How I Built a Lead Capture System Using Laravel and Filament

The Problem: Most Portfolios Don’t Capture Leads

Most developer portfolios suffer from the same problem:

• They display projects.

• They have a contact form.

• But they don’t generate actionable leads.

A typical scenario:

1. Someone submits a message.

2. It arrives in your inbox.

3. You reply manually.

4. No tracking, scoring, or follow-up occurs.

I wanted to solve this by creating a mini CRM directly in my portfolio, where leads are automatically categorized and nurtured.

Tech Stack: Choosing Speed and Maintainability

The stack was selected for quick development and ease of maintenance:

Backend:

• Laravel 12

• SQLite (development)

• Jobs and queues for automation

Admin Panel:

• Filament 5

Frontend:

• Blade templates

• Tailwind CSS v4

• Alpine.js

• Livewire

Build Tools:

• Vite for asset compilation

This setup allowed me to build a fully functional app without heavy frontend frameworks.

System Architecture

The portfolio is divided into three main layers:

1️⃣ Frontend: Lead Capture

The landing page includes multiple sections:

• Hero

• Problem statement

• Case studies

• Portfolio

• Blog

• Contact

The contact form is the entry point of the funnel.

2️⃣ Backend: Lead Management

When a user submits a contact form:

A Lead record is created:

| Field | Description |

|-------|-------------|

| project_type | Type of project |

| budget_range | Budget range |

| urgency | Urgency level |

| score | Calculated lead score |

| status | Pipeline stage (new, contacted, etc.) |

A ContactMessage record is also created to separate lead data from the user’s message.

3️⃣ Admin Panel: Filament Resources

All lead management happens through Filament, including:

• Leads

• Projects

• Blog posts

• Services

• Skills

• Contact messages

The dashboard includes widgets for visualizing lead metrics:

• Leads this month

• Hot leads

• Conversion rate

• Latest leads

The Livewire Lead Form

I implemented the form using Livewire, which enables reactive validation and logic without heavy JavaScript.

Form fields:

• Name

• Email

• Project type

• What they want to automate

• Budget

• Urgency

Workflow on submission:

Lead Scoring Automation

One of the most critical features is lead scoring, which helps prioritize high-value leads.

Each lead gets a score from 0–15 based on:

• Budget

• Urgency

• Project type

Example scoring logic:

| Factor | Points |

|--------|--------|

| Budget > $5000 | +5 |

| Urgency High | +4 |

| Automation Project | +3 |

Leads are classified automatically as:

• Cold

• Warm

• Hot

This enables quick prioritization in the admin dashboard.

Automated Follow-Up Sequence

Once a lead is created, the system triggers an automatic follow-up flow:

• Immediate email to the client

• Follow-up at +2 days

• Follow-up at +5 days

• Follow-up at +10 days

This is handled using Laravel jobs and the scheduler, ensuring no lead is left behind.

Main job: SendLeadFollowup

Email Provider Integration

The system can sync leads with an email marketing provider (Brevo) via a webhook.

Job: SyncLeadToEmailProvider

Environment variables in .env:

This allows:

• CRM tracking

• Adding leads to a mailing list

• Automated email campaigns

Sales Pipeline

Each lead progresses through a simple pipeline:

• New

• Contacted

• Meeting Scheduled

• Proposal Sent

• Won

• Lost

This transforms the portfolio into a mini CRM for sales follow-ups.

SEO Integration

I also integrated basic SEO best practices:

• Dynamic meta titles and descriptions

• Open Graph tags

• Sitemap.xml

• robots.txt

• Schema.org: Person and Website

The blog supports SEO-friendly content:

Results

The result is a fully functional lead generation system embedded in a portfolio, including:

• Optimized landing page

• Intelligent contact form

• Lead scoring and classification

• Automated email sequence

• Admin panel with pipeline visualization

All built with Laravel + Filament + Livewire.

Next Steps and Improvements

Planned improvements:

• Individual project pages for better SEO

• Full blog index page

• Project image galleries

• Automated tests

• Production deployment with queue workers

Conclusion

A portfolio doesn’t need to be static.

With Laravel, Livewire, and Filament, it’s possible to build a complete lead capture system that generates opportunities automatically.

This approach turns a simple portfolio into a business-generating machine.