3 common HubSpot mistakes that are costing you time and money
HubSpot’s Marketing Hub is a powerful platform used by some of the world’s top-performing companies and successfully leveraged by small businesses. Here at Content Matterz, we work with teams of all sizes, yet over and over, we see marketers making the same simple mistakes that hurt campaign performance and can even make it harder for them to justify the cost of their HubSpot licenses to the powers that be (gasp!).
We’ve rounded up three of the most common mistakes we see so often; it hurts! The good news? They’re pretty easy to fix!
Wait! What is this HubSpot Marketing Hub?
Did we catch you off guard? HubSpot Marketing Hub is a comprehensive marketing automation and inbound marketing platform known for its user-friendly interface, expansive features and emphasis on inbound marketing. Even if you’re not a user — yet — check out the rest of this article to learn if a few tweaks (paired with our team’s favorite marketing tool, of course) could be just the trick to help you solve some of your toughest marketing challenges.
1. Marketing Hub isn’t integrated with other key platforms
Despite its amazing ability to create automated email workflows, HubSpot wasn’t designed to just send emails — it was designed to be your one-stop-shop for interacting with and viewing everything you need to know about your marketing contacts and campaigns.
If you haven’t taken the time to connect HubSpot with all of your other platforms and accounts, stop reading and start integrating! Go ahead, we’ll wait.
At a minimum, your HubSpot instance should be integrated with:
- Your website. This is easily accomplished with a plug-in (for WordPress sites) or a snippet of code added to your website’s header.
- Your CRM. If your sales team uses a different CRM, such as Salesforce, integrate it with HubSpot so the two can work together to keep your campaigns and sales information in sync.
- Your social media accounts. Posting and syncing from HubSpot gives you better big-picture visibility into how your campaigns are performing. It’s even better if you are running ads and email campaigns at the same time.
These are just a few platforms that can be connected to HubSpot. The possibilities are nearly endless, considering HubSpot will create custom integrations if you need them. The more the merrier!
2. Your marketers aren’t using HubSpot’s AI tools properly
We’ve found that marketers fall into one of two camps when it comes to using AI to generate content. 1, they are scared to use it for fear of plagiarization or killing their brand voice, or 2, they use AI-generated content in its entirety and misrepresent information or turn themselves into personality-less computers.
This year, HubSpot launched a slew of new AI tools across all of its Hubs, with plans for many more. As of late 2023, these are the ones we’ve found useful. Below are our top recommendations for how to use them to streamline your work — without going fully Rosey the Robot.
HubSpot AI tool #1: Content Assistant
Give yourself a kickstart. Use this tool to beat writer’s block and start writing copy or summarizing blogs and other long-format pieces for social posts. Be sure to add a unique touch so your words don’t sound like every other robot on the block.
HubSpot AI tool #2: Image Generation Assistant
Need 1000 words? This feature is great for simple graphic projects like newsletter pictures and blog images. Aim for a 60/40 ratio of unique photos to AI-generated, and you’ll hit the sweet spot of easier work without losing your flavor.
HubSpot AI tool #3: AI Email Subject Line Generator
Say goodbye to bland. We like to A/B test AI-generated subject lines so we can hone in on the ones that work best for a certain audience, and then we can spin up ideas that piggyback on those for our next campaign.
Remember, these are AI assistants, and they should never completely replace human writers and editors. HubSpot advises you to use caution with AI-generated content. AI makes it easier to compose communications, but it is imperative that you have a human proofread everything and ensure it is appropriate and on-brand before hitting send.
3. You aren’t producing enough content to make it successful
With HubSpot plus the power of AI, marketers need to feed the content machine at quite an alarming rate to see success. Often, when we see marketers fall behind, it’s because they fail to produce enough content to compete. To make the most of HubSpot, marketers must have a plan to keep the wheels of creation turning at all hours.
Content is worth the investment: 69% of businesses planned to increase their content marketing budgets in 2023, and as many as 94% of small businesses have plans to boost their marketing spending in 2024.
Here’s a few tips on how to make sure you have enough content to optimize your reach and justify a HubSpot license:
- Have a dedicated content creation budget, and use it! Too often, we meet clients who set aside time or money to create content and never get around to it. Guess what? They never will! Make a budget and use it to contract with skilled copywriters and strategists who will focus solely on getting you the high-quality content you need, all day, every day.
- Update old content regularly. This is a trick we call “turkey dinnering” your content. You take the leftovers, and you make a whole new meal! This is a very effective way to make more content with less effort.
- Do a content audit once per year. Look at everything you’ve created in a single year and identify the gaps. Did you start a newsletter that stopped six months in? What about your plan to blog once per month? Identify where you are losing ground and make a concrete plan to fix it.
How a kick-ass agency partner can help
As a Gold-level HubSpot Solutions Partner, we are trained to help our clients make the most of their HubSpot licenses — all while delivering top-notch sales and marketing content that drives results. Whether it’s a first-time implementation, integrating new platforms, or creating and optimizing content for all types of campaigns, we are here to help. Reach out to us to chat about how Content Matterz can help you make the most of your marketing campaigns with HubSpot.