In 2021, HubSpot analysed data from 103,000+ customers to determine the ROI of its CRM platform. How could the data revealed influence your future B2B business strategy?
As the rest of the business gears up for the start of a new calendar year, you’re most likely deep into planning the close of this financial one.
- What kind of marketing ROI can you demonstrate for 2021?
- Has it been a successful year from a sales perspective?
- Across the business, do you have the systems and processes in place to minimise risk and adapt to market change?
Whether calendar or financial, year’s end is typically a time of reflection. For HubSpot, this doesn’t just mean looking internally at its wins and losses. How have its customers benefited by using the HubSpot platform over the last 12 months? Coronavirus continues to impact global economic sentiment. For B2B companies in particular, this has created new business challenges. Could HubSpot help you to future-proof the organisation?
Unlock visible marketing ROI from digital channels
Many B2B organisations struggle to see marketing ROI. The challenge is twofold; on the one hand, the effectiveness of their marketing strategies can be responsible (B2B inbound marketing strategies are no walk in the park). On the other hand, many organisations lack the systems to connect marketing results to revenue generated, leaving a black hole where there should be clear data on attribution.
In the ROI 2021 report, HubSpot’s customers cited an average of 181% increase in website traffic and 159% increase in inbound leads one year after purchasing HubSpot.
Lasting lockdown habits are driving the new digital consumer, “speeding up consumers’ digital adoption and introducing new trends at a rate few could have predicted,” Deloitte reveals. HubSpot Marketing Hub users are competitively placed to serve this spike in digital traffic with tactics such as segmentation, personalisation, and performance analysis through customisable dashboards, resulting in efficient lead generation and a joined-up experience for both the audience receiving the marketing and the companies delivering it.
“38% of respondents did more shopping online relative to pre-lockdown levels. Half of these converts to online shopping would maintain these behaviours post-lockdown.” Deloitte, ‘Lasting lockdown habits: a new digital consumer?’
Increase sales ROI and boost profitability
Marketing is only one part of the story. Marketing-generated revenue still depends on a sales function capable of effectively closing deals. In our experience, it’s not uncommon for organisations to overlook the intrinsic relationship between sales and marketing, investing significantly in their marketing function at the expense of the sales and forecasting systems needed to transform leads into customers, manage deal pipelines and predict revenue.
With Sales Hub, HubSpot’s survey respondents cited a 92% increase in deals closed-won and 41% increase in deal close rate within one year of purchase.
The economic climate of the last two years has made the ability to track, manage and forecast revenue in line with rapidly changing consumer demand indispensable. Without clear visibility of these vital metrics, many organisations have had to make difficult choices in regards to staff levels, hiring decisions, salary levels, and more. Risk increases across the business, as does the pressure on employees — particularly those in Sales — to perform.
The simple ability to join the dots between marketing and sales activity, create attribution models that support resource management/investment decisions, and accurately forecast revenue on a frequency of your choosing using customisable dashboards, is key.
“Without a doubt, consumer behavior has changed across several dimensions: category consumptions, channel selection, shopper trip frequency, brand preference, and media consumption. These shifts, combined with forecasts for virus containment and economic recovery, are critical for commercial strategies.” McKinsey & Company, ‘Rapidly forecasting demand and adapting commercial plans in a pandemic’
How confident are you in your future B2B business strategy?
Customers who capitalise on the power of the HubSpot CRM platform see the greatest improvement over time.
At its core, HubSpot is a CRM platform. It’s this data that makes its marketing and sales hubs so effective, enabling everything from segmented marketing lists, automated outreach and personalised communications to highly targeted sales engagement. Because all of its hubs speak to one another, the buyer’s journey feels seamless — for both the buyer and the organisation selling to them. Its Service Hub brings this journey full circle, enabling businesses to elevate their service standards in line with modern customer expectations, boosting referral traffic and word-of-mouth marketing — both highly valuable lead sources.
"According to HubSpot’s ROI 2021 report… By combining Marketing Hub and CMS Hub, customers see even greater improvement in website traffic over time. The Marketing, Sales, Service, and CMS Hub bundle outperforms Sales Hub alone and other bundles for improvement in deals closed-won one year after purchase."
As the McKinsey & Company highlights in its article, ‘The coronavirus effect on global economic sentiment (December 2021), the future remains uncertain. Despite a generally positive outlook from executive leaders towards 2022’s economic conditions, sentiment is lower than it was during the summer of 2021, and the survey recognises that it concluded days before the impact of the new COVID-19 Omicron variant was felt across Europe.
As you review performance at the end of the year, and look ahead to your B2B business strategy for 2022, could a CRM solution such as HubSpot help you to deliver successful B2B campaigns? Faced with today's market, the best steps you can take to reduce risk is maximise agility and accelerate digital transformation, putting in place the systems and processes your senior teams need to report accurately and react quickly.
To find out more about HubSpot and how it could help you to hit your business objectives in 2022, get in touch.
