The Clients

IOur work with a forward-thinking Fractional Chief Revenue Officer keen on improving the sales process led us to two distinct technology companies, each with unique potential. Our partner introduced us to a cybersecurity business that is changing how people combat phishing scams through personalized training and transparent reporting, as well as an innovative tech company using AI to help HR teams better understand workplace culture and employee satisfaction.

What were the similarities between these two companies? 

This is where things get interesting. Despite operating in different markets, both companies faced similar core challenges and needed Lynton's expertise to elevate their sales processes. Each also brought unique requirements that required careful consideration, but we were happy to take it all head-on.

The Challenges

We had two distinct tech companies pursuing the same goal: a successful migration to HubSpot with streamlined conversion journeys and strategic opportunity management. Our task was finding efficient solutions while ensuring each company received personalized attention for their specific properties, processes, team structures, and goals. This meant developing custom documentation that addressed each team's unique needs. 

Similar Challenges:  

• Both teams were new to HubSpot and previously lived in spreadsheets, assigning, tracking, managing, and reporting on key business metrics 
• Both teams didn't know what was working in their marketing and sales efforts due to a lack of proper contact sourcing and lead funnel tagging 
• Both teams were feeling stuck, having no exposure or experience to follow-up and task automation as well as next-level sales efficiencies like snippets, playbooks, custom views, and more 
• Both teams needed robust reporting and dashboards that showed the progress, completion, and performance of campaigns, overall revenue, and website health

Different Challenges:  

The Solutions

Streamlined HubSpot Setup, Adoption, and Onboarding

Our success stemmed from close collaboration with the teams using these systems daily — the business development representatives (BDRs), sales representatives, and sales managers. We demonstrated how HubSpot could transform their workflows through deal pipelines, custom views, and efficient task management. While the cybersecurity company required more extensive training for their larger team, and the HR software company operated without marketers, we secured buy-in by showing them:

• The time they can save in the Sales Hub with the ability to manage, track, and check the progression of open leads in one accessible space 
• How their prospects have interacted with their website and what content they previously engaged with 
• The ability to use next-level HubSpot features like snippets, playbooks, and more, which allowed them to focus their energy on other areas that moved the business forward 

Creative Marketing Solutions for Lead Generation

While our initial proof of concept focused on the sales team, we quickly recognized the importance of addressing each organization's marketing needs. As we optimized conversion paths and created segmented forms, we identified a key opportunity to enhance their primary lead source: the website. Working with the cybersecurity company's marketing stakeholder, we enhanced their landing pages with the following:

• Highly performing, accessible, and user experience-based modules
• New assets targeted for conversions, like CTAs and pop-up forms
• Tagging marketing campaigns like paid media and organic social with UTM codes to better segment for follow-ups and lead engagement 

Creation of Robust Conversion and Buyer's Journey Paths 

As a data-driven agency specializing in marketing, websites, and technology, we focused on understanding their fundamental metrics: lead volume, revenue sources, and progression from subscriber to lead to sales-qualified lead. Through detailed discovery workshops examining existing sales and marketing processes, we found opportunities to help through the following actions: 

• Creating new properties that were vital to each business, which supported lead routing automation efforts like product type, referral partner, and service interest 
• Optimizing what information is collected on forms and restructuring conversion opportunities on the website to be top-of-funnel, middle-of-funnel, or bottom-of-funnel 
• Establishing key ICPs and using HubSpot's technology to utilize company target audiences, personas, smart content, custom lists, filters, and views 

Clearer Data-Driven Reporting for Better Decision Making

Perhaps the most critical component of these projects was ensuring HubSpot and all related assets were configured to give key stakeholders clear, holistic, 360-degree visibility into their business metrics. Using HubSpot's robust reporting capabilities and customized filtering, we delivered targeted reports, dashboards, and scorecards for executives, sales managers, and individual sales representatives. Key milestones, events tracked, and metrics added to these dashboards for individual groups, ultimately ending up with dashboards that looked like the following: 

• Individual sales representatives - Provides a real-time performance dashboard tracking assigned leads, upcoming tasks, and close dates. This "snapshot" drives accountability while making it easy to track daily accomplishments
• Sales managers - Enables data-driven coaching conversations through comprehensive team performance metrics, revenue health indicators, and detailed insights into deal progression and potential bottlenecks
• Executives - Delivers high-level revenue performance visibility with clear tracking of key business metrics, including forecasted revenue, pipeline projections, and period-specific deal closure rates

Strategies for Automation and Lead/Deal Management

Managing operations through Excel and Microsoft Teams had become unsustainable for both sales teams, leading to manual errors, unclear ownership, and excessive administrative work. A key indicator of success in these engagements was implementing automation and efficiencies that helped representatives confidently manage their leads and deals. From tasks to follow-ups to sequences, we delivered strategic automation and revenue management strategies by:

• Establishing a playbook that included best practices around using the CRM, including HubSpot meetings, tasks, sequences, snippets, playbooks, and goal-setting strategies 
• Recommending and implementing processes that help keep sales reps accountable and set up for success on how to best spend their time in an unfamiliar tool, including reminders, email notifications of unworked or overdue tasks, and automated emails notifying poor sequence performance 
• Allowing executive stakeholders to get access to permission-set views and reports around individual rep performance and overall revenue health