Every year HubSpot hosts their annual INBOUND event and it's where they announce all of the latest product updates and features designed to help you grow your business better.
The Spotlight session is always a standout moment from the three-day event – this year, hosts Yamini Rangan, CEO of HubSpot, Stephanie Cuthbertson, CFO of HubSpot and Dharmesh Shah, Co-Founder of HubSpot, took us through the next phase of HubSpot as a driver for helping businesses grow through customer connection.
In an age where there have been huge fundamental changes in buying behaviour, personal privacy and technological evolutions, we've seen a crisis of disconnection.
Businesses are struggling to connect with prospects and customers, as well as feeling overwhelmed by a huge number of applications and systems. Teams feel ineffective, stuck and inefficient – spending more time trying to manage data and apps rather than time with customers.
HubSpot is working to connect the dots and provide more than just software. As a connected CRM, they're working towards building a system that connects the dots and creates a connected customer growth strategy.
So here are a few of the biggest updates hot off the press out of INBOUND along with how they're going to impact your business growth strategy...
- Marketing Hub Product updates
- Data quality and management updates
- CRM Customisation updates
- Commerce and Ops Hub updates
- Developer updates
Marketing Hub product updates
WhatsApp integration
Marketing & Service Hub Pro & Enterprise - In beta (September 2022)
A new HubSpot feature we know you’ve been waiting for! You can now connect a WhatsApp business account to your CRM as a messaging channel in the shared inbox. So you can now connect with prospects and customers on one of the most popular messaging apps available today! It works both ways, with business- and contact-initiated messages visible on the contact record, including video and images.
Campaigns tool updates
Marketing Hub Pro & Enterprise - Now live
There’s been a whole bunch of updates to improve the overall experience of the Marketing Campaigns tool to help marketers gain better visibility and analysis of how their campaigns are performing. These include…
- Comment threads for better collaboration
- Comments can be attached/highlighted directly to individual parts of the asset for more specific feedback
- Forms are now included as an asset on a campaign (including when you clone the campaign!)
- You can add a number in the budget field for better reporting
- View revenue attribution and deal attribution from within the campaign view
- Compare the performance of two or more campaigns against each other
- Better understanding of how each contact was influenced
Customer Journey Analytics
Marketing Hub Pro & Enterprise - In beta (October 2022)
One-size-fits-all reporting rarely fits what marketers need to prove ROI and campaign attribution. So HubSpot has got a really exciting new feature: Customer Journey Analytics provides a visual overview of your customer’s entire end-to-end journey, with clear visibility of where you’re losing potential leads during your funnel. So that you can now focus on the moments that matter most to improve and optimise conversion points.
Data quality and management updates
Data Quality Command Center
Pro and Enterprise - In beta (September 2022)
If you lack visibility across your CRM property health, this next update is for you! HubSpot’s new Data Quality Command Center provides a super straightforward dashboard giving you at-a-glance insights across your data. You’ll be able to monitor unused properties, integration issues and more, all from one place, so that you can tackle problems before they get bigger.
Cleaner imports
All tiers - Now live
Don’t let bad data clog your CRM. HubSpot’s new import experience means that it’s stopped before it can start, with automated error flagging and corrections before the data can be published. Ultimately saving you time with fewer data to manually clean and ensuring your database is more consistent, accurate and up-to-date.
Property validations
All tiers - In beta (September 2022)
Consistency is key for clean data. HubSpot’s new property validations mean that you have more control over the data being inputted into your CRM with validation rules like character limits or specific value inputs. This means fewer manual mistakes, fewer friction points and a smoother customer experience – win, win, win!
Data Model Overview
All tiers - In beta (September 2022)
Visualise your data structure in your HubSpot CRM with the new Data Model Overview. It combines standard objects, properties and associations into one single view in order to see exactly how your data is organised and connected to each other. With a good data structure, you can start to ensure better data quality for more confident and evidence-backed decision-making.
Custom Object Builder
Enterprise - In beta (September 2022)
The new HubSpot Custom Object Builder means that you can customise your data model around your company, rather than the other way around. Custom Objects enables you to create a CRM set-up as unique as your business requires. The new custom object builder is super simple to use with no coding knowledge required and the functionality to define the name, plural name and first property of a custom object through simple form fields.
CRM Customisation updates
Right sidebar configuration
Pro+ - Now live
This is one we know you’ve been asking for! HubSpot admins can now build custom-configured righthand sidebars to show exactly what your reps need to see. This can be customised for different teams with conditional logic, as well as the option to show internal data (like page views, summary data, workflow buttons) and external data (like Google Sheets or Amplitude charts). Developers can go one step further and use the developer tools to build in the custom tab for advanced customisation!
Advanced CRM highlights configuration
Free - Now live
It’s easier than ever to build out your ideal CRM set-up in HubSpot! You can now log new types of customer connection activities manually, including SMS, LinkedIn, WhatsApp and physical mail – meaning you can build a better picture of the different touch points and distribute more genuine attribution across your marketing campaigns. You can also now configure the buttons to what you want them to be for quicker access and efficiency.
There’s also a ‘Records Overview’ tab currently in beta, which Pro+ customers can use to show properties on cards, such as recent activities, property highlights or associations tables. With conditional logic, you can even show different data to different teams. Service and Sales Hub customers can also develop custom cards using the built-in developer tools.
Commerce and Ops Hub updates
Payment schedules
In Quotes - Now live
Break down large bills into a series of instalments with the new payment schedules! Ideal for eCommerce businesses, you can now sell services with their own due date, amount and name for enhanced segmentation.
Data Sync Health
Free & starter - Now live
Actively track the data moving between your integrated apps with the new Data Sync Health tool, enabling you to keep systems and teams aligned around consistent, accurate data.
Depending on your HubSpot subscription, you’ll be able to fully customise your sync set-up and keep your apps up-to-date with an out-of-the-box, code-free package. The tool will actively monitor the amount of API calls being handled, and flag any errors or discrepancies across systems and with Ops Hub Pro you can field map custom properties for advanced implementation.
Product sync
Free & starter - Now live
Use Product Sync to connect third-party apps to your HubSpot product library bidirectionally. This means you can create products in over 20 different apps that automatically sync to your HubSpot product library for efficiency and consistency.
Invoice sync
Free & starter - In beta (September 2022)
Invoice sync provides a completely separate area for you to sync your invoices one-way from third-party apps like Quickbooks, Dynamics 365, NetSuite etc. directly into HubSpot. Using this feature you’ll be able to utilise HubSpot to get a complete picture of your business, enabling marketing, sales and service teams to make data-driven decisions backed by actual revenue.
Developer updates
Projects GitHub integration
Sales & Service Enterprise - In beta (September 2022)
The new Projects GitHub Integration means that developers can now use GitHub as the source of record for their HubSpot Project’s codebase. This enables better version control and collaboration, with familiar tools and workflow triggers.
Development Sandbox
Sales & Service Enterprise - In beta (September 2022)
Developers can now have free reign to build and test concept development work within an isolated environment before implementing it into their standard sandbox or production accounts. With all the same features enabled, developers can feel confident pushing boundaries and trialling new ideas without impacting the live environment.
Debugging
Sales & Service Enterprise - In beta (September 2022)
HubSpot is making it easier than ever to debug potential causes of failure with a new CRM mid-panel card logging system. This allows developers to monitor how their private apps function, with details about each execution and whether it passed or failed.
CRM card builder
Sales & Service Enterprise - In beta (September 2022)
The CRM Card Builder tool makes it easier for CRM users to do their job. Developers can now create new CRM cards with an interactive interface for them to develop the necessary JSON payloads that deploy custom CRM cards to the middle panel of HubSpot. You can also use these new CRM cards on custom objects or to prioritise displaying specific custom object data.
Excited about any of these updates? Want to know more about how you can implement them within your business? Contact us now and our HubSpot experts can guide you through exactly how they can help you grow your revenue and build a connected customer experience.
