Optimize 3.0 Inbound Marketing Blog

How HubSpot Paid Contacts Work

Marketing vs Non-marketing contacts explained

HubSpot lets you classify each record as marketing or non-marketing. Marketing contacts are the only ones eligible for marketing emails and count toward your paid tier. Non-marketing contacts can still be worked by sales, tracked in the CRM, and used in reporting without increasing your marketing contact bill.

Why Data Quality Is the Hidden CRM Problem

“Our data is a mess.”

Practically every CRM we see that’s been in use for two or more years (sometimes less) suffers from the same problem: incomplete, outdated, or inconsistent records.

When that happens, frustration sets in. Sales reps stop entering information, managers stop trusting reports, and leadership loses confidence in the system. Over time, the CRM collapses into noise instead of clarity.

That’s why one of the first things we do for our clients is set up a Data Audit Dashboard inside HubSpot.

Amidst all of the fever dream around AI assistants and agents, sometimes the most basic features of HubSpot can be ignored.  We see this is just about every portal we encounter.   HubSpot’s data back up and restore is one of the most glaring examples.  Data back up is critical.  Here’s a quick guide to do that in HubSpot.

In this post, we’ll walk you through the step-by-step process to back up your HubSpot data, ensure continuity across your teams, and provide peace of mind for stakeholders.

You bought HubSpot, turned it on, maybe clicked around the menus, and now your sales team is grumbling that nothing makes sense. I’ve seen this movie many times before—different cast, same ending. The problem isn’t HubSpot. It’s the way it’s set up, right out of the gate. And that setup, what I call “technical onboarding,” is boring, unglamorous, and absolutely mission-critical.  If it didn’t get recorded in HubSpot it didn’t happen.

Ignoring search traffic can be extremely costly to your business.

Back in May 2018 HubSpot decided to do away with their keyword tool.  They did this for several reasons, some of them quite valid.  But by de-emphasizing such a core principle of SEO they managed to send the message to their clients that it’s no longer important.  Instead of doubling down on SEO tools they mostly ceded this side of their business to the likes of SEM Rush and Moz among others.

HubSpot's removing  their keyword as of May 1st, 2018.  What does that mean for your keyword tracking and overall SEO initiatives? (see point #3 below especially).  We've spent some time looking at some alternatives and have concluded that SEMRush is the best replacement for the HubSpot KW tool.  

Hubspot offers an array of inbound marketing tools that integrate blogging, SEO, email, lead nurturing and lead scoring to name just a few.  As long time users of Hubspot, we've developed some ways to get even more from the platform.  One of our favorite tools inside Hubspot is the keyword tool.  The following is a little hack we've developed to find those very best keywords to leverage for SEO and blog posts:

Here are two interesting yet somewhat contradictory statistics about marketing automation adoption and usage:

Call to action buttons (CTAs) are a critical component of inbound marketing. My guess is that you if you're like me you look at a website and think “those are really cool, if only I knew Photoshop I could build that.”  I used to do that until I figured out a way to create great call to action buttons without using Photoshop.

Here’s a question I hear frequently: “what is funnel marketing?” and how does it relate to inbound marketing.

If you’ve been trying to get your head around funnel marketing, I want to help solve this little marketing mystery. In doing so, provide a clear and simple example of the funnel marketing. Moreover, explain that if used properly a sales funnel will unlock the unique powers of inbound marketing automation.