HubSpot was a leading innovator when it introduced HubSpot University in 2009. Providing free training in inbound marketing more than tripled the company's customer base. In fact, free content has been the primary way this company markets itself. So it shouldn't be any surprise that HubSpot announced the release of HubSpot Marketing Free at #Inbound16, HubSpot's annual Inbound event.

What is HubSpot Marketing Free?

You might call this the starter package. It includes working versions of Hubspot's full growth stack.

  • HubSpot Marketing
  • HubSpot Sales
  • HubSpot CRM

That's a great starting place for small businesses to learn how to grow "their revenue, streamline operations, and create a delightful user experience."

Offering a free iteration of its already proven Marketing, Sales and CRM products is the beginning of new and improved product offerings from HubSpot. In 2017, the full growth stack HubSpot platform offers more tools than ever before. Using HubSpot CRM means you have a tool that makes customer relationship management as effortless as possible while fully integrate marketing and sales efforts in interface.

New Tools for Driving Business Growth

AMP Optimized: Accelerated Mobile Pages (AMP) is the direction Google is moving, and HubSpot is keeping pace. Every page published in the HubSpot COS (content optimization system) will be AMP optimized for Google's Mobile First algorithm.

Unified HubSpot Mobile App: This is another proof HubSpot's on top of the trends. When your business is on the road, you're using mobile devices. Integration replaces three HubSpot mobile apps with one. Now the team has Marketing, Sales and CRM function in one place. For businesses where much of the game is played in the field, this is a powerful enhancement.

Collect: This Chrome extension is a researcher's best friend. It gives you a place to save material your audience is interested in. Articles, images, quotes all go into a folder you can organize with tags. Sync the browser across multiple devices, including smartphones and tablets. The whole team can access and share each other's ideas. Collect also makes turning anything in "Collect" into content with a single click.

Composer: This new interface offers more than a distraction-free writing tool. It's designed to enable writing content with a collaborative environment. For example, one person may find an article that sparks an idea for content. The next person may start a draft based upon that idea. Others may join in to add ideas for how to visualize the concept, and a graphic artist contributes assets. Enlisting multiple perspectives empowers a team to meet the goals of great content, because ultimately, content should deliver a better user experience. Thus HubSpot designed an environment where key questions become a team's focus.

  • Is this content customer-engaging?
  • Does the piece deliver on the promise summed up in the title?
  • Could (or should) the content be expanded into more resources?
  • Does the content offer something not available anywhere else?
  • Is the message clear and easy to understand?
  • Is there (or should there be) a storyline that runs through the content?

Facebook Ads: Coming soon to the HubSpot Ads Add-On, this new feature will enable Facebook management directly within HubSpot. That's a real time saver!

HubSpot Growth Stack

Projects: Designed to be a learning and productivity tool in one, Projects offers pre-populated templates to guide teams through the many inbound marketing tactics available, developing strategies and executing them along the path to success.

Meetings: With this new tool, setting up appointments with prospects and customers becomes interactive. After the first share of a sales rep's calendar through an email link, the guesswork of finding a common meeting time disappears. This function can also be embedded on a company's website.

Messages: This component of Hubspot Sales enables real-time chat on company websites. All you need on your side is someone with good customer service and a thorough, customer-centric knowledge of your product or service. Good typing skills are also a plus, though voice recognition and editing skills broaden your options.

Improvements to Existing Tools

Visual Workflows, a new visual editing interface, is easier to learn. It's designed to simplify marketing and nurturing business growth.

Integration with LinkedIn Sales Navigator is getting a makeover, making it a better tool for sales reps as they seek to better understand and engage with prospects so their activities are on target.

HubSpot CRM is also getting some new features. Expanded permissions, company merging and parent-child relationships are just some of the areas in which HubSpot has improved their customer relationship management tool. Everything is focused on making "it even easier for more advanced sales teams to track and connect with their contacts."

Summary

In 2006, HubSpot began with a marketing concept and developed tools to execute that marketing model. Both concept and tools have proven themselves consistently over the past 10 years. However, that success hasn't been accidental. It's the commitment to predicting, and then adapting to change which has ensured HubSpot continues driving businesses toward success. This is one of the main reasons HubSpot is both a tool and a partner with PatraCompany.

With "free" as a place to start, what's preventing you from exploring what HubSpot, and content marketing, could do for your business?

Getting Started With Content Marketing