intentionally, they significantly improve pipeline readability and team alignment.


Available Colors

Default color palette

  • A set of commonly used colors is available out of the box (e.g. gray, blue, red, green, purple, orange, yellow, pink).

  • These defaults are designed for quick setup and consistent visibility across the UI.

Custom color selection

  • In addition to default colors, you can select any custom color using the color picker by clicking on the "+" button.

  • Supports full RGB and HEX input, allowing teams to match:

    • Brand colors

    • Internal conventions

    • Priority or urgency indicators


Contact Stage Management Rules & Behaviors

Contact Stages follow a set of system rules to ensure data consistency and prevent leads from getting stuck in undefined states.

Deleting a Stage

A stage cannot be deleted while contacts are assigned to it.

When deleting a stage, you must first reassign all affected contacts to another stage. The system will prompt you to select a replacement stage from Active, Won, or Lost.

Once reassignment is completed, the stage is permanently removed.


No Stage Assigned

If a contact has no stage assigned, the Contact Stage field will appear empty.

These contacts remain visible in Global Data but are excluded from stage-based views. Stages can be assigned manually.


Permissions & Access Control

Contact Stage configuration is permission-based to protect workspace-wide structure.

  • Admins and Managers can:

    • Create, edit, reorder, and delete Contact Stages

    • Assign icons, colors, and actions

    • Change stage categories (Active / Won / Lost)

  • Standard users can:

    • Update Contact Stages on contacts

    • Trigger stage-based actions (such as Book a Call)

    • Use stages for filtering and Smart Views

This ensures teams can move leads forward while keeping lifecycle structure centrally governed.


Contact Stages in Global Data

Contact Stages provide a structured, pipeline-style way to organize your Global Data.

Left-Side Menu

Contact Stages are also exposed directly in the Global Data left-side menu, making them instantly accessible for daily workflows.

Each Contact Stage appears as a dynamic view that:

  • Shows all contacts currently in that specific stage

  • Updates in real time as contacts move through the pipeline

  • Works as a shortcut view, without requiring manual filtering

This allows users to quickly focus on a specific part of the sales process, such as New Leads, Approved, Nurturing, or Rejected with a single click. Because these views are powered by Contact Stages:

  • They automatically stay in sync with stage updates

  • They can be combined with additional filters or saved as Smart Views

  • They help teams monitor pipeline health and workload distribution at a glance

Using Contact Stages from the left-side menu turns your pipeline structure into a navigational tool, helping teams move faster and stay organized inside Global Data.


Assigning Actions to Contact Stages

Contact Stages can go beyond simple status labels by having actions attached to them. At the moment, the only available action is - Book a Call, but this is just a foundation for what's coming up with next releases.

Approved stage can't be edited as it's tied to Appointment Setting feature in Global Data and has Book a Call action assigned by default. When a stage Approved is selected in Global Data, user will be able to book a call immediately by choosing proper event first and host afterwards (round-robin or manually select a closer)

After the call is booked, the contact is automatically removed from Appointment Setting and moved into Calls.

This turns Contact Stages into an execution layer that actively drives leads forward, reduces manual steps, and ensures no qualified lead gets stuck.


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