Opportunity
An opportunity is one commercial deal Connect tracks on the pipeline: a title, a value, the person and company it belongs to, and exactly one of five stages — open, proposal sent, negotiating, won or lost. The first three are the open stages that make up the pipeline; the last two close it.
Five stages, and what each one implies#
| Stage | Shown as | What it says about the relationship |
|---|---|---|
| open | Open | A deal exists; the person sits at the opportunity stage |
| proposal | Proposal sent | Something priced has gone out |
| negotiation | Negotiating | Terms are being discussed |
| won | Won | The person becomes a client — and that move needs a human yes |
| lost | Lost | Closed without a sale; the relationship stage is not dragged backwards |
The pipeline totals only the open three. That is why a workspace's pipeline value drops the moment a deal is won rather than rising — the money has stopped being forecast and started being real, and it is counted somewhere else.
Moving to a stage also moves the lifecycle stage of the person the deal belongs to. Open, proposal and negotiation all place them at *opportunity*. Winning places them at *client*, and that is the one transition Connect is not allowed to make on its own.
Why winning needs a person#
Becoming a client is a commercial commitment, not a data update. A workspace that has asked to see outbound actions before they happen has, in substance, asked to see this too — so the transition into *client* is on the short list of moves requiring human confirmation, and Connect proposes it rather than performing it.
Every transition is also idempotent. The same evidence often arrives twice — a re-processed message, a retried request, a redelivered webhook — and a reference key means the second arrival returns the original event instead of moving the relationship a second time. Without that, one signed order read twice reads as two.
Both facts are recorded rather than merely applied: the stage lives on the record, and the transition is written separately with who moved it and why. A column on its own cannot settle a disputed invoice six months later.
Not a CRM pipeline#
There are no custom pipelines, no probability weightings and no forecast model here. Five stages is the shortest sequence that still distinguishes the things a business treats differently, and anyone who needs weighted forecasting has a CRM already. Connect's interest in the stage is behavioural — knowing where a deal stands so it answers and follows up correctly — rather than analytical.
- Not a deal
- Same record, different register. *Deal* is the everyday word; *opportunity* is the name in the model and the API.
- Not a follow-up
- A follow-up is a dated commitment to make contact. Deals generate follow-ups; a follow-up on its own is not a deal.
- Not a quote
- A priced document is an artefact you send. The opportunity is what it is about, and outlives several of them.
Questions#
Can one person have several opportunities?
Yes, and they are independent. Their stages do not have to agree, and the relationship stage follows the furthest one rather than the newest.
What happens to the relationship when a deal is lost?
Nothing is dragged backwards. Losing a deal closes the deal; the person keeps the stage they had reached, because having lost one piece of business is not the same as never having been in any.
Does Connect create opportunities by itself?
It can propose one from a conversation, and the Connect Assistant has tools to create and move them. What may happen without asking is decided by autonomy, and the move into won is confirmed by a person regardless.