Measuring how long it takes for your deals to close is essential for understanding your sales performance and identifying bottlenecks. With two simple automations in Zapier (or Make), you can automatically record:
When a deal is opened, and
When a deal is closed, then calculate the time between both moments.
This guide explains how to set it up step-by-step.
Overview of the Setup
To calculate time-to-close, you’ll need:
Two workflows in Zapier (or Make):
Workflow A – Record the deal opening timestamp
Workflow B – Record the closing timestamp and calculate the duration
Two fields in folk:
A field to store the opening time (e.g., Day Demo)
A field to store the time-to-close result (e.g., Time to Close)
Workflow A — Capture the Deal Opening Timestamp
1. Trigger: Person Custom Field Updated
Use the trigger “Model & Folk – Person Custom Field Updated”.
Configure it to watch the deal status field in your sales pipeline.
Example:
Group: Demo Management
Status field: your pipeline stages
When stage becomes Demo Offered, this means the deal is now “opened”.
2. Action: Record Opening Timestamp in folk
Add an update step to push a timestamp into a dedicated field in folk (e.g., Day Demo).
In Zapier, use the built-in dynamic value:
{{zap_meta_human_now}}Make sure you paste it inside the folk date field.
This tells Zapier: “Insert the current timestamp right now.”
Each time a deal is moved into Demo Offered, folk will automatically store the opening time.
Workflow B — Calculate Time-to-Close
1. Trigger: Person Custom Field Updated
Use the same trigger type as Workflow A.
Configure it to run when the deal status is moved to Closed.
2. Step: Get the Person
Add a “Get a Person” action to retrieve all fields for this contact, including the recorded Day Demo timestamp.
This ensures you have both:
the opening timestamp (from Workflow A)
the closing timestamp (current time, which we will calculate)
3. Step: Compare Dates Using Zapier Formatter
Add a Formatter by Zapier → Date/Time step.
Choose “Compare Dates”.
Configure:
Field | Value |
Start Date | Map the field from folk (e.g., Day Demo) |
End Date | Use |
Zapier will then calculate the time difference.
The output will return:
days
hours
minutes
This gives you a precise measure of the time between opening and closing.
4. Step: Push Result Back to folk
Create a field in folk called Time to Close (or any name you prefer).
Then, update the person and push the value returned by the formatter.
This allows you to store the exact number of days to close the deal.
Using the Data in folk
Once the Time to Close field is populated automatically:
You can create charts showing average closing time.
You can segment by sales rep, pipeline stage, or deal type.
You can track improvements in your sales cycle over time.
This setup makes time-to-close fully automated and analytics-ready.