HubSpot Marketing Hub Onboarding: A Step-by-Step Guide for Startups (2024)

Let’s lay out a scenario and see if it sounds familiar: You've just invested in HubSpot Marketing Hub, and now you're staring down the barrel of the onboarding process. How can you get the most out of your Marking Hub account and prove to yourself (and your higher-ups) that this purchase was worthwhile?

Choosing the right CRM platform for your start-up is only half the battle. Once you’ve decided on HubSpot Marketing Hub, the next vital piece in your journey is your onboarding. Every startup is unique and you need to make an onboarding plan that aligns with your short and long-term marketing goals while also staying within your budget.

Your brain is probably swimming with a hundred questions right now:

How do you choose the right partner for HubSpot Marketing Hub onboarding? What does a typical onboarding process look like and how much should I expect to pay? How can I identify the right onboarding package for my business? What are the consequences of choosing the wrong partner?

Take a deep breath! You don’t have to do it alone.

Let’s go through everything you need to know to win HubSpot Marketing Hub Onboarding, giving you all the information you need to choose the perfect onboarding partner for your start-up.

But wait…

Before you can truly capitalize on your investment in Marketing Hub, you first need to nail your Hubspot onboarding. You have a plethora of best-in-class tools at your disposal within HubSpot Marketing Hub, and the key is getting your foundation set up correctly so you can truly leverage your new toolkit.

We’ll walk you through a sample onboarding plan and the respective costs and timelines associated with this work, highlighting the most important considerations when choosing a HubSpot onboarding partner.

Expert HubSpot Marketing Hub Onboarding Done For You

Step 1: Understand The Basics of HubSpot Marketing Hub Onboarding

HubSpot Onboarding is required for all Professional and Enterprise customers, which means you have another decision to make right after purchasing your new CRM — who should we hire to help us?

You can hire HubSpot directly or hire a HubSpot Agency Partner, more to come on this later in the post.

Regardless of who you hire, the goal remains the same. You need to set up your HubSpot environment without breaking the bank… while also ensuring that setup aligns with your business needs and operations.

Easier said than done, we know.

What are some of the features you need to consider and prepare to implement during your onboarding process?

Key Marketing Hub Features Include:

• Lead Capture and Management: Utilize forms, pop-ups, and live chat to capture leads that align with your target personas. and then manage your leads using HubSpot’s CRM integration.

• Email Marketing: Create, personalize, and automate email campaigns to nurture your leads and then track the performance of your emails.

• Marketing Automation: Automate all of your marketing tasks and workflows to nurture leads and maximize your time and effort.

• Content Management: Create and manage your content with HubSpot’s CMS (content management system).

• Social Media Management: Schedule and publish posts, monitor engagement, and analyze performance across multiple social media channels.
• Analytics and Reporting: Detailed insights into your business performance with customizable dashboards.

You’ll know you had a well-executed onboarding process if your team feels empowered to leverage all of the HubSpot features listed above. You should have peace of mind knowing that your account is set up using best practices that align with your business needs. You should also feel confident that your data is clean and reliable so you can analyze your performance and make informed decisions as your campaigns progress over time.

Step 2: Prepare for Onboarding

Before beginning your HubSpot Marketing Hub Onboarding process, it’s crucial to set clear goals and develop a sound strategy. This preparation ensures that your onboarding is aligned with your business objectives, and makes sure you and your onboarding partner are on the same page regarding needs and expectations.

What are some of the things you should lay out in your onboarding preparation?

Define Your HubSpot Goals: HubSpot is a powerful tool and has a lot of features, which makes it even more important to understand your first priority. It’s really easy to get overwhelmed with all the bells and whistles and then have a whole bunch of things partially set up. Choose a focus. For example, maybe your first priority is lead generation, and then your second is improving your customer engagement.

Define Your Strategy: Using the example above, if you choose lead generation as your first HubSpot priority you can tailor your onboarding to help you achieve these goals first. You can identify which features will be most beneficial for you and your team to learn first and then build from there. This is especially important if your team is new to using HubSpot, there’s an abundance of features to learn. So before learning the nuances of dashboards and custom reporting, focus on learning the features pertaining to lead capture.

Once you have your goals and strategy nailed down, you can start thinking about onboarding timelines and milestones, we’ll dive into timelines in Step 4.

Step 3: Evaluate Your Onboarding Options — Onboarding with HubSpot vs A HuSspot Agency Partner:

Once you’ve outlined your expectations and goals, you’re ready to make one of the most important decisions in your onboarding process: who will your onboarding partner be?

You’ll have two options, either onboarding directly with HubSpot or choosing a HubSpot Agency Partner for your onboarding process. Let’s examine the advantages and challenges associated with each of these options in more detail.

HubSpot Direct Onboarding Features:

Standardized Setup: The HubSpot team will make sure all your essential Marketing Hub features are configured correctly and make recommendations on how to best leverage the platform.

Training Sessions: You’ll have a select number of training sessions with your assigned HubSpot Rep to make sure your team understands the basics of how your account is set up.

Support: You’ll have access to HubSpot support for guidance and troubleshooting during your onboarding process.

*HubSpot also offers Advanced or Premier Onboarding for new or upgrading Enterprise customers who have more complicated use-cases.

HubSpot Agency Partner Onboarding Features:

Customized Setup: Every HubSpot Agency Partner is unique, just like your business. This means you can expect a more tailored approach to your HubSpot Marketing Hub Onboarding process that aligns with your business needs.

Industry-Specific Knowledge: There are hundreds of HubSpot Agency Partners to choose from, meaning you can select one with experience in your industry. For example, if you run a SaaS business, you can choose a partner with relevant experience with this type of HubSpot onboarding.

Done-For-You Implementation: Select HubSpot Agency Partners offer “Done-For-You” services, meaning you can hire them to handle all of your onboarding and implementation, ensuring correct setup without overloading your internal team.

Ongoing Partnership: As your Startup scales and grows, it becomes increasingly valuable to establish ongoing partnerships with HubSpot Agency Partners. It’s especially convenient when you can continue working with the same HubSpot Agency Partner who assisted with your onboarding and implementation since they are already familiar with your account and business.

Step 4: Set a Realistic Timeline for Your HubSpot Marketing Hub Onboarding

As with all great things, your HubSpot onboarding is going to take time and won’t be completed overnight. Of course your timeline depends largely on your scope and the complexities of your business.

If you decide to do your onboarding directly through HubSpot, it takes an average 3 months to complete. Here at Lean Labs, we aim to complete onboarding within 6 weeks of starting, but we’re able to modify our pace to match your business needs. In general, HubSpot Agency Partners can be flexible and meet you where you’re at.

Sample Timeline:

• Initial Setup: 1-2 weeks. This includes general account setup, basic configurations, and basic training for your team.
• Full Implementation: 4-6 weeks. This phase involves integration all of your existing systems with HubSpot, customizing all of your key features, and more in-depth staff training.
• Ongoing Optimization: This is determined on a case-by-case basis. There’s an argument to be made that you’ll forever be optimizing your HubSpot Marketing Hub setup, and your staff will endlessly be completing HubSpot certifications and improving their skills. CRM optimization is an ongoing process that ebbs and flows as your business grows.

Step 5: Establish Your Budget for HubSpot Marketing Hub Onboarding

Setting a budget for your HubSpot Marketing Hub onboarding is a crucial step in ensuring a smooth and effective implementation. Similar to your timeline, pricing is going to vary based on factors like the size of your business, the number of integrations you need to set up, the extent of staff training required, and whether or not you want “done-for-you” services.

Onboarding Directly with HubSpot:

• HubSpot Marketing Hub Professional: Starts at $3,000.
• HubSpot Marketing Hub Enterprise: Starts at $7,000.

Onboarding with a HubSpot Agency Partner:

• Done-with-You Onboarding: If you want to be more involved in your onboarding process or require less comprehensive training, costs start around $3,000+ and vary based on the level of involvement and needs.
• Done-for-You Onboarding: If you want a HubSpot Agency Partner to handle all aspects of your onboarding, costs typically start at $15,000+.

Sample HubSpot Onboarding Plan

Here’s a sample of an onboarding plan we use at Lean Labs:

Phase 1: Initial Assessment (1 week)

What’s Covered:

• Your HubSpot Goals
• Stakeholder Alignment
• Platform Audit
• Integration Planning
• Contact Property Management
• Email Account Setup
• Connect Social Accounts
• HubSpot Tracking Codes

Phase 2: Data Setup (2 weeks)

• Define Lifecycle Stages
• Define Deal Stages
• Import Contacts
• Establish Lead scores
• Contact Segmentation
• Build HubSpot Forms

Phase 3: Process Automation (2 weeks)

• Establish Lead Status
• Map Nurturing Processes
• Develop Custom Workflows
• Create Templates and Sequences
• Assign Lead Ownership
• Setup Smart Content

Phase 4: Training & Success Planning (1 week)

• Setup Meeting Link
• Contact Record Maintenance
• Software Key Feature Highlights
• Staff Q&A
• Success Planning

Nail HubSpot Marketing Hub Onboarding with Lean Labs

Nailing your onboarding is crucial for maximizing the ROI on your HubSpot Marketing Hub investment. Committing to a new CRM is a pivotal milestone step in your business's story and you need an onboarding partner you can trust every step of the way.

At Lean Labs, we have extensive experience helping SaaS startups get up and running on HubSpot. We offer three unique HubSpot onboarding packages and have a proven track record of success executing on all of them.

Reach out to us today to discuss your HubSpot Marketing Hub needs and take the first step in your journey with HubSpot.