This marketing strateg illustrates the HubSpot’s marketing strategy, including its product, pricing, placement and promotional strategies. It covers every marketing aspect that plays key role in determining the company’s success.
1. Company overview
| Company name | HubSpot |
| Type | Public |
| Year Founded | 2006 |
| Industry | Software |
| CEO | Yamini Rangan |
| Headquarters | Cambridge |
| Number of countries | 56 |
| Number of employees- 2022 | 7,433 |
| Revenue 2022 | $1.731 billion |
| Market capitalization 2022 | $18.26 billion |
2. HubSpot Marketing Strategy
We discuss HubSpot marketing strategy in light of 4P framework:
2.1. HubSpot product strategy
2.1.1. Multi-Product strategy
HubSpot employs multi-product strategy to meet the inbound marketing needs of small and medium organizations. As per Forbes, HubSpot has gained enormous success due to its multi-product strategy.
2.1.2. HubSpot product mix
HubSpot offers a wide product variety, mainly including- design tools, sales tools, marketing automation tools, CRM, service tools and other products like HubSpot sales plan, HubSpot marketing plan and business development plan etc.:
Source: HubSpot
The offered products help SMBs (businesses with employees 20 to 200) in getting discovered through internet and social media.
2.1.3. Most successful HubSpot products
Core marketing hub has been HubSpot’s most successful product. HubSpot campaigns are also highly popular among customers. HubSpot campaign best practices guide customers to use all possible tools for the best results.
In 2020, HubSpot was considered #1 Best Product for marketers in G2 list. G2 list includes 57,844 software companies. Other than topping the list, HubSpot is also recognized in three other lists, including ‘best products for sales’, ‘best software products’, and ‘best software companies’.
The success of HubSpot’s product strategy reflects in its market leadership position. Following graph shows HubSpot has largest market share in U.S marketing automation solution market:
Source: Statista
Here is another graph showing the success of HubSpot’s products over last decade:
Source: Macro-Trends
HubSpot is not only used by SMBs, but some giant corporations like Walmart also proactively invest on latest technologies, and use HubSpot to make data driven decisions.
HubSpot’s growing popularity is due to its unique selling point that compels customers to favor HubSpot over available alternatives:
2.1.4. HubSpot unique selling point
HubSpot strategy for differentiation involves capturing whole customer journey by offering all-in-one platform.
Here isHubSpot USP:
‘Powerful, yet not overpowering’
HubSpot offers a strong, unique and easy to use software. Offering such wide variety is uncommon in overly saturated market. HubSpot USP is short, attention grabbing, addresses pain point, and a fear that customers face when using similar products.
HubSpot understands the power of simplicity. Customers now prefer simple and user-friendly, yet creative designs. Companies that understand, and are able to offer a blend of simplicity and creativity succeed. Click here to see how a simple, minimalistic yet creative design enabled Apple to become the market leader.
2.1.5. HubSpot target market
HubSpot target market includes companies (particularly SMBs employing 20 to 200 employees) that need to implement the inbound marketing. It also meets the needs of companies that need assistance in sales and customer relationship management.
HubSpot has gradually increased spending on the research and development to understand the needs of its target market. Following graph shows the HubSpot market research spending:
Source: Macro Trends
2.1.6. What makes HubSpot product strategy successful?
• Adding desired features based on in-depth understanding of customers’ needs
• Wide variety
• All-in-one package
• Easy to use
• Simple layout
• Fine-tuned usability
2.2. HubSpot pricing strategy
2.2.1. Freemium pricing strategy
HubSpot adopts freemium pricing strategy. It offers a free basic CRM version that helps businesses in scaling their operations.
Other than basic version with some free features (like free HubSpot marketing campaign template), HubSpot also offers paid plans offering a wider range of advanced features.
2.2.2. HubSpot pricing plans
HubSpot offers four key products:
CRM (free)
• Marketing hub (paid)Sales hub (paid)
• Service hub (paid)
Here are four pricing plans:
Free
• Starter ($20 per month)
• Professional ($400 to $890)
• Enterprise ($1200 to $3600)
• Growth Suite (all packaged bundled in discounted price)
Here is the pricing plan for individuals and small teams:
Source: HubSpot
Here is the glimpse of pricing plans for enterprises and businesses:
Source: HubSpot
2.2.3. What makes HubSpot pricing different?
HubSpot offers lower prices than its competitors. It also offers more generous free plans for all hubs. Although, some features in basic plans have limited functionality, but still, the free plans are enough to meet the new SMB’s automation needs.
Recently, Forbes conducted a price comparison of HubSpot and Salesforce, and presented following findings:
Source: Forbes
The price comparison shows although, Sales Force is ranked excellent based on customization and analytics, but HubSpot products are more economical and easier to use.
2.3. HubSpot placing strategy
HubSpot has headquarters in Cambridge, USA. It has regional offices in Europe, Asia, Australia, Latin America, UK and Canada. The company sells its products online through its website, and through mobile apps.
HubSpot has opened customer care centers around the globe. Here is the list of HubSpot’s customer care centers with local phone numbers that are only a phone call away:
| America | U.S, Canada, Brazil, Chile, Columbia, Mexico |
| Europe | Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Luxemburg, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK |
| Asia Pacific | New Zealand, Australia, Hong Kong, India, Japan, Singapore, South Korea |
2.4. HubSpot promotion strategy
HubSpot marketing overview indicates the company uses various promotional tactics to capture the market share. HubSpot uses selective corporate and B2B channels to communicate the brand message. Company uses both- online and offline promotional channels to interact with the customers.
2.4.1. Annual marketing and sales conference
HubSpot arranges annual marketing and sales conference that spans over three to four days. This annual event not only discusses the contemporary sales and marketing issues, but also promotes its products to the event attendees.
HubSpot annual conference 2022 had the theme of ‘Age of connected customer’, and the event was attended by more than 70,000 people around the world.
2.4.2. Social media marketing
HubSpot has strong presence on social networking sites. Details are given in below table:
| Twitter followers | 832.2K |
| Instagram followers | 485K |
| Facebook followers | 2.1 million |
| Pinterest followers | 63.6K |
| Tik-Tok followers | 10.4K |
HubSpot regularly posts on social media, and arranges interesting online events to keep the followers’ engaged. It also posts humorous videos to advertise its products in fun and exciting way:
Source: HubSpot Facebook
2.4.3. Posters
Other than publishing short videos, HubSpot also publishes posters in online and print media to reach the mass market:
2.4.4. TV advertising and celebrity endorsement
Recently, HubSpot launched its first ever TV advertising campaign. After years of growth, this ad campaign will enable HubSpot in achieving its growth objectives in post pandemic world.
As per Boston Globe, the ad campaign signals the HubSpot’s rapid growth and rising profile, and stars Kathryn Hahn:
Source: Boston Globe
2.4.5. Promotional discounts
HubSpot also offers promotional discounts to its valued customers. Company offers three types of discounts, including- discount codes, one time order discounts and unit discounts.
2.4.6. Blogging
HubSpot regularly posts the blogs to create the brand awareness, create e-WOM and increase website traffic.
2.4.7. Some key success statistics
Following facts and statistics reflect the success of HubSpot’s marketing and promotional strategies:
• Venture-Beat ranked HubSpot #1 automation software based on its popularity among customers due to ease of use, power and all around functionality
• HubSpot earned ‘Most Loved’ award in 2022 by Trust Radius.
• HubSpot earned #2 rank in top 100 best software companies in 2022.
• In 2021, HubSpot earned Customer Choice award by Gartner Peer Insights.
3. Recommendations
Based on HubSpot marketing strategy analysis, we propose following recommendations:
• Introduce more high-end packages, and improve their customization and analytics to beat the Salesforce
• Invest more on celebrity endorsement and influencer marketing strategies to expand reach to the target market
• Invest more on TV advertising, and run Ad campaigns to beat the competition and break the clutter
• Increase funds for R&D to better understand the changing needs of customers in post-pandemic world
• Integrate flexibility into the contracts, and ensure that the packages may not get quickly expensive.
• Introduce more variety of cheap to expensive packages
4. Conclusion
To sum up, HubSpot holds strong market position due to its effective marketing and promotional strategies. However, intensifying competition will make it difficult for HubSpot to break the clutter. So, it is important to continuously improve the marketing strategies, and align them to the strategic objectives to stay ahead of competition.
As mentioned above, a major reason behind HubSpot’s success is its simple and user friendly design. It debunks the myths that customers will pay more for products with complex and fancy designs.
Apple presents another example of how companies can achieve success even with a simple design. To know more about how Apple is playing with simplicity and creativity, read our article ‘Apple marketing strategy’ in which we have explained all key marketing concepts in detail.
5. References
DeFrancesco, R. (2019, May 9). HubSpot Reaps The Rewards From Its New Multi-Product Strategy. Forbes.
H. (n.d.). Why Choose HubSpot?
Flanagan, E. (2023, January 19). HubSpot Named #1 Product for Marketers in 2020 G2 Best Software Awards.
U.S. marketing automation software market share 2021 | Statista. (2023, January 6). Statista.
HubSpot Revenue 2012-2022 | HUBS. (n.d.). MacroTrends.
HubSpot Research and Development Expenses 2012-2022 | HUBS. (n.d.). MacroTrends.
HubSpot, Inc. (n.d.). Marketing Software Pricing | HubSpot.
HubSpot, Inc. (n.d.-b). Marketing Software Pricing | HubSpot.
Novak, J. (2023, January 22). HubSpot Vs. Salesforce (2023 Comparison). Forbes Advisor.
Novak, J. (2023b, January 22). HubSpot Vs. Salesforce (2023 Comparison). Forbes Advisor.
What in the World is HubSpot’s INBOUND, and Why Should I Care? (n.d.).
Mustache | From horseshoe to handlebar, HubSpot CRM grows with your. . . (n.d.).
Aaron Pressman. (2022, February 24). HubSpot plans major TV ad campaign after year of growth. BostonGlobe.com.
Aaron Pressman. (2022b, February 24). HubSpot plans major TV ad campaign after year of growth. BostonGlobe.com.
H. (n.d.-a). HubSpot Ranked #1 by VentureBeat.
Hair, J. (2023, January 20). HubSpot Earns Multiple Customer Review Awards, Including #2 Best Global Seller for 2022 by G2.
