In this installment of our product analysis series, we spotlight HubSpot, a powerful all-in-one platform designed to help businesses grow through marketing, sales, customer service, and CRM tools. Whether you’re a startup building your first customer base or an established company streamlining operations, HubSpot offers a robust suite of features that scale with your business.
What is HubSpot?
HubSpot is a cloud-based customer platform built to centralize and simplify your marketing, sales, and service processes. Initially known for its marketing automation tools, HubSpot has evolved into a complete customer platform that includes CRM, email marketing, CMS, sales pipelines, live chat, reporting dashboards, and more.
Thanks to its user-friendly interface and modular approach, HubSpot’s CRM is used by businesses of all sizes, from solopreneurs to large enterprises. Its free CRM attracts many early-stage businesses, while its paid tiers offer enterprise-level capabilities that appeal to growing teams.
While HubSpot shines in ease of use and feature breadth, its pricing can increase quickly as you scale or need advanced features. Some users also find its CMS and automation tools less flexible than specialized alternatives.
Key Features
- CRM System – HubSpot’s core CRM is free and includes contact management, deal tracking, and reporting.
- Marketing Automation – Manage email campaigns, social media, SEO, and landing pages from one dashboard.
- Sales Tools – Track deals, automate outreach, and get real-time sales pipeline visibility.
- Customer Service – Includes ticketing, live chat, knowledge base, and customer feedback tools.
- CMS Hub – A website builder optimized for marketers with personalization and SEO tools.
- Analytics & Reporting – Custom dashboards and attribution tools provide insight into department performance.
- App Marketplace – Integrates with hundreds of third-party tools like Slack, Zoom, Shopify, and Salesforce.
Market Share and Users
HubSpot has firmly established itself as one of the leading customer platforms globally, especially popular among small to mid-sized businesses looking for scalable solutions across marketing, sales, and service. As of 2024, HubSpot serves over 184,000 customers in more than 120 countries, with a strong user base in industries like professional services, technology, education, and non-profits.
The platform gained traction early on by offering a free, robust CRM and gradually expanding into full marketing, sales, CMS, and customer service suites. This freemium-to-enterprise approach has helped HubSpot compete with larger players like Salesforce, which continues to dominate the enterprise CRM space. However, HubSpot’s all-in-one user-friendly interface gives it a competitive edge among businesses that want fewer integrations and faster setup.
In the marketing automation space, HubSpot is often mentioned alongside platforms like Mailchimp and ActiveCampaign, though its deep integration of CRM and marketing tools makes it unique. With a growing app marketplace and aggressive product development, HubSpot continues gaining share in the SMB and mid-market segments – especially among companies prioritizing ease of use, centralized data, and inbound marketing strategies.
Wins and Losses
Wins
- User-Friendly Interface – Clean design and intuitive tools make it easy for teams to get started.
- All-in-One Platform – Seamlessly connects marketing, sales, and support functions.
- Flexible CRM – HubSpot’s CRM is free and powerful enough for most small businesses.
- Rich Integrations – HubSpot’s app marketplace offers extensive third-party compatibility.
- Customer Support – Responsive and knowledgeable customer support, offering assistance through live chat, phone, email, and an extensive knowledge base.
Losses
- Pricing Tiers Can Add Up – Features scale quickly behind paid tiers; costs can rise as teams grow.
- Automation Limits at Lower Tiers – Full-featured automation and reporting require Professional or Enterprise plans.
- CMS Customization Gaps – While robust, HubSpot’s CMS isn’t as flexible as platforms like WordPress.
Alternatives to HubSpot
While HubSpot excels at bringing all customer-facing functions under one roof, other platforms may be better suited depending on your needs:
- Mailchimp – A great entry-level tool for email marketing, but lacks the all-in-one CRM depth of HubSpot.
- Salesforce – Offers more enterprise-level CRM functionality but with a steeper learning curve and cost.
- Zoho CRM – Affordable with strong CRM tools but lacks HubSpot’s seamless marketing integrations.
- ActiveCampaign – Powerful for marketing automation and email workflows but less developed in sales and service tools.
How HubSpot and Amalgam Work Together
HubSpot offers powerful marketing and customer management tools, but syncing data across platforms can become a challenge as businesses grow. That’s where Amalgam steps in, helping companies connect HubSpot to accounting platforms and other back-office systems to create a seamless flow from lead to ledger.
With Amalgam, users can access a comprehensive general-use report that exports all non-archived deals, including every standard and custom field, along with related data like deal owners and company contacts. This broad export is ideal for building pivot tables and summaries, giving teams quick insights by close date, salesperson, product segment, and more. By syncing sales data, centralizing reporting, and streamlining workflows, Amalgam empowers businesses to make smarter decisions with clean, real-time data—no more manual entry, no more silos.
What Amalgam Customers Say
Customer 1: “We use HubSpot to manage all our client outreach and sales tracking, but reconciling sales data with our books was time-consuming. Amalgam automated that process and made reporting a breeze.”
Customer 2: “Invoices. It’s all about the invoices. With Amalgam we’re able to get the invoicing data out of Hubspot and into Quickbooks.”
Amalgam’s Recommendation
We recommend HubSpot for businesses that want an integrated, user-friendly platform to manage marketing, sales, and support. It’s ideal for companies aiming to align customer data across departments and automate outreach without investing in a complex tech stack.
We Recommend Using HubSpot If:
- You want a CRM that’s powerful but easy to use.
- You need a marketing platform that integrates tightly with your sales process.
- You prefer an all-in-one system over cobbling together multiple tools.
- You’re looking to grow your business with scalable, automation-friendly software.
Conclusion
HubSpot is a standout platform for businesses looking to centralize their customer experience, from first touch to final invoice. While its pricing can rise with usage, its value in streamlining operations and boosting productivity makes it a strong contender for growth-minded businesses.
