As we discussed before, in our blog post, “HubSpot vs. Pipedrive: Which CRM is Better for Sales?”, choosing a customer relationship management tool for your B2B company is a big decision. You need to take a lot of factors into account, like the size of your company, what software you want to integrate, and what the main functions of your CRM will be. It’ll help you find new contacts and organize the ones you have, allow you to nurture your leads, and facilitate collaboration between your sales and marketing teams. In other words, you’ll be spending a lot of time with it. With so many options out there, there’s no one-size-fits-all answer to which is best, but we’re going to break down some of the key aspects of two of the most popular CRMs: HubSpot vs. Salesforce.
All about HubSpot
The great thing about HubSpot, especially for a new business, is that there is a free option. While you will probably have to add on some premium sales tools as your company grows and you need change, you have a lot of flexibility to purchase just the ones you need. HubSpot’s CRM also gives you the option to have as many users on it as you want, enabling more collaboration between your sales and marketing teams. The free CRM option offers contact management, deal and task management, and integrations with social media and email that allows you to track your interactions with leads. The HubSpot CRM wasn’t created to compete with Salesforce. According to Impact, HubSpot’s CRM is ideal for companies that are new to customer relationship management systems, that are looking to improve their organization and efficiency. If you’re already using the countless tools that HubSpot offers new businesses, it would make sense to want all of your information in a single place. After all, HubSpot does offer tools for social media marketing, web and social analytics, content management, landing pages, and search engine optimization, as well as videos, to teach you how to use all of them.
About Salesforce
Salesforce is one of the original CRMs, founded in 1999. Currently, Salesforce is the No. 1 CRM, dominating 30.27% of the market share, with over 45,000 domains under its belt. Known for offering just about everything you might need in a CRM and name recognition, it’s typically the first CRM that new business owners look into. It’s also not surprising that that convenience isn’t free. Convenience typically costs a pretty penny — like that last time you ordered an Uber when you really could have taken the train, or that Doordash you ordered when you had a fridge full of ingredients to make dinner, Salesforce is no different. For many up-and-coming B2B companies, Salesforce’s pricing is just not in their budget. There’s no free plan, and though pricing starts at a mere $25 a month, most companies need more than the $25 plan offers. PieSync suggests that the average user needs to spend about $150 on Salesforce to get all of the functionality they’ll need.
Interface
You know how some people live and die by Apple products, while others prefer the look and feel of a PC? Neither one is notably better (despite what people on either side of the fence will try to convince you on), but it all comes down to the type of interface you prefer. HubSpot is known for having a clean, simple, user-friendly look to it. After all, its CRM was specifically created for beginners. You’re able to clearly see everything that HubSpot has to offer, on an intuitive dashboard. We mentioned before how Salesforce provides more than most marketers will ever need, and you can tell that by looking at the dash. It’s pretty clunky, with a lot of information right there on the screen, but you still need to click around and do deep dives to find all of the information that you’re looking for. Flight Media took screenshots of both for you to compare:
Salesforce’s dashboard
HubSpot’s dashboard
Integration
Like in our previous post comparing HubSpot and Pipedrive, it all comes down to integration! While your CRM will be able to do a lot, it won’t do absolutely everything a growing business needs it to (Nope, not even Salesforce). This is where integration comes in. While some CRM systems have barriers to integration, neither HubSpot or Salesforce do. Salesforce ultimately allows for integration among more programs than HubSpot does. Still, HubSpot is sure to offer extensions for some of the most prominent programs you’ll be using, like Microsoft Office and Google Suite.
What if you already have a CRM, though, and are looking around for other options? Well, HubSpot might be the pick for you. Not only can you simultaneously use both CRMs, but you can eventually integrate your data into HubSpot. This is also handy when you have clients working along with you who use a different in-house CRM — even if that other CRM is Salesforce. Depending on the size of your business and how in-depth you want your reporting to be, there are certainly pros and cons to both HubSpot and Salesforce. If you’re just starting, though, HubSpot’s user-friendly interface and wallet-friendly pricing might be the way to go.
The online marketing world is continually going through transitions. It can be challenging to keep up with all of the new strategies, trends, and Google algorithm workarounds. It’s understandable to fall on either end of the spectrum, either staying vigilant about learning every new change or getting burned out, even trying to keep up. It’s handy to have a go-to way to ensure you’re up to date with the world of inbound marketing — and other digital marketing areas — each year. Let me introduce you to HubSpot Academy. It touts itself as the “worldwide leader in free online training for inbound marketing, sales and customer service professionals.” HubSpot Academy consists of narrated videos, how-to tutorials, and hands-on activities. Marketing, sales, and service professionals across the world use it as both foundational and continuing education. These courses are growing in popularity each year. According to HubSpot, the certification rate has almost tripled from its first year in 2016 when 55,000 people were awarded. In 2018, HubSpot Academy awarded 140,000 certifications. Here’s what you should know about HubSpot Academy to help you determine whether it’s the right fit for you and your career.
What to expect
A feature of HubSpot Academy that bears repeating is the fact that it’s free. While most courses are at least a three- to four-hour time commitment, that’s all that you spend on them. Of course, if halfway through you don’t feel like you’re getting anything out of it, you’re not obligated to continue. Loaded with foundational information that you’ll need to know for just about every other course HubSpot offers, the Inbound Marketing course is your first step. If you’re a pretty experienced marketer, you might think you can skip over the Inbound Marketing course. Still, if anything, it’ll be beneficial to brush up on some of the jargon and nitty-gritty aspects of marketing that you might not use in your day-to-day work. Other popular certification courses HubSpot offers include Content Marketing, Inbound Sales, Social Media. The Academy also offers “short courses,” which are usually between an hour and three hours long, and dive deep into more specific topics like Twitter Strategy or SEO. None of the HubSpot Academy courses’ certifications last forever. While some are valid for 25 months, others expire after just 13 months. It seems like a drag to have to retake the test, but it’s the most effective way to ensure you’re up-to-date on the most recent changes to the programs that you’re working with. You don’t have to re-watch the videos, but it doesn’t hurt to brush up.
You get out what you put in
Like most online courses, you can burn through the HubSpot Academy videos pretty quickly and not retain any of the information if you don’t make a real effort. A lot of information gets crammed into each of these classes. It would be almost impossible to watch all of the videos and remember everything that’s said. So pay close attention and take as many detailed notes as you can. That way, you can get the most out of your HubSpot Academy courses. After each course, you’ll take an exam. Depending on which course you take, it usually takes about an hour to complete. However, you have three hours to do so. To pass each course and become certified in each area, you don’t have to answer each question correctly, but you do have to score 80 percent. If you’re having your employees take the Academy courses, you might want to allow study groups or let them take the exam in pairs. Discussing the course and talking about the questions is a way to ensure everyone stays engaged, helping them retain all of the information that they’re taking in. If you don’t pass the first time you take the test, don’t worry! You can retake it in 12 hours. To up your chances of passing, read the study guide. You can also go back and rewatch videos that focus on the areas of the test that you struggled on. You’ll get it the second time around!
Professional benefits
The main advantage of taking the HubSpot Academy certification courses is the fact that you’ll enhance your skills. If you maintain your certification, you’ll get refreshers each year or two and stay sharp. If you want bragging rights, though, you can also get them here. When you pass a course, you can add a badge to your LinkedIn page (and add it to your resume!) The HubSpot Academy is a massive asset in the workplace, accelerating onboarding for new employees and giving people transitioning to a new role in the marketing or sales departments a good foundation. It’s not necessary to take every course HubSpot has to offer, so you can focus on just the ones you need. If someone is getting paid advertisements, added to their plate at work, there’s a course for that!
There are a lot of decisions to make when you’re a new business owner, so you want to make sure that the software you choose makes your job as easy as it can be. That’s why choosing between a customer relationship management (CRM) tool that makes sense for your business is such an important step to take. The fact that there are just too many different types of CRM tools out there can lead to decision fatigue. That’s why we’re going to take a deep dive into two of the most popular CRMs, Pipedrive and HubSpot, so you can see which works best for you.
Take your size into account
For small business owners who want a CRM tool to handle more than just the sales aspect of day-to-day tasks, HubSpot is a good choice. For example, a small business probably doesn’t have a coder on board yet, so HubSpot handles that. A considerable benefit of HubSpot is that so much of it is automated. When a small team is stretched thin, HubSpot is running in the background, taking care of it. HubSpot also works on a tiered system, making it ideal for small businesses, so you can manage up to 2500 contacts before the price goes up. HubSpot owns approximately 41.5% of the small business automation market, so it’s no surprise that it checks off a lot of small business’s boxes. Marketing Automation Insider suggests Pipedrive for small- to medium-sized businesses. The platform is customizable to suit different types of companies but lacks the automation options that HubSpot makes so easy. It is simple to integrate Pipedriver with Zapier, an automation tool that allows you to connect all of your apps and devices, but that does come with an additional cost.
Convenience comes with a cost
As mentioned, HubSpot’s tiered pricing system works well for small businesses. However, it can get pricey for a company that grows quickly. For example, once you establish more than 2500 contacts you manage, your price goes up to $1200 per month until you reach 10,000 contacts, and so on. Pipedrive does use a tiered system as well, but it stays at one price until you reach 100,000 contacts. Take into account, though, the fact that you’d also need to pay a subscription fee for a program like Zapier if you wanted to automate to the level that HubSpot allows you to.
How about sales?
Pipedrive is known as a CRM “built by salespeople, for salespeople.” Its primary focus is on sales pipeline management, while HubSpot is a jack of all trades, with marketing and sales functionality wrapped in one CRM. I know, the full expression is “jack of all trades, master of none.” If you’re looking to have all of your sales and marketing needs in one place, HubSpot is probably the pick for you. But if you’re just looking for a CRM to help you streamline your sales process, Pipedrive might be a better choice.
Integration, integration, integration
While it’s true that HubSpot can do just about anything you want it to do (from a sales and marketing standpoint, at least), you want to ensure you can integrate any software you’re currently using with the CRM you choose. Luckily, whether you go for HubSpot or Pipedrive, you shouldn’t have an issue ensuring your favorite apps work alongside your CRM. According to Discover CRM, Pipedrive integrates with 148 apps, HubSpot integrates with 128 apps, and both work with popular software like Zapier, Salesforce, Outlook, and Gmail. Before you take the dive, though, make sure you check the list of apps that integrate with each CRM — especially if you use some more obscure programs! I’m sorry if you went into this post intending to get a firm CRM recommendation for your particular business, but it just doesn’t work that way! Both HubSpot and Pipedrive have their strengths and weaknesses, but it’s up to you to figure out what’s important to you when choosing your business’s CRM tools.
Without the proper tools, pinpointing the engine behind company growth — sales, marketing, or the two working in tandem — is an arduous task. In this article, we explore the value of the HubSpot reporting add on tool. If this is you, you’re not alone. According to HubSpot’s “State of Inbound 2018” report, 40% of surveyed companies stated that their top marketing challenge was proving the ROI of marketing activities. Similar issues come with sales. Which representatives are closing the greatest number of deals? Are cold emails working? If you’ve been there, then you’re at a point where in-depth reporting that closes the loop between marketing and sales is a must. HubSpot comes with standard reporting capabilities, but to drill down to metrics unique to your business, you’re going to need HubSpot’s Reporting Dashboard Add-On on. Priced at $200/ month, it’s not an investment to be taken lightly. With that price tag, is it worth it? Read on to find out what the tool offers, why it’s unique, and some potential drawbacks.
Features
So, what exactly is HubSpot’s Reporting Dashboard Add-On? It’s a tool for building customized reports in a way that’s organized and easy to understand. You can then syndicate your findings across your organization. Let’s break these components down:
Building Customized Reports
With HubSpot’s Reporting Dashboard Add-On on, you can create a custom visual look at your data that answers virtually any sales or marketing related question. Want to know how many marketing qualified leads became sales qualified leads this month? Done — with the conversion rate in plain sight. You can choose from pre-made reporting templates or roll your sleeves up and build reports from scratch. Choose from an array of displays; pie charts, bar graphs, donut charts, and more. Data can be viewed in real time, so you’re never left wondering how to pivot your sales and marketing efforts to achieve optimal results.
Organizing Your Reports
Of course, with endless options for creating reports, you need a way to organize them. This is where dashboards come in; Create up to 200 dashboards which can house up to 10 reports each. Now, everyone in your company can have visibility on aggregated metrics that matter to them — whether that’s a high-level overview of marketing performance or the amount revenue a specific sales representative generated last quarter.
Syndicating Your Reports
Don’t let critical reports go unnoticed. The HubSpot’s Reporting Dashboard Add-On on allows you to send reports to your team’s inbox on customized timelines. Whether it’s daily, weekly, or monthly — your team will always be aware of their progress.
Why It’s Great
It’s Simple
You don’t need to be a data scientist to understand what you’re looking at. It’s all in one place — organized and in the format that is most useful and convenient for you. Visual reports allow you to understand trends at a glance, and precise numbers provide a more detailed view of progress.
Enables Sales and Marketing Alignment
When marketing and sales work together, the possibility and fear of a lead slipping through the cracks dissolves. As a result, the ROI of marketing efforts increases, your sales team runs more efficiently, and there is visible top-line growth. In fact, in organizations where sales and marketing are aligned, marketing acquired leads are 67% more likely to close. How does this connect with the add-on? With the tool, you can create a report where you can see how many sales qualified leads to become opportunities. If this conversion rate seems a bit low, you have a jumping off point for correcting the problem.
Monitor Metrics Unique to Your Business Because you can easily build custom reports and dashboards, you have unhindered access to metrics that matter to your business. Say goodbye to scouring your arsenal of tools to find the data points you need. They are neatly and conveniently packaged to be accessed at will.
Drawbacks
Drilling Down Into Data
With customized reports, you can’t access granular data on broad metrics. For example, let’s say you build a report that shows how many leads fall into lifecycle stage for the current month. You can’t just click on the sales qualified lead bar to see who these leads are. For this, you will need to create a list where you will define the qualifications for a lead to appear on that list.
The Price
$200 per month is a lot — especially when tools like Google Analytics are free. To decide if it’s worth it, you need to assess why you want the tool.If you are interested in granular data such as bounce rate, entrances, the assets driving conversions, and so on, then you’ll be just fine with Google Analytics. However, if you have grown to a point where you need to close the loop on marketing and sales efforts, then the HubSpot add-on is worth it. This brings us to the answer to the question that started this blog: Is HubSpot’s Reporting Dashboard Add-On on worth the price?
The Verdict
The tool serves as a single source of truth that encourages visibility throughout your company. Instead of just being a tool on website performance alone, like Google Analytics, it’s the be all end all tool for measuring the health of your organization. The main drawback is the price, but if you strike up a deal with just one lead that would have slipped through the cracks otherwise, then it’s already paid for itself. So, the answer is yes. Investing $200 per month for the add-on is worth it.
HubSpot is the leading software for inbound marketing — but it’s an investment. Like any investment, it’s important to do your vetting before you go all in. That’s where HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Free comes in — it allows you to capture some of the benefits HubSpot has to offer without the buy-in.
With this information comes a few questions. What does HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Free offer? What key features is it missing? But most importantly — how do you know when it’s time to upgrade?
First, let’s dissect question number one, which naturally pairs with question number two.
What is HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Free?
According to HubSpot, the free version includes “the basics you need to capture, track, and convert leads — for free.” It’s best for those who want to start developing a marketing strategy, a basic tech stack, and are exploring CRM systems. Let’s unpack this by discussing some of the most notable features, and conversely, what these features lack. Forms:
Generating leads is good, knowing exactly where they came from is better. HubSpot offers two avenues for lead capture: Lead Flows, and Forms (which are static and would be used on a landing page or in a sidebar for instance). With HubSpot free, you have access to both of them.
However, when you capture a contact there is little action you can take within HubSpot. For example, when someone downloads an asset it’s best practice to immediately send them a follow-up email to thank them and provide a link to the asset.
Unfortunately, the free version doesn’t include email or workflows. As a result, you can’t automatically send emails. If you’re tech-savvy you can integrate HubSpot forms with an email marketing platform using a tool like Zapier. As long as you remain organized, this is an effective solution for companies just starting out with HubSpot’s Marketing Hub. Reporting Dashboards:
When it comes to marketing, understanding the data from your website and knowing how to leverage it is crucial — so it’s handy that HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Free offers reporting dashboards, but there’s a catch.
When on the free version you are limited to one dashboard — the Marketing Performance Dashboard. This provides elementary statistics which include site sessions, new contacts, and customers.
Dashboards allow you to choose a timeframe. For example, you can compare the current month to the previous month or even set a custom date range. Stats are limited, but when you’re first getting your feet wet, that’s okay.
You can supplement HubSpot’s data with a platform like Google Analytics which provides more detailed insights. Google Analytics can tell you which pages are driving the most traffic, average user retention, bounce rate, and much more. Contact Management:
On HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Free, you can manually change a contact’s lifecycle stage, make a note on a contact’s profile, and assign a contact to an owner — just to name a few.
But, there are some features HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Free lacks in contact management. For example, a company on the free version doesn’t have the ability to make lists. Lists are a tool for sorting contacts based on almost any piece of criteria: a specific form they filled out, the type of company that employs them, what pages the contact has viewed, and so on. Lists are great for sending targeted email blasts or just keeping contacts organized.
Another contact management caveat of the free version is the visibility of a contact’s activity — it expires after seven days. Access to this information can provide insight into what services interest a lead, for instance. Without this data, your strategy relies more on guesswork.
Now that we’ve discussed the pros and cons of HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Free, you might be looking for an answer to the third question. How do you know when it’s time to upgrade?
Should you upgrade to Marketing Hub Starter?
First, let’s address the next level up from free — Marketing Hub Starter. There are four major selling points: it includes lists, mass email, more data, and starts at just $50 a month. This version is a good fit for people who have started to develop a marketing strategy, but don’t have many contacts and therefore less to manage.
Need ideas for developing a marketing strategy? Access “Growth Plays” here.
More Data:
Advanced analytics are a crucial ingredient for success. With the free version of HubSpot’s Marketing Hub, you’re looking at stretching your company between two data tools at least — HubSpot and Google Analytics.
Once you upgrade to Marketing Hub Start you’ll have access to a “standard marketing dashboard plus 1 additional custom dashboard.” It’s still valuable to supplement with Google Analytics since the data is more comprehensive. However, the data tools that come with the starter version can provide valuable insights into the efficacy of your marketing efforts. Mass Email:
Don’t be quick to think email is dead. Sending targeted mass emails is still an essential marketing tool. According to emailmonday, “email has an average ROI of $38 for each $1 spent.”
HubSpot Marketing Dashboard- Email
The email function in HubSpot Marketing Hub Starter includes personalization — but doesn’t include the design manager, blog/rss email, or CAN-SPAM footers. With these limitations, it might more sense for your company to use an alternate marketing email software such as MailChimp or Constant Contact. Lists:
Mass emails are most effective when they’re targeted. This is where lists provide their value. Lists allow you to segment your contacts based on almost any criteria — down to what information they enter on a form.
HubSpot Marketing Dashboard- Lists
There are two types of lists — active and static. An active list constantly changes based on who meets the criteria, while a static list does not change regardless if someone meets the criteria after the list was created.
These tools are essential for a skilled marketing strategy, but it’s just as effective, or more effective to “outsource” these functions with an integration tool like Zapier, as mentioned earlier. The main benefit of HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Starter is having these tools in one place.
Or is Marketing Hub Professional right for you?
HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Professional is best for the “more experienced marketers and growing marketing teams.” It allows you to “run complete inbound marketing campaigns at scale with automation.”
What is HubSpot’s Marketing Hub Professional holy grail feature/ headliner/ attribute that makes it worth the investment? Workflows. A workflow is a set of rules you activate within HubSpot to complete a certain task. This one tool is able to unlock an array of time-saving functions that erase trivial manual work so you can keep big picture objectives at the forefront of your to-do list.
They have two main functions: marketing automation and administrative duties. Marketing Automation:
According to HubSpot, marketing automation is “software that exists with the goal of automating marketing actions. Many marketing departments have to automate repetitive tasks such as emails, social media, and other website actions.” This is where workflows play an integral role because they enable email workflows.
An email workflow is “a series of automated emails that trigger based on subscriber behavior or data. These are often referred to when marketers assemble a series of automated emails that work together to accomplish a goal, such as onboarding new customers or nurturing new leads.” Email workflows are incredibly valuable. According to Omnisend, email workflows boast up to a 455% better click rates than traditional newsletters.
Essentially, email workflows allow you to do all the heavy lifting up front. Once a workflow is activated, you can just sit back and watch your long-term lead generating machine work. Administrative Tasks:
At some point, you’re going to decide the tools you have for managing your contacts aren’t cutting it. There’s no hard and fast rule for how many contacts you need before this happens, but at some point, you’ll need an automatic system for organizing your contacts.
You can create a workflow that changes a contact’s lifecycle stage based on a set of criteria that you set — it’s that easy.
When set up correctly, you’ll know exactly where someone is within the sales funnel without ever lifting a finger. This insight is crucial for measuring the performance of marketing efforts and knowing the right way to approach a lead.
It’s important to note that this is just one of the administrative duties you can automate with workflows. Let’s not forget lead notifications, buyer persona assignments, and much more.
The Bottom Line
There are many factors that determine which level of HubSpot’s Marketing Hub software you should choose: company goals, size, how developed your marketing strategy is, and much more.
Make the decision easier by bringing in an expert. Contact us today for a complimentary marketing plan which includes a comprehensive assessment on which version of HubSpot’s Marketing Hub software is right for you. We’ll also equip you with a 90-day growth maximizing strategy.
For years, the HubSpot Certification and the Inbound Certification served as core training for those new to HubSpot, teaching the principles and practices of inbound marketing as well as how to use its marketing automation and CRM platform. Now, there are even more resources available. (more…)
