What Will Your 2023 Tech Stack Look Like
The new year is an exciting time for many sales and marketing executives; new directions, goals, and quotas drive the need to generate new revenues and enter new markets. Unfortunately, a looming global recession will strain organizational budgets and make it difficult for revenue leaders to meet new ambitious goals. Sales and marketing technology will continue to play a significant role in helping companies work smarter while focusing on personalization and customized sales experiences.
HubSpot users will not only benefit from an all-in-one sales/marketing/service solution for customer-facing functions, but they will also be able to expand their technology by using thousands of apps that integrate with the CRM platform.
We researched and talked to industry experts to look at emerging martech and sales tech trends for 2023. At InboundAV, we surveyed our HubSpot consulting team and they shared that Microsoft Teams, Calendly, Salesforce.com, and PandaDoc were popular HubSpot integrations.
Marketing Apps
Marketing professionals continue to look for new ways to use technology that provides personalized experiences through video, automation, and segmentation.
Video Marketing
“Because it can hold a viewer’s interest for longer than static postings, video-first content is becoming an increasingly important priority area in social media marketing.” (Techfunnel Author)
With so many different social media and content channels, video is becoming increasingly popular for driving organic and paid social engagement. Marketers are looking for ways to create brand loyalty and communities by creating relevant and exciting content. Video provides the ability to show the personal side of companies without spending an excess of funds. Tools like Loom, Vidyard, and Videolicious allow marketers to create quick and easy software demos and email them directly to their prospects.
Social media video streaming is moving into the business world. TikTok, Facebook/Instagram Reels, and LinkedIn videos are all emerging channels for sharing short, personalized experiences with customers. The casual format makes creating video libraries for content marketing campaigns quick and easy.
YouTube, Wistia, Vimeo, and Brightcove are all popular platforms for hosting and serving videos. If you want to keep a tight-brand connection with your audience, it is easy to upload and share videos using the HubSpot Documents feature.
Gifting Platforms
For many years, lunch and learn was a popular tactic for connecting with prospects. Thanks to the emergence of gifting platforms like Sendoso, ReachDesk, and Alyce, you can send lunch to your prospects without leaving your home office. These platforms provide the ability to send gifts directly from HubSpot. Marketers create swag boxes with branded products like ball caps and coffee mugs, with sales teams able to send the gifts via email.
Email Tools
Email sending relies on clean data and the best way to ensure high-deliverability rates is to run your list through email validation tools. If your list is small and active, that process is easy to manage. As your list grows though, the marketing process becomes more complex. That’s where automated email validation comes in. HubSpot App Marketplace features several automated tools like ClearOut, Kickbox, and Everbounce.
HubSpot introduced automated data management tools with Operations Hub. If you are not an Operations Hub user, then Insycle Data Management is one of the best tools for keeping data and text formats clean. Sigparser is another handy tool that enables turning your emails into contacts.
Revenue/Sales Apps
Sales and revenue operations tools that integrate with HubSpot Sales Hub continue to grow in popularity. David Dulany at Tenbound, an analyst firm focused on Sales Tech, sees two converging trends, “Larger sales tech solution providers are becoming a “one-stop shop” for all your sales tech needs through acquisitions and innovation. Upstart SaaS providers will be emphasizing interoperability and ease of use from the beginning.”
David identified three emerging trends in the sales tech space:
Identifying leads "above the funnel"
Sales Development reps often need to invest a lot of time researching prospective leads before picking up the phone for the first time. New machine learning tools are emerging to identify “above the funnel” leads based on buying behavior, personas, and company profiles.
Artificial Intelligence (AI) for better messaging
Sales automation tools help sales reps send emails and make calls. However, until now there haven’t been a lot of options for automating messaging platforms like Slack, Facebook Messenger, and WhatsApp. HubSpot provides two-way integrations for all of these platforms, but if you want to automate your messaging, you will need to look at third-party tools like Owler Max (A Meltwater Product) and LeadIQ. Owler identifies and curates online and social data to make it easier to integrate intelligence into your messaging. LeadIQ automates the messaging process by collecting contact data and adding it to your HubSpot CRM, tracking sales triggers, and composing personalized messages.
Virtual Sales Development Scorecards
There was a time when a sales manager could motivate their team by walking around a bullpen, creating excitement and competition. The work-at-home movement removed that motivating factor, and many sales leaders now struggle with keeping their SDRs motivated. Gamification platforms emerged to track sales and motivate teams, but most relied on separate monitors to display scoreboards. Virtual scorecard apps like SalesScreen bring gamification to remote SDR teams. SalesScreen collects sales statistics from your HubSpot CRM, identifies problems, and helps managers create motivational scorecards on the SDR’s computer.
Language-Specific Apps
“Most non-native English speakers use internet translation tools, which may translate and brand your material incorrectly. Due to this, the production of multilingual material is increasing, particularly with the quick development and widespread availability of machine translation (MT).” (TechTrends)
LiveChat/Mobile App Translations
Online chat tools are one of the best ways to convert website leads and handle customer service requests. While your website may have multi-lingual versions, most chat tools can’t translate the chat thread. Babelbot translates chats into 65 languages and provides the translated text in the message stream for vendors and customers.
Lokalize automates translating mobile apps, gaming, and other assets by creating custom workflows for developers and marketers.
While all of these exciting new technologies will help your organization be more competitive in 2023, onboarding, integrating, and managing all of these third-party applications with HubSpot can be a challenging process. That’s where InboundAV can help.
Tech Stack Services from InboundAV
“You can have a great technology stack, but if you don’t have the talent and expertise to maintain and manage your platform, you may not receive the best payback from your investment.” (Peter Malick, Founder and CEO, InboundAV)
HubSpot reports that most companies manage seven to ten integrations, but as a company grows, keeping these applications working together is often expensive and time-consuming. HubSpot users often depend on partners to integrate, onboard, and maintain their tech stacks.
InboundAV, a HubSpot Platinum Partner, offers a range of HubSpot services to manage their tech stacks.
Platform Audits
A HubSpot consultant develops a detailed and objective analysis of an existing tech stack and recommends updates and improvements.
Onboarding and Training
InboundAV consultants will work with your IT staff to complete standard integrations, set up HubSpot to work with the applications, and train users on how the applications work together. They will also work with the support teams from the different software providers to troubleshoot problems and identify areas of improvement.
Advanced Analytics, Dashboards, and Reports
HubSpot provides a complete set of analytics and reporting tools that need to be integrated with external applications and data platforms for enterprise-wide reporting. InboundAV consultants can work with your analytics team to ensure your HubSpot data integrates with third-party apps.
Custom Integration and Development Services
InboundAV employs skilled HubSpot developers who understand the HubSpot platform, data architecture, APIs, and multiple development languages necessary to build custom integrations with third-party applications. We will also provide project managers and account managers to oversee complex projects.
About InboundAV
InboundAV is a full-service business development agency and HubSpot Platinum Partner. We help growing businesses develop game-changing strategies and the automated processes needed to help you scale. As a HubSpot partner, we provide a full range of services to support your operations team, including custom integrations, automated workflows, onboarding, training, and ongoing support services.
