HubSpot Rolls Out New Features in Sales and Service Hub

Even the crėme de la crème sales team will agree that sales support material is important to move clients further in the buying process. But what is more important is finding the right sales and service enablement content at the right time. 

And that is what HubSpot’s latest features do. Hubspot recently launched three high-value features—Playbooks, Call Transcription & Coaching, and Inbound Calling—to strengthen the value of its Sales & Service Hub Professional.

We will dive deep into each of the features one by one, beginning with Playbooks. So, let’s see what it means for users and how they can leverage it to their best advantage. 

What are Playbooks?

Playbooks are strategic tools used in business to define and document important processes, methodologies, and best practices. They serve as comprehensive guides that facilitate the standardization and streamlining of operations. With well-crafted playbooks, organizations can establish consistent protocols and empower teams to achieve optimum results.

Overview of HubSpot Playbooks

HubSpot, a leading CRM and sales enablement platform, provides a powerful tool called HubSpot Playbooks that revolutionizes sales processes. It equips sales teams with the necessary resources to drive growth, increase efficiency, and deliver exceptional customer experiences.

Benefits of HubSpot Playbooks

Implementing HubSpot Playbooks offers a plethora of benefits to businesses:

1. Increased Efficiency and Productivity: By providing clear guidelines and automating repetitive tasks, teams can save time, eliminate guesswork, and focus on high-value activities.
2. Consistent and Effective Communication: HubSpot Playbooks ensure that every interaction with prospects and customers is aligned with the organization's messaging, delivering a unified and powerful brand experience.
3. Improved Sales Performance and Conversion Rates: With HubSpot Playbooks, sales reps have access to proven strategies and tactics, leading to improved engagement, better closing rates, and higher revenue generation.

Here’s What Playbooks Means for Professional Tier Users

Hubspot's Playbooks simplifies the process of searching and sharing content and helps create a robust sales enablement strategy. And it is now available for Professional SKU users too. 

Playbook is a simple sales management platform that allows you to create scripts, guides, battle cards, and other resources for sales reps. Also, it lets you customize the content in the format of your choice. For instance, you can create: 

• Product and services specifications 
• List of questions that your team needs to ask during a discovery call
• Guidelines on pricing and discounts 
• Competitor analysis report, including SWOT and battle cards
• Negotiating tactics
• Customer support-related information 
• How-to-handle-common-objections document

Once you have these resources ready, you can save them within your HubSpot account and store all customer-centric questions and answers within the contact file or the client's deal record.

How Playbooks Will Benefit You

Say Goodbye to Hunting Content

If you are a Professional tier user, you can use Playbooks to create a repository of sales-related resources and practices to share with your team. It removes the hassle of searching for content on your desktop. 

Log into your HubSpot CRM, and find all the relevant information needed to close deals in just a few clicks. Whether product brochures or pricing guidelines, Playbooks makes the entire sales process more efficient by storing all the content and making it more accessible. 

Have a Steep Learning Curve for New Team Members

On average, large enterprises spend almost $1,000,000 annually on sales training. And that still does not guarantee short ramp-up periods for new hires. This is because, sometimes, the product knowledge required to close deals is acquired on the job. 

The Playbooks platform allows you to equip your new team members with the resources needed to start selling like your top performers. New hires can immediately access coaching, mentorship, and other insights to be their best at the job.

Track Reports and Make Informed Decisions

Measure the performance of your resources with an in-built dashboard that shows which type of collaterals are used the most. Such data allows you to decide better which types of new resources you need to create to further support your team. 

Here is what to expect from the new feature:

• Create 5 Playbooks per portal.
• Have quick access to Playbooks and search or share collateral within the HubSpot CRM.
• Add notes to the Playbooks based on the customer conversation.

The Playbooks platform in the Enterprise SKU remains the same, with the following features:

• Create 5,000 Playbooks per portal 
• Surface Playbooks in CRM 
• Embed notes fields in Playbooks 
• Embed properties to capture Q&A and add property data

HubSpot CRM Playbooks

HubSpot CRM is a powerful tool that can revolutionize the way your business manages customer relationships. Playbooks, one of the remarkable features of HubSpot CRM, take this management to the next level.

A. Understanding HubSpot CRM

HubSpot CRM is designed to help businesses organize, track, and nurture their customer relationships. It provides an all-in-one solution for managing contacts, deals, tasks, and more. With its intuitive interface and robust functionality, it simplifies the sales process and allows for effective communication with prospects and customers.

By utilizing HubSpot CRM, your team can access a wealth of information about each contact, ensuring a personalized and efficient approach to customer interactions. From contact details to their interaction history, HubSpot CRM provides valuable insights to help you build strong and lasting relationships.

B. Overview of HubSpot CRM Playbooks

HubSpot CRM Playbooks take the power of CRM to a whole new level. They integrate seamlessly with the CRM, enabling teams to automate and optimize their sales and customer service processes. Playbooks provide a structured framework that guides sales representatives and customer service agents through each stage of the customer journey.

Key features of HubSpot CRM Playbooks include:

• Playbook templates: Pre-built templates that can be customized to fit your specific sales or customer service process.
• Task automation: Playbooks automatically create and assign tasks based on predefined rules, ensuring each team member knows what to do at every step.
• Guidance and suggestions: Playbooks offer guidance and suggestions to help sales reps and customer service agents navigate conversations effectively and close deals more efficiently.
• Real-time tracking: Playbooks provide real-time tracking of interactions and outcomes, allowing teams to measure their performance and make data-driven decisions.

By leveraging HubSpot CRM Playbooks, your team can streamline their workflows, maintain consistency in their processes, and ultimately, drive better results in sales and customer service.

Sales Playbooks in HubSpot

A. Definition and Purpose of Sales Playbooks

Sales playbooks in HubSpot are comprehensive guides that drive successful sales processes by providing sales teams with the tools, resources, and strategies they need to effectively engage and convert leads into customers. These playbooks outline the goals and objectives of the sales process, enabling teams to align their efforts for maximum efficiency and effectiveness.

• Explain how sales playbooks drive successful sales processes: Sales playbooks provide a cohesive framework for sales teams to follow, ensuring consistent messaging and actions throughout the entire sales cycle. By guiding sales reps through each step of the process, playbooks streamline workflows, improve productivity, and ultimately increase sales revenue.
• Outline the goals and objectives of sales playbooks: The main goal of sales playbooks is to empower sales teams to close deals effectively and efficiently. They provide reps with the necessary information, scripts, templates, and strategies to engage prospects, address their pain points, and overcome objections. The objectives include shortening the sales cycle, improving conversion rates, and nurturing customer relationships.

B. Creating Effective Sales Playbooks in HubSpot

1. Identifying Target Audiences

• Discuss the importance of understanding and segmenting target audiences: Identifying and understanding the needs, preferences, and pain points of target audiences is critical for creating effective sales playbooks. By segmenting audiences based on demographic, psychographic, and behavioral characteristics, sales teams can tailor their messaging and strategies to resonate with each specific group.
• How to tailor sales playbooks for specific customer personas: Once target audiences are identified and segmented, sales playbooks can be customized to address the unique challenges and motivations of different customer personas. This includes adapting language, offering relevant solutions, and addressing objections specific to each persona.

2. Mapping the Buyer's Journey

• Importance of aligning playbooks with different stages of the buyer's journey: The buyer's journey consists of awareness, consideration, and decision stages. Sales playbooks must align with each stage to ensure a seamless and personalized experience for prospects. By addressing specific needs and concerns at each stage, playbooks guide prospects through the sales funnel effectively.
• How to create content for each stage to guide prospects through the sales funnel: Sales playbooks should include content tailored to each stage of the buyer's journey. This includes informative blog posts, case studies, product demos, and testimonials to educate, build trust, and influence prospects at every stage.

3. Content Creation and Optimization

• Strategies for developing engaging and valuable content within playbooks: Sales playbooks should prioritize high-quality content that captures the attention of prospects and provides them with valuable insights. This can be achieved through storytelling, highlighting customer success stories, and showcasing unique selling points.
• Utilizing HubSpot features to optimize content for maximum impact: HubSpot offers various features, such as personalization tokens and lead intelligence, that can be leveraged to optimize the content within playbooks. By tailoring content based on prospect data and behaviors, sales teams can deliver highly targeted messages that resonate with potential buyers.

4. Sales Enablement Integration

• How playbooks integrate with sales enablement tools in HubSpot: HubSpot's sales enablement tools, such as email templates, call scripts, and meeting scheduling, can be seamlessly integrated with sales playbooks. This integration enhances the sales team's efficiency and effectiveness by automating repetitive tasks and providing them with the resources they need to engage prospects at every touchpoint.
• Enhancing sales team efficiency and effectiveness through integration: By integrating sales playbooks with sales enablement tools, reps can easily access and utilize the most up-to-date resources and strategies. This streamlines their workflows, reduces manual effort, and enables them to focus on building relationships and closing deals.

Customer Service Playbooks in HubSpot

Customer service playbooks play a crucial role in delivering exceptional service to customers. They provide a framework for consistent and personalized customer experiences, ensuring that every interaction meets or exceeds customer expectations.

A. Significance of Customer Service Playbooks

Customer service playbooks are essential in demonstrating the role of customer service in delivering exceptional service. They provide guidelines and best practices for customer interactions, ensuring that each customer receives consistent and personalized experiences. With playbooks, businesses can establish clear expectations for their customer service team, resulting in improved satisfaction and loyalty.

Consistency is key in customer service, and playbooks help to ensure that every customer receives the same level of service regardless of the representative they interact with. By defining standards and guidelines, playbooks serve as a reference point for customer service professionals, enabling them to provide consistent service every time.

B. Key Components of Customer Service Playbooks

1. Defining Customer Service Standards

A crucial component of customer service playbooks is establishing clear guidelines and expectations for customer interactions. This includes defining the tone of communication, response times, and resolution processes. By setting these standards, businesses can ensure that their customer service team delivers a consistent and high-quality level of service.

Consistency is especially important when multiple customer service representatives handle customer inquiries. Playbooks help to align team members by providing clear guidelines, ensuring that the service provided is both unified and in line with the company's overall brand image.

2. Handling Different Customer Service Scenarios

Customer service playbooks should provide guidance on handling common customer issues and inquiries. By including step-by-step instructions and best practices, businesses can ensure that their customer service team is equipped to handle various scenarios effectively. This helps to streamline customer interactions and reduce response times.

Additionally, playbooks can address escalated customer complaints. By including predefined solutions and effective communication strategies, businesses can empower their customer service team to handle challenging situations and turn them into positive customer experiences.

3. Cross-Department Collaboration with Sales and Support

Effective collaboration between sales, support, and customer service teams is vital for delivering exceptional service. Customer service playbooks in HubSpot facilitate seamless coordination and information sharing between these departments.

By having playbooks that integrate sales and support processes, businesses can ensure that customer inquiries and issues are handled efficiently. This collaboration enables the customer service team to access relevant information from other departments, leading to faster resolution times and enhanced customer satisfaction.

Best Practices for Creating Playbooks in HubSpot

A. Clear and Actionable Information

When it comes to creating playbooks in HubSpot, one of the best practices is to ensure that the information provided is clear, concise, and easily understandable. Playbooks should contain actionable steps that can be followed by the sales, deal management, service, and customer interaction teams.

By keeping playbooks concise, teams will have no trouble understanding and implementing the guidance provided. Clear instructions and actionable steps enable sales representatives and customer service agents to engage effectively with prospects and customers, resulting in improved outcomes.

B. Optimizing Playbooks for Prospect Calls

To effectively guide prospect calls using HubSpot playbooks, it is important to follow some key tips. First and foremost, playbooks should highlight relevant features and integrations available within HubSpot. This ensures that sales representatives have all the necessary tools to successfully engage with prospects and provide them with the information they need.

Additionally, optimizing playbooks for prospect calls involves providing well-structured guidance on how to handle different scenarios. This includes addressing common questions, objections, and concerns. By equipping sales representatives with comprehensive playbooks, they can confidently navigate prospect calls and convert leads into customers.

C. Leveraging HubSpot Features in Playbooks

1. Personalization and Automation

When creating playbooks in HubSpot, it is crucial to exploit the personalization and automation tools available. Personalization allows for tailoring the content within playbooks to the specific needs and preferences of prospects and customers. Automation, on the other hand, streamlines processes and ensures that the right message reaches the right person at the right time.

By leveraging personalization and automation features within HubSpot playbooks, businesses can enhance customer experiences and responses. Personalized messages resonate better with prospects and customers, leading to increased engagement and conversions. Additionally, automation eliminates manual errors and saves time, freeing up resources to focus on strategic activities.

2. Tracking and Analytics

Another crucial aspect of creating playbooks in HubSpot is leveraging the platform's tracking and analytics capabilities. By utilizing these features, businesses can measure the effectiveness of their playbooks and make data-driven decisions to improve them over time.

Tracking and analytics provide valuable insights into how prospects and customers are interacting with the playbooks. This includes information on which sections are most frequently used, where users may be dropping off, and where improvements can be made. By regularly analyzing this data, businesses can refine and optimize their playbooks, ensuring continuous improvement and better outcomes.

HubSpot plans to release new features in the Enterprise SKU in 2022 to support upmarket customers. So, that is for later. 

For now, the company has launched two more features along with Playbooks:

1. Call Transcription and Coaching 
2. Inbound Calling

Conclusion

Customer service playbooks in HubSpot are an indispensable tool for delivering exceptional service. They provide guidelines, best practices, and a framework for consistent and personalized customer experiences. By leveraging playbooks, businesses can enhance customer satisfaction, improve efficiency, and drive long-term loyalty.

Our next blog will focus on the second feature, that is, Call Transcription and Coaching release, where we will explain how you can leverage it for your business to close more deals. Follow our blog section to be the first to know about it and keep up-to-date. 

If you have any follow-up questions about Playbooks or need help to get started with it, write to us today at info@growthnatives.com and our experts will get in touch with you.