HubSpot Sequences

HubSpot is a software platform empowering marketing and sales professionals to do more with less. One of their handy tools is the HubSpot Sequences creator. HubSpot Sequences are sales funnels that give you both automated email functionality and person-to-person contact integrations using the task reminder feature.

HubSpot Sequence Example

HubSpot Sequences are a way of introducing a lead to your company, providing value to them, building rapport, and giving them opportunities to engage with your company or initiate a business relationship. Here is a quick example sequence using emails and tasks to take a fresh lead from the moment they express interest to buying from your company.

Lead Input: Manual

Email 1: Welcome Email

Task 1: Reach Out on LinkedIn

Email 2: Blog Post or Video (Provide Value)

Task 2: Phone Call

Email 3: Follow-up Email with Testimonials (Social Proof)

Task 3: Change Lead Status

Email 4: Final Offer (If they didn’t already begin working with you, this is their last chance)

Email 5: Break-up Email

Task 4: Analyze Sequence

As you may have noticed, the emails are all outgoing to the prospect, giving them some information. The tasks, on the other hand, are for the sales rep. Each one is a task reminder of something the sales rep may need to do manually to move the process along further. For instance, a task may be reaching out to chat with the prospect on LinkedIn or another social platform or initiating a phone call with the prospect. If, at any point in the process, an action taken by the prospect would make their enrollment in the sequence irrelevant, you can make it so that they’ll automatically unenroll when this occurs.

How to Create a HubSpot Sequence Strategy

Understand Your Prospects

It’s crucial when building an automated email sequence that you understand the leads you’re speaking to. You need to know their pain points and desires to be able to tweak the email templates to create something that resonates with them. If you aren’t personalizing and segmenting your approach on Sequences, you’re missing out on one of the tool’s greatest strengths.

Involve Your Sales Reps

To make sure all of your top sales reps are entirely on board with the system, make sure they get some say in how it’s built. They know what has worked in the past to acquire customers, so chances are they know a lot about the customers of your company. If the sales reps have input on the email sequence system, they’re more likely to utilize it in their approach, and it’s more likely to benefit the sales process.

Personalize the Sequence

HubSpot Sequences gives you the opportunity to edit the email template for each individual prospect you enroll. This can allow you to speak directly to their most significant pain points. If your salespeople take good notes when talking to prospects, you may even have some specific things to mention about that individual or company specifically, which shows them that your company is listening to their problems and genuinely wants to help.

Track Your Sequences and Optimize

Along with the ability to personalize your HubSpot Sequences comes the ability to segment your campaigns by creating multiple variations of your sequences. You can bring a handful of leads through each one and begin using HubSpot’s analytics tools to determine what’s working and what’s not. This can help you to optimize your sequences by using the copy and content that speak to your prospects’ interests and problems the most.

What Should You Include in a Sales Sequence?

The main things you can include in your sequences are task reminders and emails. The emails are built from an email template, which can be tweaked for each individual lead or segments of leads as necessary. The task reminders let a member of the sales team know what they need to do manually next, such as make a phone call to a prospect or change their status in the system.

To build rapport properly, you’ll want to provide value in some of the emails. HubSpot allows you to edit the email template for each prospect which can help you target specific problems or pain points they’ve expressed to you.

Some great things to include in your emails:

• Case studies
• Videos on relevant topics
• Blogs on relevant topics
• Personalized surveys
• Testimonials

You’ll also want to create tasks that help you to connect with the prospects and bring them further along the buyer’s journey. You don’t want to create tasks just for the sake of busy work; make sure they’re all action steps that guide the lead through the sequence effectively.

HubSpot Sequences vs. HubSpot Workflows

HubSpot Sequences is a tool for creating sales sequences or series of sales emails to leads. HubSpot Workflows also allows you to create automated email sequences, but it is better for marketing purposes and lacks some of the personalization aspects of HubSpot Sequences.

A HubSpot sales sequence always begins with manual lead input. For this reason, it’s best for use by a sales team or somebody from your company working one-on-one with leads. In HubSpot Sequences, you can fill out email templates and create task reminders for the salesperson. Each email task reminder is a message that is sent internally to a sales rep from the company containing task details to remind them to perform another step in the sales process. The task could be something like manually reaching out to a lead by phone and may contain specific notes about the lead written by another member of the sales team to personalize the sales approach further. Unlike HubSpot Workflows, the sequence emails in HubSpot Sequences are built for each recipient from an email template. This gives a greater level of customization and makes HubSpot’s sequences tool a better fit for a sales team or salesperson.

Workflows, on the other hand, can include trigger criteria, which can enroll contacts automatically. For example, suppose leads fill out a contact form submission on your website to get in touch with you. In this case, they could be automatically enrolled in the workflow and receive marketing emails. Workflows are also capable of handling a much larger flow of leads and automatically nurturing them with additional content and offers. Unlike sequences, workflows support HTML-rich email templates, which can include stylization and images. These capabilities make workflows great for marketing email lists, with many recipients and image-rich content.

5 Best Practices for Managing HubSpot Sequences

Build Sequences to Nurture Leads in Each Stage of Buyer’s Journey

To quickly and effectively nurture your leads and turn them into customers, you need to use the email marketing tools at your disposal to target them based on their place in the buyer’s journey. For example, a buyer who has just become aware of the product or service you offer may respond best to a ‘welcome sequence,’ while someone in a later stage of the buyer’s journey may be asking more detailed questions and will be more open to offers and demos. It’s up to you to ensure you’re not rushing your prospects to buy from you but instead creating educated and informed buyers.

Utilize Tasks to Speak One-on-one

Especially for high-ticket products and B2B interactions, you don’t want your entire sales process to be carried out over email automatically! Prospects want to hear from your team! A great way to do this is to create task reminders to reach out personally. This can be through messaging functions on social media apps like LinkedIn or phone calls. This isn’t the only thing you can do with a task reminder; you can also remind your salespeople to change lead status in the system, analyze the contact record or other data provided by HubSpot, or even make changes to an email template.

Personalize Templates to Resonate

Utilize every bit of data given to you either directly by your prospects or by HubSpot. The information they tell you can help you personalize the approach you take with them and make them feel heard.

• Use their company or individual name
• Mention their business goals
• Recommend products/services that meet those goals
• Recommend content like videos and articles based on what they’ve told you

Analyze Sequence Enrollment and Engagement

You could do everything else mentioned above completely the wrong way the first few times, and with this one tip, make it into a working sequence. Analyze the data HubSpot collects while prospects are going through the sequence and make changes accordingly. This can also be done more effectively and quickly by splintering your approach into several variants and analyzing those to choose the more effective variants first. However, it’s often apparent when a piece of the sequence isn’t pulling its weight. Is everyone dropping off before the first phone call? Look at the content provided before that. Are they scared off right after being given an offer? Perhaps rethink the offer. Utilizing sequences to augment sales success is an iterative process, and trial and error go a long way in ensuring long-term success.

Don’t Inundate Prospects with too Much Information

Be sure to use email sequences strategically. Don’t overwhelm your leads with daily emails. In this case, less is usually more. Try to create a sequence that is spaced out over the course of a couple of weeks and includes at most 4 or 5 emails. Some sales professionals recommend as few as three. In any case, be strategic in your approach. This includes follow-up sequences, be sure that each follow up email has a distinct purpose and that the entire follow-up sequence is spaced out enough after the initial welcome sequence.