If you’re tired of chasing down leads or forgetting to follow up with clients, you’re not alone. A lot of people get stuck because they rely on memory, sticky notes, or a messy inbox. If you’re using Insightly as your CRM, you already have tools to automate much of this. The trick is setting things up so they actually save you time, not add more busywork.
This guide is for anyone who wants to cut down on manual follow-up and finally get reminders that work with you, not against you. No fluff—just practical steps, pitfalls to avoid, and a few shortcuts.
Why Automate Follow-Ups in the First Place?
Let’s be honest: most people don’t need more reminders—they need better ones. Automation isn’t about doing everything, it’s about making sure the right things don’t fall through the cracks. Here’s why it matters:
- You close more deals when you follow up on time.
- You look more professional—nobody loves being forgotten.
- You free up your brain for stuff that actually requires thinking.
But, automation can backfire if you set up too much or make it too complicated. So let’s keep it simple.
Step 1: Make Sure Your Insightly House Is in Order
Before you dive into automating, you need a decent foundation. If your CRM is a junk drawer, automation just multiplies the mess.
Quick sanity check: - Are your leads, contacts, and organizations up to date? - Do you have clear stages or pipelines for your sales or projects? - Are you already in the habit of logging notes and tasks?
If not, spend half an hour cleaning up. Automation works best when it’s built on clean data.
Step 2: Get to Know Insightly’s Automation Tools
Insightly offers several ways to automate reminders and follow-up tasks. Here’s what’s worth your time:
- Workflows: Automate actions (like creating tasks or sending emails) based on triggers.
- Activity Sets: Predefined groups of tasks you can apply to records in one click.
- Task Reminders: Simple pop-up or email notifications for tasks—easy, but not “automation” in the full sense.
- Third-party integrations: Zapier, Outlook/Google integrations, and others. Sometimes necessary, but don’t start here.
What to skip:
Don’t bother with over-complicated workflow chains unless you have a real process mapped out. Start small.
Step 3: Automate Basic Follow-Ups with Workflows
Workflows are the backbone of automation in Insightly. They let you trigger actions based on changes to leads, opportunities, projects, or other records.
How to set up a simple follow-up workflow:
- Go to System Settings → Automation → Workflows.
- Click “Add Workflow” and choose the record type (e.g., Leads, Opportunities).
- Set up a trigger. For example, “When Lead Status changes to Contacted.”
- Add an action. For follow-ups, you usually want to “Create Task.”
- Configure the task details:
- Assign it to yourself or a team member.
- Set a due date (e.g., 2 days after the trigger).
- Add a clear subject, like “Follow up with {{LEAD_NAME}}.”
- Optional: Set a reminder (email or popup).
Pro tip:
Don’t go overboard with triggers. The more complex the logic, the more likely you’ll forget how it works—or why you set it up in the first place.
Step 4: Use Activity Sets for Repetitive Sequences
If you have a repeatable process (say, three follow-up calls and a check-in email over two weeks), Activity Sets save time.
Setting up Activity Sets:
- Go to System Settings → Activity Sets.
- Create a new Activity Set and give it a name (e.g., “New Lead Follow-Up”).
- Add tasks with specific due dates relative to when the set is applied (e.g., “Call lead” due 1 day after, “Send email” due 3 days after).
- Apply the Activity Set to a record manually (from the Lead or Opportunity page).
When to use:
Great for onboarding, sales cadences, or any process you repeat often. Not so great for one-off or very custom follow-ups.
Step 5: Set Up Task Reminders The Right Way
Every task in Insightly can have a reminder (popup, email, or both). Don’t underestimate the basics:
- When creating a task (manually or via workflow), set a reminder.
- Choose a realistic lead time. If you always snooze reminders, make them show up when you’ll actually act on them.
- Avoid reminder fatigue. Too many popups = you’ll start ignoring them.
Pro tip:
Email reminders are easy to miss in a busy inbox. Popups are more annoying (which, in this case, is good).
Step 6: Advanced — Automate with Third-Party Tools (If You Must)
Sometimes you’ll hit a wall with Insightly’s built-in automation. Maybe you want to trigger a follow-up when someone replies to an email, or when a proposal is signed in DocuSign. In these cases, third-party tools come in handy.
- Zapier: Connects Insightly to thousands of apps. Can create tasks, update records, or send messages in Slack when something happens.
- Native integrations: Insightly has built-in connections to email/calendar. Good for syncing tasks.
- Drawbacks: More moving parts, more stuff that can break, and more cost.
My advice:
Don’t start with Zapier unless you’ve maxed out what Insightly can do on its own. Every new integration is another thing to maintain.
Step 7: Test and Tweak—Don’t “Set and Forget”
Most automation fails not because it’s badly built, but because nobody checks if it’s working.
- Test your workflows: Create dummy leads or opportunities and see if the right tasks/reminders fire.
- Ask your team: Are reminders showing up? Are tasks too soon/too late?
- Review every few months: Disable what you don’t use. Update steps that don’t make sense anymore.
Pro tip:
Keep a one-page cheat sheet of your active automations. It’ll save you headaches when you need to update or debug something.
What Works, What Doesn’t, and What to Ignore
What works:
- Simple, direct workflow triggers (“When X happens, create a follow-up task”).
- Activity Sets for repeatable processes.
- Task reminders for daily to-dos.
What doesn’t:
- Overly complex chains of automation—especially if you’re a team of one or two.
- Relying entirely on email reminders.
- Automating stuff nobody actually wants to do.
What to ignore:
- Unnecessary integrations. Each new tool is a new point of failure.
- “Set and forget” mentality. Automation is only as good as its upkeep.
Wrapping Up: Keep It Simple, Review Often
Don’t fall for the myth that more automation is always better. Start with the basics—a few well-timed follow-up tasks and reminders can make a huge difference. Review what’s actually helping, and don’t be afraid to turn stuff off.
The goal isn’t to automate your job away. It’s to free up your time for the things that matter—like having actual conversations with your clients, not just checking boxes. Set up a few automations today, see what sticks, and build from there.