A potential customer lands on your website, intrigued by your product. They browse for a while, even add an item to their cart—but then, they disappear. Days later, they see an email reminding them about that forgotten purchase, and they're clicking "Buy Now."

This seamless process results from well-thought-out workflows and automation. Businesses rely on these tools to guide customers through their journey—from when they first hear about a product to when they make a purchase (and beyond).

Let’s learn how understanding the customer journey and implementing workflows and automation can help businesses create better customer experiences. We’ll break it all down step by step.

Understanding the Customer Journey

To make workflows and automation work for you, you first need to understand the customer journey. Think of it as the path your customers take when interacting with your brand, from the first touchpoint to the post-purchase phase. Here are common stages of the journey:

1. Awareness – This is where potential customers discover your brand, often through ads, social media, or word of mouth. At this stage, they’re just starting to recognize their needs and looking for solutions.
2. Consideration – Here, customers actively compare their options, researching products, reading reviews, or signing up for newsletters to learn more.
3. Decision – This is the pivotal moment when a customer decides to make a purchase—or not. It’s where your workflows need to shine.
4. Retention – A sale isn’t the end of the journey. Businesses that keep customers engaged after the purchase (with follow-ups, exclusive offers, or helpful content) build loyalty and encourage repeat business.
5. Advocacy – The final stage, where satisfied customers become your brand’s champions, recommending you to others.

Each stage requires a different approach. Understanding what your customers need and expect at every step helps you design workflows and automate tasks that feel natural and helpful—not pushy.

For example, you automate welcome emails after someone subscribes, showing them you value their interest. Then, you send personalized product recommendations based on their browsing behavior, nudging them toward a decision.

A Lead’s Life Cycle Stages

As leads move through the customer journey, they don’t just evolve in their understanding of your brand. Their transformation is also about how your team sees and interacts with them.  

Each stage reflects a shift in their needs and expectations, as well as the type of interaction that’s most effective.

Here’s a closer look at each life cycle stage:

1. Lead

A lead is someone just stepping into your orbit. Maybe they’ve stumbled upon your blog, downloaded a free resource, or liked a social media post. At this stage, your goal is to build trust and spark curiosity. 

You’re planting the seeds for a relationship by providing valuable, engaging content. These early interactions are gentle nudges, inviting them to explore further without pushing too hard.

2. Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL)

When a lead shows sustained interest—like opening multiple emails or revisiting your website—they become a Marketing Qualified Lead. These folks are starting to connect the dots between their problem and your potential solution. 

This is where your messaging becomes more targeted. Instead of broad awareness, show how you can solve their specific challenges. Case studies, success stories, or tailored content can help solidify their interest, nudging them closer to engaging with sales.

3. Sales Accepted Lead (SAL)

Now the lead takes a significant step—they’ve expressed interest in speaking with your team. Maybe they’ve filled out a contact form or requested a demo. At this stage, it’s all about responsiveness and personalization. 

They’re looking for real conversations, not generic pitches, so your sales team needs to be ready to dive in.

This is the handoff point where marketing and sales align, ensuring the lead feels valued and understood.

4. Sales Qualified Lead (SQL)

Sales Qualified Leads are the gems your team has been waiting for. These are the leads who’ve been vetted and show strong potential to convert. They’re asking detailed questions, exploring pricing, and maybe even looping in their decision-makers. 

The goal here is to provide clarity and build confidence. Whether it’s through personalized demos, tailored proposals, or thoughtful follow-ups, your job is to make it easy for them to say, “Yes, this is the solution we need.”

5. Opportunity

This is where things get serious. Opportunities are leads deep in the buying process—evaluating options, negotiating terms, or working through the final details. It’s a stage that demands transparency and trust. 

Every interaction should reassure them that they’re making the right choice. This could mean addressing concerns promptly, showcasing your unique value, or simply staying consistent and communicative.

6. Product Qualified Lead (PQL)

Some prospects take a hands-on approach by trying your product through a free trial or freemium plan. These Product Qualified Leads are often your warmest prospects because they’ve already invested time exploring your solution. 

Your role is to guide them toward seeing your offer's full value. Highlighting advanced features, sharing tips to maximize their trial, or showing how others have succeeded can help convert their curiosity into commitment.

7. Customer

The journey doesn’t end when a lead becomes a customer—it evolves. Now, the focus shifts to onboarding, ensuring they feel confident in their decision and know how to use your product or service effectively. 

A great customer experience sets the stage for long-term loyalty. Regular check-ins, helpful resources, and meaningful touchpoints can turn customers into advocates ready to share their success stories and recommend you to others.

Automating the Lead Life Cycle with Advanced Workflows

When automating your workflows, these stages act as a blueprint for structuring your processes. Align your workflows with the natural flow of the customer journey to ensure every lead gets the attention they need at the right moment without overwhelming your team.

Why use automation? Businesses using marketing automation experience a 14.5% increase in sales productivity while reducing marketing overhead by 12.2%. 

With the proper workflows, you can automate repetitive tasks and enhance the overall lead experience, making your processes seamless and scalable.

Let’s break it down.

Workflow Basics

Workflows are like the engine behind your automation efforts. They’re designed to handle repetitive tasks, so your team can focus on high-value interactions. With workflows, you can:

• Send personalized emails at the perfect time.
• Assign leads to the right sales reps without delay.
• Automatically update your CRM as leads engage with your brand.

Imagine a lead downloading an eBook and immediately receiving a follow-up email with additional resources.

Meanwhile, your CRM flags them as a Marketing Qualified Lead, triggering a nurture sequence tailored to their interests. That’s automation doing the heavy lifting, freeing your team to engage meaningfully when it matters most.

How to Set Up Effective Workflows on HubSpot

Here’s how to turn those life cycle stages into actionable, automated workflows:

1. Map Enrollment Triggers to Life Cycle Stages

Triggers are the starting point of any workflow. Think about what actions signal a lead’s transition into a new stage, such as:

• Filling out a form (Lead stage).
• Opening multiple emails or clicking on links (MQL stage).
• Requesting a demo (SQL stage).

2. Mapping these triggers ensures that your workflows activate at just the right moment.
3. Add Stage-Specific Actions
4. Customize the actions within each workflow to meet leads' needs at that particular stage. Here’s how:

• Lead Stage: Send a friendly welcome email introducing your brand and offering educational content to spark interest.
• MQL Stage: Share targeted resources like case studies or comparison guides that align with their challenges.
• SQL Stage: Automatically assign the lead to a sales rep, notify them of the assignment, and provide key context for their follow-up.

5. These tailored actions ensure leads progress through the funnel while receiving relevant, value-driven communication.
6. Monitor Engagement and Progress Dynamically

The beauty of workflows is their flexibility. Use engagement metrics like email opens, clicks, or website visits to adjust the flow dynamically. 

For example, if a lead doesn’t engage with an email campaign, trigger a follow-up sequence to re-capture their attention. Conversely, if they show high interest, fast-track them to the next stage.

Tips for Optimizing Workflow Performance

Creating workflows is a powerful way to streamline processes, but optimizing them ensures every step adds value, moves leads through their journey, and simplifies processes for your team. 

These tips will help you fine-tune your workflows for maximum efficiency and impact:

1. Define Clear Enrollment Triggers

Consider enrollment triggers as the gates determining who gets into a workflow. If these gates are too broad, the workflow gets flooded with irrelevant contacts; if they’re too narrow, you risk missing valuable opportunities.

For instance:

• Good Trigger: "Contact filled out the demo request form."
• Vague Trigger: "Contact showed interest."

The more precise your trigger, the better your workflow aligns with user actions. Use defined, measurable actions.

Triggers should directly tie to the goal of the workflow. If the goal is to nurture leads interested in Product A, ensure your trigger relates specifically to actions around Product A, such as downloading a relevant eBook or visiting a product page.

Use tools like HubSpot’s Breeze AI to suggest triggers tailored to your needs, such as form submissions, page views, or property changes. Defining clear triggers prevents misaligned actions and keeps your workflows running smoothly.

2. Leverage Personalization

Your audience wants to feel seen and understood; personalization helps you achieve that. Research shows that personalized emails result in six times more transactions, 29% more people opening them, and 41% more clicks.

Use data-driven insights to tailor your communication to each lead's unique journey. 

For new leads, reference the exact form or event that brought them into your system: “Thanks for signing up for our webinar on lead generation strategies!”

If a lead downloaded a technical whitepaper, follow up with content that digs deeper into technical features, not general overviews.

Customized Actions can also be helpful here. Assign leads to sales reps who specialize in their industry or needs.

HubSpot lets you use CRM data to create hyper-specific workflows. For example, you could trigger a workflow that sends personalized guides to CFOs in the healthcare industry who have visited your pricing page more than once. 

3. Review and Adjust Regularly

Even the best workflows can become outdated or lose their effectiveness over time. Workflows aren’t set-it-and-forget-it systems—they need regular maintenance. 

Analyzing their performance helps you uncover what’s working and what’s not. Monitor key metrics like email open rates, conversion rates, and lead progression through life cycle stages.

Ask yourself:

• Are leads dropping out at a specific stage?
• Are certain triggers leading to high bounce rates?

Based on your findings, refine your workflows. For example, if your MQL nurture emails aren’t being opened, test different subject lines or adjust the timing of your sends. Small tweaks can have a big impact on performance.

Track open rates, click-through rates, and conversion rates for emails and content. Low engagement could signal the need for more compelling copy or different timing. 

Then, identify stages where leads are stalling or dropping out entirely. For instance, if many MQLs aren’t converting to SQLs, consider refining your lead qualification criteria or enhancing your MQL nurture content.

4. Use AI Tools

AI tools like HubSpot’s Breeze make automating workflows smarter and easier. They eliminate guesswork when creating enrollment triggers and actions, saving time and boosting precision.

Breeze can suggest specific enrollment criteria, such as “Contact viewed the pricing page three times in the past week.” This level of granularity ensures you’re targeting the right people at the right time.

It can also automate actions like creating tasks for your sales team, sending targeted emails, or setting delays until key dates (e.g., a product launch).

AI can adjust lead scores based on behavior dynamically, ensuring leads are always routed to the proper workflows.

Let’s say you’re running a free trial program for your software. With Breeze, you could:

• Trigger a workflow for users who signed up for the trial but haven’t logged in after three days.
• Automate an email reminding them of the trial’s key benefits and offering a quick-start guide.
• Set a task for your sales team to call high-value leads after seven days of trial usage.

AI reduces manual effort and ensures your workflows remain agile and responsive to changing behaviors.

Take Charge of Your Workflows Today

Optimizing and automating workflows isn’t just about efficiency—it’s about creating a seamless experience for both your team and your leads. 

You can ensure your workflows are more than automated tasks by defining clear enrollment triggers, personalizing every interaction, reviewing performance regularly, and leveraging the power of AI tools like HubSpot’s Breeze.

Successful workflows involve understanding your customer journey and aligning every action with your business goals. 

Stay proactive, keep refining, and never hesitate to embrace innovation. The rewards? Streamlined processes, better lead conversion, and a team freed to focus on what they do best.

Ready to Transform Your Workflows with Origin 63?

At Origin 63, we specialize in helping businesses like yours unlock the full potential of HubSpot’s workflow automation. From mapping enrollment triggers to crafting personalized campaigns and integrating AI tools like Breeze, we’ll guide you every step of the way.

Streamline your processes, nurture leads more effectively, and achieve scalable growth with expert help. Let’s work together to build workflows that don’t just perform—they excel.

Contact us today to start your automation journey!