3min
Tammy Duggan-Herd from We are passionate about bringing technology to small and medium size business. These days, there is no excuse from not having some form of what we used to call a 'tech stack' to support you and your business go about its business.
One of the main reasons people dont employ technology it seems, is thats its too complicated, and they dont feel qualified to assess and install the right thing and are afraid of making an expensive mistake.
And this is why we are such massive fans of HubSpot. Its hugely powerful, bringing the very latest in marketing. sales and customer service technology to your fingertips. But it's also stupidly easy to use.
Not only is it easy to use, it comes with a ton of powerful features for free.
Yes, free of charge, no cost.
So let's have a look at not just the features that are free, but the ways you can actually use them for your business.
HubSpot free features and what they do
Contact Management - Keep all your information about your clients or other contacts, in one place. Includes emails, tickets, meetings, documents, quotes etc.
Contact Website Activity - see what pages on your website your contact has visited, and how often, how long for and so on.
Companies - Link your contacts to a record of the companies they work for. Includes data like physical address, website, sector and so on.
Deals - One of the most powerful features. It's the heart of your sales process. It allows the user to create a 'deal' and map where that deal sits in a customisable sales process. The 'deal' pulls all the features into one place. So the contacts involved, the customers, conversations, amount, likelihood of closing, products that have been pitched, quotes, etc.
Tasks and Activities - Your very own project management software. Links to contacts, deals, companies etc. and allows you to direct team members activity and allocated responsibilities, set deadlines, link to workflows etc.
Company insights - Automatically pulled from publicly available data and recorded along with the company entry in your database. Shows things like telephone numbers, websites, turnover and so on. Hugely useful.
Gmail and Outlook Integration - Connect your email of choice to ensure what goes on in the CRM is mirrored in your email client and vice verser. The integration with Gmail especially is awesome.
HubSpot Connect Integrations - explore the library, there are a ton of other systems HubSpot connects with for free. Accountancy software like Xero, design software like Canva, Proposal software and so on.
Custom Support Form Fields - Build fields in your customer support tickets that are specific to you and your products and services.
Prospects - see what companies are visiting your website and any available insights as well. Replaces things like Leadfeeder for free.
Ticketing - arrange customer enquiries and complaints into an easy to manage ticket system. Allows you to copy the right people in straight away or route ot the best person to help.
Forms - Build forms in pages on your website so that contacts who fill them out drop straight into the CRM automatically, includes built in idiot proof GDPR compliance.
Ad management - Connect Facebook and Google accounts directly to your CRM to see who has come from where. Helps to see which campaigns are working, and importantly allows you to create audiences directly out of your contacts making for perfect matches.
Conversations Inbox - Set all incoming comms from Inbox's and Live Chats, Messenger etc. to all come into the one place. Meaning everyone can see everything and things dont get missed.
Reporting Dashboards - already set up and ready to go. Several classic reports get populated automatically from the dashboard allowing you to introduce much higher levels of accountability to salespeople, marketing and customer services.
Email tracking and notifications - See who opens your emails, and get an alert to tell you when they've done it. o powerful when trying to get a hold of a prospect or client.
Email templates - If you are stuck for inspiration, or just want basic and easy to read, HubSpot has it covered. Replaces services from software like Mailchimp.
Canned Snippets - If you find yourself utilising the same terms over and again, create a short hand that can drop a paragraph or so directly into an email, saving time and lower frustration.
Documents - Store regularly used documents like brochures and questionaries directly in the CRM to short cut their addition to email. Also allows you see who has opened them and for how long they've been read.
Calling - use limited minutes of Voip calling straight out of the CRM (more minutes available in the paid subscriptions)
Meeting Scheduling - send a client links directly to your calendar to save all the back and forth with setting up meetings and calls.
Messenger Integration - Linked your Facebook page and the messenger service straight into the CRM, store the conversations and requests, create support tickets etc.
Custom Properties - If you can't find the field you are looking to add to your customer or company record, simply ands easily create a custom one just for you.
Now, have a look through that list again and check yourself. That stuff is all free, and according to HubSpot free for ever! And free forever for a million CRM records.
For many businesses, especially smaller businesses, you may never need another system. Especially when you see the next blogs which detail the free Marketing Hub, Sales Hub and Service Hub functionality you get when you sign up for the CRM tool too!
If you want to find out more about how HubSpot, free or paid services, can work for you and your business click here to book a call and we'll get back to you.
Gerd Altmann
Wokandapix