Since its inception, HubSpot has been dedicated to providing a truly connected CRM platform that helps its users create deeper and more meaningful relationships with their customers. To achieve these deeper relationships, HubSpot knows that teams need to work efficiently and effectively to reduce friction points and provide optimum customer experience which will in turn drive business growth. Any additions, features and integrations that have been launched over the years have always stayed true to this goal. 

But HubSpot has identified a problem. A connection issue. It recently argued that how we engage as companies, interact with customers and support each other as teams is being tested. Customers are not getting the connected and engaged experience they need from companies; data and systems are siloed and are not being utilised to maximise their potential and increasingly hybrid working styles and data privacy wariness means that actually, we are all more ‘disconnected’ than ever before. 

Yamini Rangan, Chief Executive Officer at HubSpot, said “Businesses are in a crisis of disconnection today. Their systems and data are disconnected because of cobbled point solutions. They’re disconnected from their customers, as buyers tune out saturated channels. And, they’re disconnected from their peers in a more hybrid world.” 

However, HubSpot isn’t one to shy away from problem solving and innovating to overcome such challenges and its latest feature releases aim to address this disconnection. HubSpot has announced a new era of growth, it’s called ‘the age of the connected customer’, which aims to help businesses create deeper, more meaningful connections with their customers.  

We’ve taken a look at some of the new features specific to the Marketing and Sales Hubs that will help businesses foster those deep and meaningful relationships with their customers.

Marketing Hub 

HubSpot helps its users utilise their valuable data to create inbound marketing strategies that convert into quality leads. These latest improvements to the Marketing Hub will boost a company’s ability to do this well. 

WhatsApp Integration with HubSpot CRM 

WhatsApp has over two billion monthly worldwide users so it’s no surprise that it is now the world’s most popular messaging forum. HubSpot’s integration with WhatsApp means that businesses can now enjoy frictionless communication with customers on a channel they are already using daily to interact with their friends and family. In fact, on average, UK consumers spend 28 minutes on WhatsApp each day, so they are already naturally more inclined to engage with a brand on this platform.    

Sharon Cheng in an article for SleekFlow, argues that instant messaging is the preferred way of social communication. “The conversion rates of e-mail and SMS are only 2-5%, while WhatsApp’s conversion rate is 45-60%. By customising the message with relevant products or services that match your customer’s preferences, they are more likely to view, respond and, most importantly, buy from your brand. WhatsApp is also a much more personal method of engaging with your customers. Without the clutter and noise that fill people’s email inboxes, your marketing message is delivered to your target customer in real-time and away from bulk promotional messages.” 

With the new integration, businesses can easily connect a WhatsApp Business Account with their HubSpot inbox and seamlessly communicate with prospects and customers using images, video or text.

As with any marketing channel, it’s important that customers receive useful and expected information, so to ensure customers with the right permissions are being contacted, HubSpot records customer opt-ins within contact subscription preferences, and checks opt-in status before sending outbound messages. 

This feature is available in Professional and Enterprise editions of Marketing Hub and Service Hub and companies will also need a WhatsApp business account and phone number. 

HubSpot has produced a handy guide that gives step by step instructions on how you can connect WhatsApp to your conversation inbox.  

Customer Journey Analytics 

This feature is one of our favourites. Having a comprehensive view of the entire customer journey is a key part of fostering customer connections. The new customer journey analytics tool really helps users visualise and understand a customer’s entire end-to-end journey. This colourful addition provides deep insights into touchpoints that lead to conversion as well as identifying those that have resulted in lost prospects.  

Users can view their marketing activities together (across ads, email, page views, media, and more), and see the multiple paths that prospects and customers take with a brand which allows for true optimisation and quick trouble shooting to create an optimum customer journey.  

The level of attribution data provided by the customer journey analytics tool, tells users where, when and how individual prospects are interacting with a brand along the customer journey and what’s making a difference (good and bad). This knowledge empowers brands to create truly personalised experiences so they can build deeper and longer lasting relationships.   

This feature is currently available to users with Enterprise plans. 

Campaigns 2.0 

HubSpot’s campaigns tool is an incredibly useful tool for marketers as it brings all assets relating to campaign – from landing pages, blog posts, call-to-actions, social posts and emails into a single view. This makes reporting really easy as you can see what’s performing well and what needs improvement, at a glance.   

HubSpot reports that customers who used HubSpot’s campaigns tool added 66% more contacts than those who did not, and an average of 68% more form submissions than those who did not. Those users that use campaign analytics added an average of 72% more contacts than those who did not.  

HubSpot says it best itself, ‘Campaigns are truly the command center, that one-stop-shop, for your entire marketing team to gather around, and create beautifully orchestrated and omni-channel experiences for your customers’. 

However, the campaigns tool has had a bit of a makeover and HubSpot has added some features that make it even more useful. One of our favourites is the ability to compare the performance of two or more campaigns against each other, side by side.   

Users can set tasks and assign them to owners, as well as setting due dates and enjoy enhanced collaboration through a new comment thread tool. They can attach or highlight comments directly to individual parts of a campaign asset, and connect forms as an asset on a campaign. Importantly, users can now view revenue and deal attribution from within campaigns, too.  

Campaigns 2.0 is available on Marketing Hub Pro and Enterprise plans. 

Ad conversion events 

Marketers with Marketing Hub Professional plans and above can now use ad conversion events to power targeted ads on LinkedIn.  

The new ad feature integrates perfectly with HubSpot’s CRM (naturally) and reporting is slick and in-depth. Users can see sales, sign ups and interactions – right down to an individual blog post view – that have occurred following an interaction with a LinkedIn ad.     

This insight can be used to target the most valuable customers and report on actual ROI from these targeted ads.     

The new access to first-party data allows users to target, report, and optimise ads in a ‘cookieless’, privacy-first online environment.     
 

Sales Hub  

HubSpot’s latest improvements to its Sales Hub continue to empower reps to close a sale whilst delivering a great customer experience.   

Inbound calling 

Generic, inflexible customer service experiences leave customers feeling unseen and uncared for when they need help the most.  

HubSpot states that its “mission to help millions of organisations grow better is only made possible when we connect companies to customers”.   

With its new inbound calling feature, reps can place outbound and receive inbound calls right to their personal phones, without divulging their personal phone number.  

Phone numbers acquired through HubSpot allow sales teams to easily record, transcribe, and coach straight from within the comfort of a CRM.   

An inbound calling channel is a fundamental part of customer service and customer support so this new feature should really help better connect customers to companies.  

This feature is currently available in the US, UK, and Canada only on Sales and Service Hub Starter+ plans. 

Custom Goals  

With custom goals, users can easily set, track and manage sales performance, driving transparency and accountability across a business.  

This feature allows users to get goals unique to their business, team or even an individual sales rep, and updates are easily digested using a progress bar. Automatic notifications can also be set up to fire when a goal is set, achieved, exceeded or missed. 

Elizabeth Juran for Ready North, states that Customer Goals gets “stakeholders on the same page for real-time tracking and accountability”. 

Customer goals also encourages key stakeholder alignment, so everyone is able to see progress or sticking points which can be easily identified and acted upon, so there are no unexpected surprises come final reporting time. 

This feature is available to users with Sales and Service hub enterprise plans.   

Deal Management  

Sales teams know, that better managed deals are more likely to become successfully closed deals. HubSpot has made improvements to its sales forecasting and deal management features that include a new goals tool, team goals, better integrated forecasting and improved deal management experiences for sales reps.   

With the new functionalities, users can modify a CRM to display which properties and deals matter most to a business, so high-priority initiatives are always top-of-mind. This improved connection between sales reps and teams will allow for a more efficient and joined up effort when it comes to closing those big deals. 

This feature is available to users with Sales and Service Hub professional plans.     

Steph Cuthbertson, Chief Product Officer at HubSpot says “Creating meaningful, lasting connections is the future. HubSpot is on a mission to create a powerful and easy-to-use product that gives you the insights you need to drive growth in this changing landscape.” 

When interacting with a business, customers want to feel valued. To do this, companies need to ensure their customer experience is connected and personalised. They also need to ensure their internal teams are connected and aligned to make this connected customer experience a reality. HubSpot’s latest enhancements help companies address the ‘crisis of disconnection’ and attract, engage and delight customers in a more connected way. We can’t wait to see what comes next! 

Media Matters is a certified HubSpot Solutions Partner and we use this platform daily to run automated and inbound marketing campaigns for our clients. We can assist your business in getting set up on HubSpot with onboarding support to help you bring your marketing strategies up to date. We can also provide ongoing workshops and training to ensure your sales and marketing teams are working efficiently together to help grow your business. Let’s have a chat and see how we can help your business utilise HubSpot and all it has to offer.