How to set up Hubspot to capture, track and convert leads

If you're already using Hubspot for your sales operations, you'll already be aware of how the system can track activity and deals. When you add marketing operations to the mix, you'll be able to gather much more information on where you've captured your leads, from which page and content piece. You'll also be able to see how many times they visited your website before they converted and what product they're interested in.

To gain these insights and to set your sales and marketing operations up for success, here's the Hubspot operations playbook I use for early stage start ups.

1. Lead Lifecycle - Marketing - closed won

To accurately map leads through the entire marketing funnel will require some simple set-up in Hubspot in order to track all leads whether coming from marketing or sales. This will start with set up of Hubspot forms to track all demo requests across the website, landing pages and from LinkedIn. And ensuring that all leads follow the same route through the sales cycle and are attributed in the same way.

Hubspot forms

Forms required: Demo Request, Contact us, Campaign landing page, LinkedIn lead gen

Form set up: Marketing -> Lead Capture -> Forms -> Create Form

Choose a blank form to customise how you want to set up the form with custom fields. These can then be cloned and edited later on when needed.

Hidden fields for attribution: 

• utm_source

• utm_medium

• utm_campaign

• Original source

• Campaign name

Form fill redirect settings: redirect to thank you landing page 

Lifecycle properties

As standard, most lifecycle properties will already be set up within LinkedIn for the sales process, customisation will come right at the beginning and right at the end of the sales process. Therefore, the set up in lifecycle stage I suggest will be:

How to add lifecycle stages: Settings -> Data Management -> Properties -> Create property 

Lead lifecycle

An example of event leads going through the full lead lifecycle:

Lead -> nurture email -> increase lead score/reply -> MQL -> sales send call/email sequences -> SQL -> Opportunity -> Closed

MQL -> sales send call/email sequences -> SQL -> Opportunity -> Closed

Extra steps are required at the lead stage to convert to an MQL to then transfer over to sales and then there’s extra steps once handed across to sales between MQL and SQL.

2. Nurturing campaigns

Here’s an example nurturing workflow based on attempting to convert a lead into an MQL. Leads will be uploaded into Hubspot and enrolled into a workflow and will only come out of the workflow when they reach a certain lead score, reply to an email, or request a demo. The workflow will be a simple linear workflow:

Email 1: Thank You + Resource

Timing: 1–2 days after the event Goal: Keep the brand fresh and deliver value

• Subject line: "Thanks for stopping by + here’s your free [guide/toolkit]"

• Content:

  • Thank them for attending

  • Share a useful resource (e.g., event slides, industry guide, checklist)

  • Light CTA: "Learn more" / "Explore the platform"

Email 2: Pain Point Education

Timing: 3–4 days later Goal: Show you understand their challenges

• Subject line: "Are you facing [pain point] too?"

• Content:

  • Short content piece (blog) or LinkedIn post that speaks to a common issue from the event

  • Provide insight or tip that helps

  • CTA: “See how we help companies like yours”

Email 3: Customer Story

Timing: 3–5 days later Goal: Build credibility and relevance

• Subject line: "How [Company] solved [problem] in [industry]"

• Content:

  • 1-paragraph story or link to video/testimonial

  • Match to lead’s vertical or job function if possible

  • CTA: "See more stories" or “Book a discovery call”

Email 4: Value & CTA

Timing: 1 week later Goal: Encourage stronger conversion action

• Subject line: "Ready to see how this fits your team?"

• Content:

  • Recap key value points

  • Use social proof (logos, stats)

  • CTA: "Book a demo" / "Chat with us"

Optional Email 5–6:

• Invite to another webinar or free audit

• Offer a checklist or tool for further qualification

This workflow once built in Hubspot can then be cloned per event with emails updated with information from that event.

3. Lead Scoring

For an example simple lead scoring model I would suggest the below:

Score reached to qualify as MQL: 30

Form fill and replies qualify immediately, score accumulation will mark as MQL when threshold is reached (separate workflow required to update lifecycle stage when threshold is met.

Of course this is an example and template set up and they'll be certain difference from business to business. You've got to do what's right for how you are set up.