Auto-Archive Stale Deals

Automatically move deals with no activity to a cleanup stage after 30 days

Pipedrive deals accumulate over time. This automation scans for deals with zero activity (no calls, emails, notes) for 30+ days and moves them to a 'Stale' or 'Follow-Up Needed' stage. Keeps your pipeline clean and your team focused on hot deals.

Every day at 6:00 AM, Nora queries your Pipedrive account for all open deals not currently in a terminal Won or Lost stage. It checks the last activity timestamp on each record, looking for calls, emails, meetings, or tasks. If a deal shows zero logged activity for 30 days or more, Nora moves it to a designated 'Stale' pipeline stage. It then sends a summary message to your sales channel listing the archived deals and their original owners.

Sales managers read the morning summary rather than manually filtering the pipeline board. They use the active pipeline view to run team meetings based only on deals with momentum. The manager and deal owners still review the Stale stage weekly to decide whether to officially mark those deals as Lost, re-engage the prospect, or delete the record entirely.

Runs daily at 6am using Pipedrive, run by your Sales Manager.

How it works

1. Daily pipeline query — Nora runs on a schedule at 6:00 AM. It calls the Pipedrive API to retrieve all deals currently in active pipeline stages, ignoring anything already marked Won or Lost.
2. Activity timestamp check — For each active deal, Nora reads the last activity date. It looks at the timestamps for all logged calls, emails, meetings, and tasks associated with the deal and its linked contacts.
3. Exception handling — Nora checks for custom exclusion fields. If a deal has a 'Do Not Auto-Archive' checkbox ticked or a specific priority tag, Nora skips it regardless of the inactivity duration.
4. Stage movement — If a deal has no activity for 30 days and no exclusion tags, Nora updates the deal record. It changes the stage ID to the designated 'Stale' or 'Follow-Up Needed' stage in your pipeline.
5. Owner notification — Nora compiles a list of the moved deals. It sends a message to your specified communication channel, tagging the respective deal owners with links to the Pipedrive records.

What this replaces

Sales managers open the Pipedrive board and manually scroll through the pipeline stages. They click into older deals to check the activity history, calculating the days since the last email or call. They drag dormant deals one by one into a cleanup stage, or message the reps asking for updates before moving them.

• Filter Pipedrive deals by open status
• Click individual deals to check the most recent activity log
• Drag inactive deals to a different pipeline stage
• Message sales reps about the moved deals

Rough estimate rather than a measured figure: about 15 minutes a day, assuming an active pipeline of 100 deals and checking 20 older ones at 45 seconds each.

What it needs to run

Accounts and plans

• Pipedrive account
• A team communication channel (WhatsApp, Slack, or email)

Access it asks for

• API Key or OAuth access to read and update deals
• Read access to deal activities to check timestamps
• Write access to pipeline stages to move the deal

What Nora reads

• Deal status and current stage
• Last activity timestamps for calls, emails, and tasks
• Custom field values for exclusions

What Nora writes

• Deal stage updates
• Activity logs noting the automated move

When it goes wrong

• The target Stale stage is deleted Nora detects the missing stage ID when attempting to move a deal. It stops the run, leaves the deals in their current stages, and sends an alert asking you to specify a new destination stage.
• Pipedrive API rate limit is reached If the account hits the limit of 100 requests per 2 seconds, Nora pauses execution. It waits for the rate limit window to reset, then resumes querying or moving the remaining deals.
• A deal has future scheduled activities Nora reads the scheduled date for upcoming tasks. If a future activity exists, Nora considers the deal active and leaves it in its current stage, reporting nothing.
• A rep logs an activity during the query Nora relies on the timestamp at the exact moment of the query. If the activity is logged seconds after the query, the deal is moved. The rep can manually drag it back.

Who this is for

Worth it if

• Sales teams managing more than 50 open deals at a time
• Managers running weekly pipeline reviews who need accurate active deal counts
• Organizations with long sales cycles where deals frequently stall and require separate nurture tracks

Not worth it if

• Teams with very low deal volume where every opportunity is tracked intimately
• Workflows where inactivity is an expected part of the primary pipeline stage, such as waiting on annual renewals

A worked example

A commercial landscaping company has 140 open deals. They configure Nora to check daily at 6:00 AM, moving deals with no activity for 30 days to a 'Cold' stage and sending a summary to the sales WhatsApp group.

Good morning. I completed the daily pipeline cleanup. I found 4 deals with no activity in the last 30 days and moved them to the Cold stage:
- Acme Corp Maintenance (Owner: Sarah) - Last activity: 32 days ago
- Oak Street Plaza (Owner: David) - Last activity: 35 days ago
- City Parks Bid (Owner: Sarah) - Last activity: 41 days ago
- Westside Retail (Owner: Marcus) - Last activity: 30 days ago

Your active pipeline now has 136 deals.

Frequently asked questions

Can I change the inactivity threshold from 30 days?

Yes. You tell Nora in your chat channel what timeframe you prefer. If you want to change it to 45 days, or apply different rules for different pipelines, you just ask. Nora updates its instructions and applies the new threshold on the next scheduled run.

What if a deal is waiting on a client and shouldn't be moved?

You can create a custom field in Pipedrive, like a 'Hold' checkbox or a specific tag. Tell Nora to ignore deals with that tag. During the daily check, Nora will read the custom field and skip the deal, regardless of how long it has been inactive.

Will Nora delete the stale deals?

No. Nora only changes the pipeline stage of the deal, moving it to a designated cleanup or stale stage. It does not delete the record, the contacts, or the history. You retain full access to the deal and can move it back to an active stage at any time.

How does Nora know what counts as activity?

Nora reads the standard activity log in Pipedrive. This includes calls, emails, meetings, and tasks logged against the deal or its linked contacts. If you want Nora to also check for specific field updates or note creations, you can tell it to include those as activity indicators.

Connects to

• Pipedrive — all 10 Pipedrive automations

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