Marketing platform with CRM features

ActiveCampaign

CRM

Every verdict, with its evidence

Core objects

In full

The sales CRM carries four separate records: the deal, the contact, the account, and the task. A deal takes a primary contact plus secondary contacts, and the create-deal API exposes `account` as an optional parameter, so organization association is possible but not compulsory - a deal created from an account record does not need a contact at all. Accounts hold their own fields, associated contacts, notes and deals, and a contact can belong to only one account. Tasks attach to contacts and to deals; vendor documentation does not describe attaching a task directly to an account.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/206797510-Understanding-pipelines-stages-deals-and-tasks, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360008034900-How-to-use-Accounts-in-ActiveCampaign, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360008108619-Getting-Started-with-Accounts, https://developers.activecampaign.com/reference/create-a-deal-new, https://developers.activecampaign.com/reference/tasks

Verification: Verified

Pipeline stages

In full

A pipeline is a defined set of stages, displayed as ordered columns that a deal moves through from left to right. Pipelines are unlimited and each carries its own stage set. Moving a deal to a different stage does not change its status, which stays open until it is explicitly closed.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/206797510-Understanding-pipelines-stages-deals-and-tasks, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000030899-How-to-create-and-edit-a-pipeline-in-ActiveCampaign, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000240450-How-to-mark-a-Deal-as-Won-or-Lost

Verification: Verified

Status

In full

The ActiveCampaign deal object carries its own status attribute, documented in the API reference with the values 0 for open, 1 for won and 2 for lost. The help center is explicit that this is separate from the stage: moving an opportunity to a different stage only repositions it in the sales process and leaves its status at open. Whether the opportunity is still live is therefore read from the record without any lookup against the stage.

Source: https://developers.activecampaign.com/reference/deal#deals-parameters-available-values

Verification: Verified

Resolution

In part

The same status attribute distinguishes won from lost, so the outcome sits on the opportunity itself. Vendor documentation lists the ways it is set - a Status dropdown on the record, dragging to the won or lost target on the pipeline board, the Update a status CRM action inside an automation, or the API passing 1 for won and 2 for lost - and states that only changing the status makes the platform treat the opportunity as closed.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000240450-How-to-mark-a-Deal-as-Won-or-Lost

Verification: Verified

Actual close date

In full

ActiveCampaign keeps the settlement date itself, distinct from the shipped Forecasted Close Date that a user sets. The Forecasted Close Date article draws the line directly, describing that field as separate from the opportunity's native data such as the created date or the date on which the status was changed to won or lost. The Deal Forecast report then scores forecast accuracy by comparing the forecasted date against the date the opportunity was actually marked won, and the Deal Overview report reports an average time to won. No user is asked to type a settlement date - it follows from the status change - so the platform stamps it. Worth noting for the buyer: this date is surfaced through reporting rather than as a plainly named close-date attribute in the deal API schema.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/4405498687132-What-is-the-Forecasted-Close-Date

Verification: Verified

Record preservation

In full

Settled opportunities stay in the database and stay in reporting. The API lists opportunities with a status filter, so won and lost records are retrievable by that status. The Deal Overview report is built on them, covering opportunities marked won and marked lost, a won ratio by count and by value calculated against closed opportunities, and an average time to won. The Deal Forecast report likewise reviews opportunities that have been closed. Nothing in the documentation describes closing as deleting or archiving the record.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000240770-Deal-Overview-report

Verification: Verified

Structured lost reasons

In part

No out-of-the-box lost reason field appears in the documentation for marking a deal won or lost. A structured reason is instead created as a custom deal field, and the vendor's own guidance names a won or loss reason as the example use for a dropdown deal field. That field is structured rather than free text, deals can be filtered by it in the pipeline, and custom reporting carries deal custom field name and value as dimensions, so the reason is reportable. The buyer has to configure the field, and nothing in the documentation makes it mandatory at close.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360001517940-Custom-deal-field-overview, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/206393184-Filtering-and-searching-deal-data, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/8488616908316-Custom-Reporting-Dimensions, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000240450-How-to-mark-a-Deal-as-Won-or-Lost

Verification: Verified

Email sync

In full

A user connects a Gmail, IMAP or Microsoft Exchange mailbox to the CRM, and messages to and from contacts then sync into the contact and deal records, appearing in the activity stream and an Emails tab. One-to-one mail is composed and sent from inside a deal, contact or account record; when a mailbox is connected the message goes out through that mail server and lands in its Sent folder. The troubleshooting guidance confirms that both sent and received mail from the connected client is shown, subject to documented conditions such as the contact having an open deal, the address matching, and trashed mail being excluded. The connection is per user, so one user's synced mail is not visible to another.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/218253748-Connect-your-email-account-to-ActiveCampaign, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/115001500724-Troubleshooting-connected-email-accounts, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/115001313410-What-is-the-difference-between-the-ActiveCampaign-Chrome-extension-and-connecting-my-email-account-to-Deals-, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/115001093870-Send-a-direct-1-1-email-from-a-deal-record, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/4405818422940-Will-1-1-emails-sent-through-a-contact-s-profile-or-open-deal-sync-with-a-connected-email-s-Sent-folder-

Verification: Verified

Calendar sync

In part

Calendar Feed publishes CRM tasks to Google Calendar, Apple Calendar, Outlook or any client that accepts a subscription calendar, filtered by task type, pipeline and owner. The vendor states plainly that the flow is one way: task changes made in the CRM reach the calendar, but changes or deletions made in the calendar are not reflected back in the CRM. Only incomplete tasks appear, and refresh frequency is set by the calendar client.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/115000648630-Sync-tasks-to-your-calendar-with-Calendar-Feed

Verification: Verified

Schedulable activity types

In full

Tasks are created from a deal or a contact record with a due date and due time, and assigned to any user with permission to view the pipeline. Task types are user-definable: the API documents that task types are configurable and vary by account, with endpoints to create, update, delete and list them, and the help center states that administrators add task types and task outcomes in task settings. Documented examples of task types include a call, an email, a meeting and lunch, so operational internal work can be modelled as its own type.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000031540-How-to-create-a-task, https://developers.activecampaign.com/reference/tasks, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/4403751822226-An-overview-of-Task-Outcomes, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/206797510-Understanding-pipelines-stages-deals-and-tasks

Verification: Verified

Opportunity reporting

In part

Two of the three required reports exist natively. The Deal Overview report gives won ratio by count and by value across closed deals, which is the overall win and loss rate, and the Deal Forecast report projects the pipeline on a daily, weekly or monthly cycle driven by the first-class Forecasted Close Date field on the deal. Stage-to-stage conversion is the gap: the five shipped CRM reports cover deal overview, sales performance, deal forecast, tasks and sales engagement, none of which report conversion between stages, and the custom reporting measure list carries deal counts, values, days to win and days to loss but no stage transition or stage conversion measure. Stage is available only as a dimension for slicing, and custom report data is refreshed once a day rather than in real time.

Source: https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360000240770-Deal-Overview-report, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360010830600-Deal-Forecast-report, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360003700700-Sales-Performance-report, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/sections/360000454264-CRM-Deal-Reports, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360015967799-Custom-Reporting-Measures, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/8488616908316-Custom-Reporting-Dimensions, https://help.activecampaign.com/hc/en-us/articles/360018102120-Intro-to-Custom-Reports

Verification: Verified