Every lead sits in a stage of your pipeline, such as Hot, Proposal Prepared or Won. You decide what your stages are called, what order they go in and what kind of stage each one is. Alongside the stage, each lead has an owner, an expected close date, a rating, who referred them and, for lost leads, a lost reason.
Why it helps
Your pipeline matches the way your business actually works.
Won and Lost stages give you real win rates and closed dates, not guesses.
Stage history shows how long leads spend in each stage, so you can see where they stall.
Lost reasons tell you why work slips away.
Stage types
Each stage has a Stage type. The type, not the name, tells OnboardMe how to treat leads in that stage.
Stage type | Use it for | What OnboardMe does |
|---|---|---|
Open | Leads you're still working. | Shows on the board, counts towards your pipeline value, and is flagged after 30 days in the same stage. |
Won | The lead became a client. | Sets the lead's closed date and counts as a win. |
Lost | The lead didn't go ahead. | Sets the closed date, asks for a lost reason, and hides the lead unless you turn on Include lost leads. |
On hold | Leads parked for now, for example "Onboard next year". | Kept in your pipeline but never flagged as stale. |
Note: If you change a stage's type, leads already in that stage follow it. Changing a stage to Won or Lost gives those leads a closed date, and changing it back to Open clears it.
Manage your stages, sources and lost reasons
Owners and admins can change these. On the Leads tab, click Manage options.
The window has four tabs: Statuses, Sources, Lost reasons and Proposal automation. For proposal automation, see Move leads automatically with proposals.
Add or edit a status
On the Statuses tab, click Add status, or Edit next to an existing one.
Enter the Name and, if you like, a different Display label. The label is what your team sees.
Choose the Stage type.
Turn on Inactive to stop offering the status without deleting it.
Click Save.
Drag rows to change the order. The order is used in every dropdown, on the board and in Insights, and it saves straight away.
OnboardMe's built-in options are marked Standard. You can relabel them, reorder them and change their stage type, but not rename them. Restore puts a standard option back to its original label, order and stage type. Remove deletes an option you added, or hides it if leads still use it.
Sources work the same way, without a stage type.
Lost reasons
The Lost reasons tab holds the reasons your team can choose when a lead is lost, such as Chose another firm or No response. Add your own, edit the wording and drag them into order.
When you move a lead into a Lost stage from the table or the board, OnboardMe asks Why was this lead lost? Click a reason, or click Skip. You can also set or change the reason later in the lead's Pipeline section.
Pipeline fields
Open a lead and use the Pipeline section. The same fields are on the Lead Details tab of the lead's record.
Field | What it's for |
|---|---|
Owner | The staff member responsible for the lead. You can choose any active staff member. If the owner later becomes inactive, they stay on their existing leads. |
Expected close | When you expect the lead to sign. |
Rating | Hot, Warm or Cold, to show how likely the lead is to go ahead. |
Referred by | The person or referral partner who sent you the lead. |
Lost reason | Shown for leads in a Lost stage. |
Change any of them and click Save.
Tip: Rating is separate from stage. A lead can be in "Proposal Prepared" and still be rated Cold.
Stage history
Every time a lead changes stage, OnboardMe records it. Open a lead and expand Stage history to see each move, when it happened, who made it and how long the lead spent in the stage before.
Moves made by a proposal show which proposal did it, for example Proposal sent: Tax return 2026. Click it to open the proposal. See Move leads automatically with proposals.
Leads that existed before stage tracking started show Before stage tracking for their starting stage.
Days in stage
The In stage column on the Leads table shows how long each lead has been in its current stage. It turns orange once an open lead has been in the same stage for 30 days, so you can see who needs a nudge. Leads that are on hold, won or lost aren't flagged.
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