HubSpot Workflows - 12 Tips for Effective Marketing Automation

1. What are HubSpot workflows and what advantages do they offer?
2. Step-by-step to your own Hubspot Workflow
3. Tips for optimizing existing HubSpot workflows
4. Many tools, many possibilities! Marketing Automation Tools in Comparison
5. Efficient work thanks to HubSpot workflow automation? Yes, please!

In everyday marketing, regular operation and exceptions go hand in hand: Recurring tasks paired with endless ifs and buts and changing responsibilities pose a real challenge when it comes to establishing effective marketing workflows.

The workflow tool from HubSpot Marketing Hub provides a real relief here: It allows teams to both create simple and complex workflows and have them executed automatically.

In this article, our guest author Michael Kröner explains the possibilities HubSpot automation workflows offer and how best to set up your own workflows.

What are HubSpot workflows and what advantages do they offer?

HubSpot is one of the most popular marketing automation platforms worldwide and is used by companies of all industries and sizes to make tasks in marketing and sales more effective. The focus is on automating the initiation and execution of tasks or workflows, saving time and costs. As an all-round software HubSpot can optimize pretty much any area: E-Mail-Marketing, Customer Relationship Management, sales automation and much more.

With well thought-out use - and ideally in combination with other Best Practices for Marketing Automation, HubSpot workflows bring some advantages.

A major factor is time: By automating recurring tasks can be done, Marketing & Sales Teams can spend their time and energy on other important projects. In addition, the error rate decreases, as certain data, information & Co. do not have to be entered manually again and again, but are recorded once and centrally. Regarding internal workflows, automations help to create clear responsibilities and deadlines and to comply with them. Last but not least, formal and substantive automations bring reliable uniformity to every form of marketing communication, ensuring consistent quality and establishing a clear, recognisable brand.

Step-by-step to your own Hubspot Workflow

#1 Clear Target Setting

Define specific goals that you want to achieve with your workflows. Whether it's about lead nurturing, e-mail marketing or internal processes: Clarifying and recording your goals helps you make work processes more effective.

#2 Sensible types of automation

Based on your respective goals for your automations, you should also define their “type”. For example, it may make sense in the area of lead management to use deal or pipeline automations exclusively, while workflows should be defined for cross-departmental tasks.

#3 Consistent naming

Over time you will create and activate more and more workflows. To keep an overview and modify quickly and easily, you should name the workflows and corresponding folders sensibly and consistently.

#4 Clear authority

Think about who can create and activate workflows. This way there are fixed contacts in case of questions and problems and work is done uniformly and clearly. It is also worth introducing a 4-eyes review before each go live.

#5 Simple structures

Try to set up your workflows as simple as possible and avoid complicated If / Then branches. It is often better to split extensive and complicated workflows into several, rather than to get a large and complicated workflow running error-free.

#6 Early visualization

If you do want to work with more complex workflows, it is worth visualizing them before implementing them. Whiteboard-Tools such as Miro is suitable for this. By simulating the workflow and visualising it, you can identify potential problems early on, get feedback and build it faster and error-free in the HubSpot workflow tool later.

#7 Rules for exceptions

Depending on the workflow, it may be necessary to define so-called unenrollment triggers or suppression lists. These are defined actions, statuses or persons who are exempt from a workflow. For example, leads whose score falls below a certain threshold are automatically removed from a particular workflow.

#8 Practical copy paste

To save time when setting up a new automation, HubSpot recently introduced the feature to copy actions between identical workflows (for example from contact-to-contact or from deal-to-deal automation). To do this, open two tabs within one browser, copy the desired action, and then click on the menu of the action card that is closest to the target.

#9 Multiple test functions

To test before the go-live whether your workflows work as desired, HubSpot offers two test functions. You can either use the “test criteria” function to find out which criteria a specific data set meets, or simulate using HubSpot’s test function whether the respective workflow works without errors. Another testing option is to create a list with test contacts, which can be used to check the enrollment triggers of your workflow.

#10 "Property is known" for re-enrollment

Within a HubSpot workflow, you have the ability to run a contact through an automation not just once, but multiple times (“Re-Enrollment”). Use the “property is known” condition for this, as the condition for triggering the automation is always met as soon as a value is contained in the property or it is updated.

#11 Functional delays

When contacts or deals are active in multiple workflows, it can happen that the respective enrollment triggers interfere with each other. To avoid this, you should work with delays. These are defined delays that define when the next action is executed. You have the option to set fixed dates, times, weekdays, periods or events to restart the workflow.

#12 Branches with “Value equals branch”

Based on certain conditions, objects within a workflow can pass through different follow-up actions. To save time, multiple branches can be automatically configured using the “value equals branch” function. These are based on the selected property and the values available in it.

Tips for optimizing existing HubSpot workflows

As with all process management activities, existing HubSpot workflows should be regularly reviewed for their validity and functionality. With each product launch, campaign and every new lead, there are opportunities to adapt and improve existing automations. Here too, there are some good tricks to help you get the best out of each HubSpot workflow:

#1 Relevance check

To keep order in your list of active workflows, you should regularly check their relevance. Especially when only a few people are involved in an automation, this indicates that it is of low benefit and can be removed for the sake of clarity.

#2 Track performance

On the detail pages of your workflows, you get insight into their history and performance. Thanks to the insights, you can see which workflows have run entirely or how often they were "stopped" due to exception rules.

If workflows are interrupted too often and exceptions become the rule, their efficiency and meaningfulness should be questioned.

#3 Filling gaps

At the beginning of each HubSpot workflow there is a clear target definition. Reaching the target in lead-based workflows not only means the end of the target, but also a campaign stop for the respective lead. So that this one does not "go underground" and can continue to be played with relevant content, the endpoints of your workflows should represent the beginning of new automations at the same time.

Many tools, many possibilities! Marketing Automation Tools in Comparison

Of course, besides HubSpot there are numerous other tools with which you can automate your workflows. To find the suitable software among the multitude of providers, you should define exactly what goal you want to achieve with the automations in advance, for example better teamwork, efficient e-mail marketing, central data collection and segmentation. Based on your project, you can now select suitable tools and compare them in terms of their scope of services and cost points. You can find an overview of the most popular software as well as their functions, prices and reviews in the Marketing Automation Tools at OMR Reviews.

Brevo (ehemals Sendinblue)

Mailingwork

Mailchimp

Klaviyo

Smartsheet

n8n

Zapier

IFTTT

Microsoft Power Automate

And of course:

HubSpot Marketing Hub

Efficient work thanks to HubSpot workflow automation? Yes, please!

Regardless of the size and industry of your company, it may be worthwhile to improve your workflows through HubSpot automations. Both internal and external tasks can be done or initiated, avoiding mistakes and increasing efficiency. Of course, automated everyday marketing requires some planning and preparation: goals must be defined, workflows created and teams briefed.

Nevertheless, the effort is worth it: it doesn't take long until a completely new flow develops for you and your team, and your everyday life becomes more productive and efficient.