Your business has been chugging along quite nicely for a number of years, but for some reason this year you’ve noticed a drop off in your customer base. Or maybe your base has held steady, but hasn’t grown. You’ve typically relied on word-of-mouth referrals from existing clients, but you start to wonder whether or not it’s time to really start investing in your marketing efforts. You do some research, stumble upon HubSpot, and fall in love with everything that you can do—both on the Marketing side of the software, but also the Sales side and the CRM.
You’ve never felt this way about a marketing product before. You’ve got butterflies in your stomach thinking about all of the potential. This is going to be the product that helps you bring your business to the next level.
Is Your HubSpot Portal Getting A Bit Dusty?
Wondering if you could be getting more value from your HubSpot investment? Find out with a free assessment from one of our experts.
You’re about to pull the trigger and buy a HubSpot subscription.
But wait, what’s this? The butterflies start to get aggressive in your gut, and you’re having second thoughts. You start to doubt that you have the skills to handle such a powerful tool on your own. You wonder if you’re going to be able to get all of the value out of HubSpot, or if you’re going to be throwing money out the window by signing that user agreement. Is this going to bring you to the next level or set you back?
The question you’re struggling to answer is: Should I be working with a HubSpot Partner Agency?
Benefits of Working with a HubSpot Partner Agency
There’s no doubt that HubSpot is a powerful tool, and as such it can command a healthy fee from its users: Typically between $50 and $2,400 a month, depending on a number of factors. Depending on the size of your business, that’s not chump change. But you know the value that HubSpot as a suite of tools brings to the table, and you can justify the expense.
Can you make the same case for why you should be working with a HubSpot partner agency? It’s definitely easy to go with your gut reaction and say “no”—working with an agency is only going to be a drain on your budget, and isn’t going to do anything for you that you couldn’t do for yourself. Right?
Wrong.
There are a number of reasons that working with a HubSpot partner agency would make sense for your business. Yes, it’ll cost you money. But the added value that a partner agency brings to the table will ultimately save you time, frustration, and yes, money, compared to going it alone.
1. Working with a HubSpot Partner Agency waives your $3,000 HubSpot on-boarding fee.
One of the most costly aspects of deciding to start using HubSpot is the mandatory $3,000 fee that they charge to onboard all new customers.
What does onboarding include? By signing on, new HubSpot customers get:
- An implementation specialist who will help with all of the technical setup of HubSpot and 90 days of support
- Advice and guidance to help you integrate your current CRM and other systems with HubSpot
- Guidance on developing and managing your first inbound campaign
- Access to HubSpot Support, training programs, and the customer success team
While all of that is certainly valuable, $3,000 is a lot of money to pay to implement a product, especially on top of what you are already paying.
By working with a HubSpot partner agency to purchase and implement your subscription, you will be able to avoid paying the onboarding fee while still getting all of the value that would typically come with it. The technical assistance setting up your software, profiles, and integrating your other systems will mean that you can spend less time fiddling around with code and more time putting the power of HubSpot to use attracting leads and closing sales.
And while the HubSpot integration team is great at what they do, the simple truth is that every day they are handling multiple implementations, stretching their attention and resources. A partner on the other hand, will be much better equipped to devote their whole attention to getting your system up and running.
2. You gain access to the agency’s knowledge and expertise, and potentially other tools in their arsenal.
Generally speaking, if you are working with a marketing agency, that agency wants you to be successful. The more successful that you are, the more you will value the agency, and the more likely you are to continue doing business with them. Ensuring your success is just good business on the part of an agency.
So by working with an agency, you are paying for their help with HubSpot, but you will also indirectly gain access to their knowledge and expertise, which will come in handy when you are building a campaign or developing an inbound marketing strategy.
Plus, most agencies use a number of tools to inform their efforts, including things like Moz, BuzzSumo, and SEMRush—which can cost thousands of dollars and take quite a while to learn to use. By working with an agency, in addition to HubSpot support you will gain access to these tools without having to invest your own time and money.
3. Agencies have a direct line to internal HubSpot resources.
Don’t you hate it when you are having trouble with a website or a service and you need to call support, only to be stuck on hold for 20 minutes before someone is able to help you? Or when you have a question,, but you don’t know who you should talk to to find the answer?
Unfortunately, you can run into those same issues working with HubSpot as you would with any other software.
HubSpot partner agencies, though, have a direct line to internal HubSpot resources. This means that if you are having problems with HubSpot, they can facilitate faster resolution, saving you a lot of headaches and slammed down phones.
Partner agencies also have access to partner training programs and other collateral and materials that help to make them pros at using the HubSpot platform, which means that in many cases they can even help you solve your issue directly without having to get HubSpot Support involved at all.
Need one more cool benefit to working with a HubSpot partner agency? As partners, they often have early access to new HubSpot products and features in Beta, giving them time to familiarize themselves with the functionality before it becomes available to the general public.
This means that by the time you have access to the tools, your agency is already a pro and can help you get the most out of the new features. It also means that if you are purchasing a new product or service and the agency you are working with knows that an update from HubSpot is coming that will answer your need, they can advise you to wait—potentially saving you a lot of money.
The Bottom Line
HubSpot is a powerful tool, and one that most businesses can benefit from using. But it can be a challenge to get up and running on your own. Working with a HubSpot partner agency allows you to get the most out of your HubSpot account right from the beginning, saving you time, money, and headaches by helping you focus all of your efforts on bringing in new leads and converting them to customers.
