Amie-Lynn Mitchell
Product Marketing Manager
The start of a new year usually comes with equal parts motivation and pressure. You want to be more organized, stay on top of follow-ups, and feel confident that nothing important is slipping through the cracks… but you also know your calendar’s already full and your inbox isn’t slowing down anytime soon.
That’s where your CRM really earns its place.
If it’s anything like Copper, it should be helping you move faster and think less about the mechanics of work. But, if it’s started to feel cluttered or harder to use, that doesn’t mean anything went wrong. It usually just means your business has grown, your processes have evolved, and your setup hasn’t been adjusted in a while.
Here’s the reassuring part: CRM success doesn’t come from tearing everything down and starting over. You don’t need a full rebuild to get real value out of it — especially if you’re using Copper.
In most cases, setting up your CRM for a better year ahead comes down to a handful of small, intentional tweaks that make it easier to use every single day.
Quick Win #1: Get organized so Copper shows you what matters
When people say their CRM feels overwhelming, it’s usually not because there’s “too much data” in it. It’s because nothing feels clear. You open it up with every intention of getting something done, and suddenly you’re staring at long task lists, crowded pipelines, and no obvious place to start.
A well-organized CRM flips that experience completely. It helps you focus, cuts down on decision fatigue, and makes it easier to move forward without overthinking every single step.
Saved filters for pipelines and tasks
Saved filters are one of those features that don’t sound exciting, but once you start using them, you wonder how you ever functioned without them. They save you from making the same small decisions over and over again, which is exactly the kind of mental energy you want back.
Instead of opening Copper and immediately re-filtering everything, you can set up views that already match how you structure your day.
Saved filters help you:
See what actually matters right now instead of everything, all at once
Cut back on the repetitive actions that slow you down every time you login to Copper
Focus on the work that moves things forward, not just what’s loudest
A few easy places to start filtering by today:
Deals closing this month, so you always know what’s coming up
Tasks due today or overdue, so follow-ups don’t sneak past you
Opportunities that haven’t had activity in a while and might need a nudge
When you’re setting these up, think about your habits. What do you check first thing in the morning? What do you glance at before you log off? Build saved filters around those moments, and Copper starts to feel like it’s reading your mind.
Task grouping that matches how you work
Task lists only feel intimidating when everything’s dumped into one long, endless list. Grouping tasks is what turns that chaos into something your brain can actually work with.
Grouping tasks helps you:
Break a huge list into smaller, more manageable chunks
Spot patterns instead of reacting to tasks one by one
Decide what to do next without overthinking it
Depending on how you work, you might try grouping by:
Due date, if deadlines are your biggest source of stress
Task type, if your days are a mix of follow-ups, meetings, and admin work
Or owner, so you can see where your team is at with their to-do list
There’s no universally “right” way to do this. The best setup is the one that feels natural to you. If a layout looks clean but still leaves you staring at the screen wondering where to start, it’s not doing its job. The goal here is less mental friction and more momentum.
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Customizing pipeline cards and columns
Your pipeline should tell you what’s going on without making you click into every deal. If you’re constantly opening records just to get basic context, that’s a sign your pipeline view could use a little love. Customizing pipeline cards and columns helps you:
Understand deal health at a glance
Spot stalled opportunities faster
Make quicker decisions without having to dig for details
When you’re choosing what to surface, think about the questions you usually ask yourself when you scan your pipeline. Things like:
“Is this deal actually moving?”
“When was the last time we followed up?”
“Do I know what the next step is here?”
Surfacing details that answer those questions, whether that’s deal value, last activity, or next steps, makes your pipeline feel more intuitive and a lot more useful. You can choose to surface items on your Pipeline cards such as Company, Description, Days in stage, Level, Primary Contact, Source, Tags and more. Think about showing the fields that are most important to you, your team and your company objectives.
The goal isn’t to show everything. It’s to show the right things. A good gut check is this: when you look at your pipeline, can you immediately tell what needs attention? If yes, you’re doing it right. If not, a few small tweaks can make Copper feel way more helpful and a lot less overwhelming.
What this unlocks
Once Copper’s organized around your priorities, it becomes easier to trust what you see. You spend less time searching for information and more time acting on it. Over time, that clarity turns into momentum, and momentum is a big part of long-term CRM success.
Quick win #2: Automate the repetitive work that slows you down
Automation gets avoided mostly because it sounds intimidating. People hear the word and immediately picture complicated flows, hours of setup, and something breaking at exactly the wrong moment. In reality, the automations that help the most are usually the boring, obvious ones.
What really slows teams down isn’t one big task. It’s all the tiny stuff that keeps tapping you on the shoulder all day.
None of that work is hard, but it adds up fast. Automation isn’t about removing the human side of your work. It’s about taking the mental load off so you don’t have to remember everything perfectly.
Forms that automatically create records
If leads are coming in through your website and someone’s still copying and pasting them into Copper, this is one of the easiest wins you can grab.
Forms can automatically:
Create a new record the moment someone fills one out
Place that record into the right pipeline
Capture key details consistently every time
That means nothing gets lost, and response times stay fast even when things get busy. It also makes life easier for your team, because every new lead shows up with the same structure and context. You can also automatically assign a team member to these new records to ensure they are taken care of asap.
When you’re setting up forms, it helps to be a little selective. Ask yourself what information you actually need to move the conversation forward, then make those fields required. That way, new leads arrive ready to work instead of half-filled and confusing.
Simple follow-up automations tied to stage changes
You don’t need a fancy workflow to make automation useful. One small automation in the right spot can do a lot of work for you.
When a deal hits a stage like “New Lead” or “Proposal Sent,” Copper can automatically:
Create a reminder task
Update the record so nothing gets missed
This way, deals keep moving even when your day gets chaotic. You don’t have to rely on memory or sticky notes or that mental list you swear you’ll remember later.
If you’re not sure where to start, pick one stage where things tend to stall and add one simple automation there. That’s enough to see real value.
Duplicating automations that already work
If you’ve already set up one automation you like, you’re halfway done. There’s no reason to start from scratch every time. Duplicating automations lets you:
Reuse something you already trust
Make small tweaks instead of big decisions
Expand automation without overthinking it
Copper’s automation setup makes this easy, especially now that you can adjust timing and logic without getting lost in the weeds. You can experiment, see what works, and change things later if you need to.
What this unlocks
Automation keeps work moving even when you’re busy. Leads get faster responses. Deals progress more consistently. Important steps don’t fall through the cracks just because you’re in meetings or offline. That reliability is a huge contributor to sustainable CRM success.
Quick win #3: Work smarter by reducing everyday friction
Quick win #3: Work smarter by reducing everyday friction
Most CRM frustration isn’t caused by one big, dramatic problem. It’s the tiny stuff — the constant copy-paste, the tab hopping, the “wait… where did that email go?” moment for the tenth time today.
Individually? Annoying. Collectively? Absolutely exhausting.
The fix isn’t changing how you work. It’s shaving off those little points of friction so Copper fits into your day instead of slowing it down.
The Feed is your new favorite coworker
Instead of clicking through records to piece together what’s happening, the Feed gives you one clean, scrollable view of everything that matters: emails, meetings, tasks, deal updates, and next steps. You can check in, reply to emails, move deals forward, and log updates without leaving the page or losing your train of thought.
And when you don’t need everything? Filters and tabs have your back. Follow just the accounts you care about. Zero in on emails or meetings. Or take a quick look at the Keep Things Moving section when you want a gentle nudge on what needs attention next (no judgment, here… we’re all busy!).
The Chrome Extension and Email Finder
If you spend most of your day in Gmail, this one’s a no-brainer. Copper’s Chrome extension lets you do CRM things right where you’re already working, instead of jumping back and forth between tabs.
With the extension, you can:
Create records straight from your inbox
Log emails and activity automatically
Find email addresses without leaving the page
Bank notes on a record no matter what website you’re on, or refer to previously logged notes on the fly
The biggest win here is flow. Copper stops feeling like a separate system you have to “go update” and starts feeling like it’s just part of your normal routine.
Linked Pages to keep context in one place
If you’ve ever thought, “I know this doc exists somewhere,” Linked Pages are about to become your new favorite thing.
Linked Pages let you attach external tools, docs, or resources directly to a record in Copper, so you don’t have to go hunting for them later. Everything stays connected to the deal or account where it actually belongs.
This is especially helpful for Google sheets or tools you reference over and over during a deal. For example, an excel report that you refer to often.
Keyboard shortcuts and the AI Email Rewriter
These are the kind of features that don’t feel life-changing at first, but quietly save you a ton of time.
Keyboard shortcuts help you move around Copper faster, especially if you’re in and out of records all day. And the AI Email Rewriter is there for those moments when you know what you want to say, but don’t feel like rewriting the same message again.
It helps you clean up drafts, adjust tone, or get unstuck when writing follow-ups without starting from a blank page.
What this changes day to day
When Copper fits naturally into how you already work, it stops feeling like something you have to manage. Things feel lighter. You switch contexts less. You spend more time actually doing the work instead of managing the process around it.
Those little efficiencies might seem small at the moment, but over time, they add up to a CRM that feels genuinely helpful instead of quietly exhausting. And that’s exactly where you want to be.
Start small and build momentum
Here’s the thing: you don’t need to fix everything at once. Trying to tackle every quick win in one sitting is usually how good intentions turn into another half-finished project.
The better move is to start small. Pick one thing. Clean up one view. Turn on one automation. Try one feature you’ve been meaning to use. Then see how it actually feels in your day-to-day work. When something genuinely makes your job easier, it’s a lot more likely to stick.
If you want a little extra guidance, you can watch our webinar replay to see these quick wins in action — because, really, there’s no pressure to do everything at once.
And if you’re still deciding if Copper is the right fit, try it for 14 days free!
Sometimes the fastest way to know what works is to actually use it. Because a fresh start doesn’t have to be dramatic. Sometimes it’s just one small change that finally makes your CRM feel like it’s working on your side again.
