While both terms are used interchangeably, they refer to different aspects of the customer journey. Understanding the distinction—and how they work together—helps sales and marketing teams optimize their strategies for better lead management and conversion.
While both terms are used interchangeably, they refer to different aspects of the customer journey. Understanding the distinction—and how they work together—helps sales and marketing teams optimize their strategies for better lead management and conversion.
Definitions: Lifecycle Stage vs Lead Status & Why They Matter
Lifecycle Stage
Lifecycle stages represent the broad phases a prospect moves through in their journey with a company. These stages are progressive (they shouldn’t move backward) and help segment contacts for targeted marketing and sales efforts.
HubSpot’s Default Lifecycle Stages:
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Subscriber → Signed up for emails/blog but hasn’t engaged further.
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Lead → Shown interest (e.g., downloaded a resource, visited pricing page).
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Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) → Meets criteria set by marketing (e.g., engaged with multiple pieces of content).
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Sales Qualified Lead (SQL) → Vetted by sales as ready for direct outreach.
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Opportunity → In active sales discussions (e.g., demo scheduled, proposal sent).
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Customer → Closed a deal.
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Evangelist → Promotes your brand (e.g., referrals, testimonials).
Why are Lifecycle Stages Important in the Sales and Marketing Process?
This structured framework works directly with HubSpot’s flywheel model and inbound methodology. HubSpot's flywheel model, inbound methodology, and lifecycle stages are interconnected frameworks in sales and marketing. The inbound methodology guides strategies for attracting, engaging, and delighting customers, while lifecycle stages provide a granular understanding of the customer journey. These stages align with the flywheel model's emphasis on providing a seamless experience for customers at every touchpoint. Together, they create a holistic approach to driving business growth and fostering long-term customer relationships.
Lifecycle stages allow businesses to segment their audience based on where they are in the customer journey. This segmentation enables more targeted and personalized marketing and sales efforts tailored to the specific needs and behaviors of leads or customers at each stage.
Once established, marketing has the criteria they need to pass a prospect to the sales team to be vetted and nurtured. This helps prioritize leads based on their level of interest and readiness to make a purchase. It ensures that sales and marketing resources are focused on leads that are most likely to convert into customers, improving efficiency and effectiveness.
Lastly, lifecycle stages provide valuable data that can be leveraged to analyze the effectiveness of sales and marketing strategies. Businesses can identify which tactics and channels are most successful at moving leads through the funnel and optimize their approach accordingly.
Lifecycle Stages Help With:
- Segmentation → Tailor messaging (e.g., leads get educational content; opportunities get case studies).
- Alignment → Marketing hands off MQLs to sales when criteria are met.
- Reporting → Track funnel health (e.g., conversion rates between stages).
Lead Status
Lead status is a sub-stage under the SQL lifecycle stage, indicating where a prospect is in the sales process. Unlike lifecycle stages, lead statuses can fluctuate (e.g., a lead might move from "Connected" to "Bad Timing" if they’re not ready to buy).
HubSpot’s Default Lead Statuses:
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New
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Open
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In Progress
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Open Deal
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Unqualified
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Attempted to Contact
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Connected
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Bad Timing
Why is Lead Status Important?
These statuses clarify where each potential customer stands throughout the sales process, allowing sales teams to prioritize and/or customize their efforts accordingly. It also helps identify which leads require further nurturing and can be cycled back to marketing or require a follow-up and are ready for a conversation with sales.
Lead Statuses Help With:
- Sales Prioritization → Focus on "Open" or "Connected" leads first.
- Recycling Leads → Move "Unqualified" or "Bad Timing" leads back to marketing for nurturing.
- Process Transparency → See bottlenecks (e.g., too many stuck in "Attempted to Contact").
How are Lifecycle Stages and Lead Statuses used together?
Now that we know the purpose of each strategy, let’s review how they work together.
Ideally, lead statuses are used as a sub-stage for the SQL lifecycle stage. Providing full insight into the sales process a prospect goes through.
There are two common mistakes in this strategy. The first common mistake is having lead status and lifecycle stage match one other. For example, marking a Subscriber lifecycle stage as a New lead status. Since subscribers are a very top-of-funnel prospects, assigning a lead status before they reach the sales process would create misleading reports.
The second most common mistake in this strategy is not using lead statuses. Without lead status, sales teams can find it difficult to recycle contacts back to marketing, without changing a prospect’s lifecycle stages (remember, lifecycle stages are not meant to go backwards!). By having lead statuses, sales teams can segment prospects to track performance such as bad fits vs good fits or common prospect’s pain points and behaviors that can help change and improve sales/nurturing efforts.
This image helps illustrate how lifecycle stages and lead status work together:
Example: How They Work Together
Scenario: A SaaS company uses lifecycle stages and lead statuses to track a prospect.
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Subscriber → Signs up for a newsletter (no lead status assigned).
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Lead → Downloads an ebook (still no lead status—too early!).
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MQL → Attends a webinar (marketing flags them as qualified).
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SQL → Sales reviews and assigns "New" lead status.
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SQL with "Connected" status → Prospect has a discovery call.
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Opportunity → Proposal sent; lead status becomes "Open Deal."
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Customer → Deal closed; lifecycle stage updates, and lead status is archived.
Pro Tips from the Team
Avoid These Mistakes:
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Matching Lifecycle Stages & Lead Statuses
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Don’t label a "Subscriber" as "New" in lead status. Lead statuses should only apply to SQLs.
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Fix: Only assign lead statuses once a contact becomes an SQL.
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Skipping Lead Statuses Entirely
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Without lead statuses, sales can’t track why deals stall.
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Fix: Use statuses like "Unqualified" or "Bad Timing" to recycle leads without resetting lifecycle stages.
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Best Practices:
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Automate transitions (e.g., MQL → SQL when a lead books a meeting).
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Regularly review "Unqualified" leads → Send them to marketing for re-engagement campaigns.
Lifecycle stages map the macro journey; lead statuses track the micro sales process. Used together, they create a seamless handoff between marketing and sales—and ensure no lead falls through the cracks.
