From self-implementation to HubSpot CRM and Sales Hub optimization

The solution: order in the chaos

Hoang: "We knew we needed help to get it right this time. I have experience with CRM systems, but obviously am not an expert in software implementation. So we contacted HubSpot to ask who could help us with this project. Thanks to HubSpot's recommendation, we chose Webs. They were going to help us untangle our CRM issues."

When Mollie teamed up with Webs to work on Mollie's HubSpot portal, they found that most of the problems had to do with the lack of a standardized process. After isolating this underlying problem, Mollie and Webs set about organizing the HubSpot CRM:

Cleaning up the data within HubSpot

The first step was to determine the value of the data within the entire lifecycle and specific half-phase using questions such as, "Is the data up-to-date, relevant and useful?" and "What data is worth keeping and what can go away?" This was a logical first step for Mollie, as a cluttered and inconsistent database can negatively impact marketing and sales productivity.

Blueprint for the process

After cleaning up the data, Mollie focused on creating a blueprint of the ideal process. This mapped out what the marketing and sales process should look like within the HubSpot portal.

Hoang: "The blueprint was a big eye-opener for me. It clarified how the CRM system relates to the Sales Hub and Marketing Hub processes. The blueprint also allowed us to simplify certain steps within the sales process."

Once the process was mapped out, Mollie bent over backwards to implement the process within HubSpot. This involved cleaning up a years-old file of false triggers, duplicated properties and unused workflows and lists.

Sales training

Once the HubSpot portal was set up around a clear process, Mollie held one-day sales workshops to teach sales staff how to use the new sales process within HubSpot and explain how most Sales Hub tools worked.

HubSpot's eight golden rules
To ensure that the new sales process and cleaned-up CRM would continue to be useful in the future, Mollie created a summary of the sales workshops titled, "The Eight Golden Rules of HubSpot. This document contains everything new employees need to know to keep HubSpot healthy. In addition, it clearly outlines the benefits for sales associates so they can quickly and fully master the process.

Connecting to our ecosystem of tools

Hoang: "Because we have a fairly complex HubSpot portal and a whole ecosystem of tools, it is essential that our organization (and I assume the same goes for other SaaS organizations) has a scalable and easy-to-manage sales process and integration program in place. So training our sales staff was a fundamental part of this project. If the new sales process had not been adopted by our people, this project could never have succeeded. Moreover, it was very important to us that HubSpot could be linked to our other tools. Fortunately, we found out that HubSpot integrations allow you to share data between all your tools quite easily."

Report

The final step involved putting together a reporting overview. For this, several reporting dashboards were developed to track the effectiveness of marketing and sales efforts.

Hoang: "Thanks to our new reporting dashboard, I now have insight into our sales data. I can see if our salespeople are following the new process and if they are using HubSpot efficiently."

Change management in an enterprise organization

Mollie initially implemented HubSpot CRM in 2017, but as the company continued to scale up and organizational and operational changes accelerated, the idea of a holistic HubSpot CRM system became more and more obsolete. This created data and process issues within the HubSpot portal. This prevented sales teams from efficiently using HubSpot to track deal progress or organize and automate their sales activities.

The HubSpot CRM and Sales Hub initially worked fine, but things went awry when Mollie did not regularly review and further develop the tool over the years. As a result, sales data was stored in separate systems. And as Mollie scaled from a handful to more than 50 sales professionals, more and more incompatible data sets began to circulate. The old method of keeping track of deals - in Excel or a shared Google Document - began to look increasingly detrimental to the company.

Hoang Pham, Head of Growth at Mollie: "It was becoming increasingly difficult to have to jump back and forth between the different points where our data was stored. This led to delays within the sales team. All we were using HubSpot for was some administrative work. We then realized that our sales teams were not using HubSpot to its full potential and that we were not getting everything out of HubSpot that was in it."

Mollie's HubSpot portal began to have significant problems in terms of data integrity, organization and automation. As a result, HubSpot was barely usable for both marketing and sales. We were faced with a choice: move on or continue looking for another system.

Instead of making the costly and time-consuming switch to a new CRM, Mollie decided to further explore and expand the capabilities HubSpot offered, focusing primarily on the process. Because while technology certainly plays an important role, when it comes to ROI, everything hinges on the right processes.

The result: a super healthy HubSpot portal

For Mollie, aligning the CRM and Sales Hub with business goals has definitely paid off. It allows for better forecasting and more streamlined processes, which means the sales teams can now use the tool effectively. It also gives Mollie better insight into its sales figures, allowing the company to continue to grow.

To measure how successful the new process is, Hoang tracks portal usage in HubSpot. When he sees sales leads using HubSpot to make their forecasts, he knows that all the data is stored in HubSpot and therefore reliable.

Hoang: "Not only did my sales colleagues learn a lot from this project, I also learned a lot. As a result, I feel I can be a better HubSpot portal owner. Before working with Webs, I was always putting out fires for every problem with the HubSpot portal. Now I know how to come up with a sustainable solution instead of a temporary patch. Mollie now has a super healthy HubSpot portal ready to grow with our ambitions."

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