Change Lead Status..

[dpuryear]

I want to expand the Lead Status to include more. Right now it's really hard to get a view of all of your lead status without opening them. Salesforce, etc. can set Status to things like:

Initiated Contact
Contacted
Whatever..

I tried to find a way to add Status values, but couldn't find it under Admin. How is this done?

Or is it even possible?

I hope so!

If not, how are you tracking the status of your leads? In Process isn't exactly very helpful if you have leads in different stages..

[susiewilliams]

I think the definition of a lead (versus an opportunity) is what's confusing things here. A lead is supposed to be used only for a fleeting moment, until you decide to either promote this person to an opportunity or disqualify the lead and leave it alone. There are those organizations that use "lead nurturing" techniques to direct marketing activites towards the lead until it's a qualified opportunity; for these organizations, the lead sticks around for a while longer, but it's still a transition state, from being just some random person to being a qualified opportunity.

So, my suggestion is to take a look at your sales process and your sales stages, and decide if you're really doing "opportunity-type" activities against a lead. If you are, consider converting your leads to opportunities sooner in the sales cycle so you can take advantage of the more robust features found in the Opportunity forms.

[dpuryear]

I think the definition of a lead (versus an opportunity) is what's confusing things here. A lead is supposed to be used only for a fleeting moment, until you decide to either promote this person to an opportunity or disqualify the lead and leave it alone. There are those organizations that use "lead nurturing" techniques to direct marketing activites towards the lead until it's a qualified opportunity; for these organizations, the lead sticks around for a while longer, but it's still a transition state, from being just some random person to being a qualified opportunity.

So, my suggestion is to take a look at your sales process and your sales stages, and decide if you're really doing "opportunity-type" activities against a lead. If you are, consider converting your leads to opportunities sooner in the sales cycle so you can take advantage of the more robust features found in the Opportunity forms.

So, I see your point about definitions here, but.. Hmm, well I do see your point. I guess my thing is I don't want to convert a lead into a Contact or Op until I qualify him or not.

Oh well.

I don't think this is a big issue after reading your reply, it may be my mindset.

[andydreisch]

Susie, all true, but it still may be useful to alter the dropdown values for Leads.

dpuryear, dropdown values are fully configurable via Admin -> Dropdown Editor (under "Developer Tools"). In there you'll see "lead_status_dom". There you can add as many items as you'd like.

You must be an administrative user to gain access to the Admin area.

Andy

[dpuryear]

Oh, okay cool.

I just can't get my mind around the concept of slamming someone into a Contact or an Op when I haven't fully qualified them yet but they have been contacted, etc. To me, they are still a Lead. But if I have tens or hundreds of those, only having In Progress is more or less useless.