Drop your contacts in, name your stages and set your first follow-ups. That is the whole set-up, and for most teams it takes about 10 minutes. Here it is on one page.

Before you start

Create an account on the Free plan. It covers 2 seats and 1 pipeline, needs no card and is enough to see whether Leadline suits you. If you want the Team plan straight away, its 14-day trial needs no card either.

Import your contacts

Export a CSV from your spreadsheet or your old CRM and drop it in. Leadline reads the column names and suggests a match for each one: name, company, e-mail, phone and deal value. Check the suggestions, change any that are wrong and press import. Duplicates are merged, so if the same person appears twice you end up with one contact and both sets of notes.

Build your pipeline

Name your stages. If you are unsure, start with lead, qualified, proposal, negotiation and won. Then drag your open deals into the right columns. Each column shows how many deals it holds and what they are worth, so you see the shape of your quarter straight away.

Connect your e-mail

Connect Gmail or Outlook. The e-mails you send to a contact are logged on their timeline, and you can see when a proposal has been opened.

Set your first follow-ups

Open the deals you are most worried about and give each one a next step with a date. They appear on your list for that day. This is the habit that matters most, so do it before you invite anyone.

Invite the team and get the app

Invite your colleagues, then install the phone app for iOS or Android. The board, contacts and follow-ups are all there, and you can log a call before you reach the car.

Set-up is not the goal. A board the team opens every morning is.

What to leave for later

Reports, quotas and custom fields can wait until the board is part of your week. Get the basics right first; the rest is easier once there is real data in it.