Features
HubSpot is a comprehensive CRM platform that provides a suite of tools to connect marketing, sales, content management, and customer service. Here are some of the key features of HubSpot:
- Marketing Hub: This includes tools for lead generation, marketing automation, and analytics, helping you grow traffic, convert more visitors, and run complete inbound marketing campaigns at scale.
- Sales Hub: This is a sales CRM software that provides deeper insights into prospects, automates tasks, and helps close deals faster. It includes features like advanced CRM, meeting scheduling, and payments.
- Service Hub: This is a customer service software that helps connect with customers, exceed expectations, and turn them into promoters who grow your business. It includes features like tickets, customer feedback, and knowledge base.
- CMS Hub: This is a content management software that’s flexible for marketers, powerful for developers, and gives customers a personalized, secure experience. It includes features like a drag-and-drop editor, SEO recommendations, and website themes.
- Operations Hub: This is an operations software that syncs your apps, cleans and curates customer data, and automates processes — so all your systems and teams work better together. It includes features like data sync, programmable automation, and data quality automation.
What’s great about HubSpot?
- HubSpot provides a comprehensive suite of tools that can be used together for maximum efficiency.
- It offers a wide range of features in each of its hubs, catering to different aspects of a business.
- HubSpot offers a thriving community with free courses, certifications, resources, and a legendary customer support team.
- It provides a platform that grows with your business, making it a great long-term investment.
What you need to be aware of:
- HubSpot offers a lot of features and tools, which might be overwhelming for new users.
- The pricing might be on the higher side for small businesses or startups.
HubSpot Pricing
HubSpot offers different pricing plans for its Marketing Hub, tailored to meet the needs of different businesses. Here are the details:
-
Professional Plan
The Professional Plan is comprehensive marketing software for automation, reporting, and campaigns. The pricing starts at $800 per month, billed annually at $9,600 per year. This includes 2,000 marketing contacts, with an additional cost of $225 per month per 5,000 additional marketing contacts. Please note that there is a one-time Professional Onboarding fee of $3,000.
-
Enterprise Plan
The Enterprise Plan pricing details are not directly provided on the website. For this, you would need to contact HubSpot directly.
-
Add-ons
HubSpot also offers add-ons to customize and enhance your plan with additional features. The pricing for these add-ons would depend on the specific features you choose.
Please note that the prices mentioned are as of the time of writing this review and may vary. For the most accurate and up-to-date pricing information, please visit the HubSpot Pricing Page.
Let’s Look Into Hubspot a little more
HubSpot CRM is an all-in-one customer relationship management platform designed to help small and mid-sized businesses unify their marketing, sales, and customer service operations. With its comprehensive set of features, generous free offering, and easy setup, HubSpot aims to provide growing companies with the tools they need to attract, engage, and retain customers.
HubSpot packs its paid tiers with advanced capabilities like sales force automation, workflow automation, detailed analytics, and more. However, the fairly high pricing may put it out of reach for some budget-conscious buyers. While HubSpot doesn’t offer the best value compared to competitors, its focus on delivering a powerful yet intuitive CRM makes it worthy of evaluation.
Free Version Provides Core Features
HubSpot sets itself apart by offering a feature-rich free version of its CRM, unlike most competitors that only provide free trials. The free version supports one user and contains core contact and deal management capabilities perfect for solopreneurs and very small teams.
You can still get key benefits like automatic data capture from email and calendar integrations. Basic sales automation helps track deals through a pipeline. Mobile access ensures you can manage contacts and view analytics on the go. And the free version provides access to HubSpot’s library of free CRM tutorials and resources.
While the free version has clear limits, it’s remarkably functional for early stage businesses looking for starter CRM. You’ll miss out on features like reporting, workflow automation, and email templates only available in paid tiers. But the free offering gets you up and running at no cost to centralize basic customer information. For entrepreneurs and microbusinesses, it’s an excellent way to benefit from HubSpot’s CRM before needing more advanced functionality.
Paid Tiers Unlock Premium Functionality
Once you outgrow the free version, HubSpot’s paid tiers add capabilities for more users, deeper analytics, sales acceleration tools, marketing campaign integration, and more.
The Starter tier at $45/month supports up to two users and lets you add integrated payments, store documents, build basic reports, and unlock an SDK for connecting your phone system.
Stepping up to the Professional tier at $450/month unlocks support for multiple teams, customized reporting, product libraries, video messaging, and other more advanced features. The Enterprise tier starts at $1,200/month and adds predictive analytics, AI conversation intelligence, and other premium tools.
Some key features available in paid tiers include:
- Sales Hub – CRM, pipeline visibility, meeting scheduling, email templates
- Marketing Hub – Campaign creation and automation, landing pages, SEO tools
- Service Hub – Ticketing, knowledge base, multi-channel inboxes
- Analytics – Custom reporting, AI recommendations, forecasting
- Operations – Workflow automation, custom apps, data quality
While not cheap, HubSpot justifies its premium pricing by packing its higher tiers with robust functionality for organizations to scale their operations. The platform brings together features to attract, engage, convert, and retain customers across the entire lifecycle.
Intuitive Interface Gets You Up and Running Quickly
Considering its breadth of capabilities, HubSpot offers a refreshingly clean and intuitive interface. Navigating between contacts, deals, reports, and settings is straightforward. Key information surfaces at a glance on record pages. The platform provides clear pointers for initial setup steps to get you going quickly.
While importing large datasets takes some work, basic CRM workflows like adding new contacts, logging activities, managing deals, and sending emails are simple right out of the box. The interface reduces the learning curve often associated with more complex CRMs. Even without extensive training, users can dive into core features that improve sales and marketing efforts.
For those who do want in-depth training, HubSpot provides an entire library of articles, video tutorials, and courses for free through its HubSpot Academy. Whether you want to master reporting or get certified in Sales or Marketing Hub, HubSpot supplies ample educational resources.
Powerful Analytics and Automation
Data insights and process automation represent two of HubSpot’s biggest strengths. The platform makes it easy to create customized reports and interactive dashboards that provide visibility into pipeline performance, campaign ROI, and other key metrics. Guide visitors provide suggestions to improve analytics. Predictive analytics even surface trends and prescribe actions based on machine learning.
On the process side, HubSpot enables users to automate repetitive tasks and communications through workflows and sequences. For example, you can set up a workflow to notify sales reps when a new lead matches their criteria or automatically enroll customers in a nurture sequence after signup. This top-notch automation eliminates manual busywork and helps teams operate more efficiently at scale.
All-in-One Capabilities With Some Gaps
When looking at pure CRM functionality, HubSpot lags behind CATEGORY LEADERS like Salesforce and Zoho in some regards. For example, HubSpot doesn’t allow the same level of template customization that a platform like Zoho CRM does through its Canvas builder. And HubSpot’s AI capabilities aren’t yet on par with Salesforce’s more mature Einstein recommendations.
However, HubSpot closes many of those gaps when you look across its entire suite, which seamlessly integrates Marketing, Sales, Service, Content Management, and Operations Hubs. Companies that adopt multiple Hubs can unify data and processes across departments on a single platform. While HubSpot may not lead in individual categories, its combined offering presents an attractive all-in-one option.
Premium Pricing Limits Affordability
The main drawback of HubSpot CRM is its pricing. The starter paid tier runs $45 per month, while the advanced Enterprise tier will cost no less than $1,200 per month. That represents a significant premium over competitor pricing. For example, advanced Zoho CRM plans cost around $50 per user annually versus over $100 per user monthly for HubSpot.
Of course, cost always depends on your specific needs. Solo entrepreneurs can benefit from the free version alone. Larger teams may justify the added costs for productivity gains. But companies with tight budgets will find more affordable and full-featured options elsewhere.
For a CRM supporting five users, you’ll pay $450 per month. Expanding to 10 users costs $1,200 monthly. Adding further users runs over $100 each. So the price tag can grow quite high for larger organizations.
Ultimately, small and mid-size businesses need to carefully weigh whether HubSpot’s pricing aligns with the value they’ll derive. Companies willing to pay more for exceptional integration, automation, analytics, and support will find strong ROI. But budget-limited buyers can get comparable functionality for much less through other solutions.
Ideal User Profile
HubSpot CRM caters strongly to these types of users:
- Growing small or mid-size businesses – The platform gives you room to scale and add capabilities as you grow beyond basic CRM.
- Companies focused on inbound methodology – HubSpot pioneered inbound marketing and aligns tightly with that strategy.
- Businesses wanting integrated platform – Tight integration between Marketing, Sales, Service Hub drives unified customer experience.
- Teams needing intuitive software – The platform emphasizes usability and getting up and running quickly across roles.
- Users who leverage analytics and automation – From customizable reports to workflow triggers, HubSpot unlocks data insights and efficiency.
While anyone can benefit from HubSpot CRM’s extensive feature set, it’s not necessarily a fit for all budgets or team sizes. But for its target growing businesses that leverage connected platforms, HubSpot delivers on its promise of an intuitive all-in-one CRM.
Businesses with tight budgets or needing deep platform customization may find better value from lower-cost competitors. But HubSpot remains a solid choice for growing companies.
Frequently asked questions
What is HubSpot?
HubSpot is a comprehensive CRM platform that provides a suite of tools to connect marketing, sales, content management, and customer service. It is designed to help businesses grow by streamlining their processes and improving efficiency.
What are marketing contacts, and how does contact pricing work?
Marketing contacts are the contacts you choose to market to using HubSpot’s tools. The pricing for marketing contacts depends on the number of contacts you have. HubSpot’s pricing plans include a certain number of marketing contacts, and there is an additional cost for extra contacts.
How many marketing contacts can I have with a HubSpot plan?
The number of marketing contacts you can have with a HubSpot plan depends on the specific plan you choose. For example, the Professional Plan includes 2,000 marketing contacts, with an additional cost for extra contacts.
How many emails can I send with a paid HubSpot plan?
The number of emails you can send with a paid HubSpot plan depends on the specific plan you choose. For detailed information, you would need to check the features of the specific plan or contact HubSpot directly.
Do I need to buy onboarding for HubSpot?
Yes, there is a one-time onboarding fee when you sign up for HubSpot’s Professional or Enterprise plans. This fee covers the cost of setting up your HubSpot account and getting you started with the software.
What type of support does HubSpot offer?
HubSpot offers 24/7 customer support. They also provide tailored onboarding, free online training, and a community of users for additional support and learning.
Does HubSpot offer discount pricing for startups and nonprofits?
HubSpot does offer special pricing for eligible startups and nonprofits. For more detailed information, you would need to check with HubSpot directly.
