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M$1 December 30, 2008 02:24 PM

Has anyone used an "Inbound Marketing Tool" such as HubSpot http://www.hubspot.com for advertising?

I am not affiliated. I am interested in knowing if there are any other services that offer a comparable service to this in a similar Search Engine Optimization. I believe Google Analytics, Clicky, and Rhinoseo provide nearly all of the same data that Hubspot collects at a cost of $0, but then HubSpot charges $6,000 a year for its services. Is there something I'm missing with this company and why do you think they are charging this much a year for its service, while other companies can provide free technologies? How can any new business see that these costs are well worth it? Has anyone used or know any companies that use their "inbound marketing" services? Can this be affective way of getting traction on a website or would hiring a SEO all-star full time be better recommended for a startup?
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December 30, 2008 03:46 PM
I have never understood how HubSpot can work with their business model. As you mentioned there are several services that offer much the same tools for a cost of NOTHING.

Of these services I have given Google Analytics a try and must say I do like it though I actually sell hosting and provide AwStats on my servers with my hosting accounts, so I tend to stick with that (since it is server side I believe it gives slightly more exact numbers while services like Google Analytics is a slightly more general option).

I really do believe using something like this is all a startup has to have for their website, so long as they are devoted to the site and making adjustments as needed. SEO all-stars can be a great resource but the services they offer are ALL things a normal individual can do if they take the time to understand how Search Engine Optimization works.
Source(s):
years of online Marketing Experience

Asker's Rating:
• I still believe HubSpot must offer something that Google Analytics does not, or there is something extra service wise you're getting, but do not know exactly what makes it so much better!


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January 02, 2009 02:00 PM
Disclosure: I work at HubSpot, but I also know a lot about the software and business model. ** Everyone should make sure to see the links below to unbiased opinions from real HubSpot customers. **

spoon - You are absolutely right that for someone like you, HubSpot may not be a good option. The right questions to ask are (1) who will find HubSpot valuable, and (2) what does HubSpot do?

1) HubSpot is for marketing mortals and small business owners - not web gurus (like spoon). They do not know how to work with javascript tracking codes, HTML, etc. - they have other talents (traditional marketing and running a business). For these people a simple methodology plus a set of integrated software tools plus advice and support is extremely valuable. In addition to software, we provide training and support (with a live human, living in the USA). All of this is important to HubSpot customers.

2) HubSpot does a lot more than just SEO. HubSpot includes software to publish a website, publish a blog, analyze each blog article and its performance, monitor social media, track leads, analyze markeitng campaigns, integrate with Salesforce.com, build landing pages, track competitors, evaluate keywords, monitor keywords, automatically evaluate each page of your website for SEO, and more. Pretty much a complete web marketing system. For a lot of people that do not have technical skills like yourself, trying to cobbble together AWstats, plus Google Analytics, plus a keyword tool, plus lead intelligence, plus a form builder, plus a leads database, plus integration with Salesforce.com, plus Wordpress, plus social media monitoring, etc. is quite difficult - and that still does not get you all the tools we have built at HubSpot. And we enhance the software each and every month...

Over 900 companies are paying HubSpot customers, and we only launched our product a year ago. I would encourage everyone to get unbiased opinions from people who actually use HubSpot as a paying customer. Two great links to do this are below:

http://www.linkedin.com/answers/marketing-sales/public-relations/MAR_PRR/364314-20794753

http://twitter.com/hubspot/favorites

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December 30, 2008 04:53 PM
The problem with these SEO genii is that they all claim to be experts on it but somehow they only apply their knowledge into bringing more traffic to ... yeah, you guessed it, their SEO websites. Kind of a circular reference.

Most of what you need to know still comes out from Google's services (as spoon already told you), and Google never charges you to look at their basic data. Between the Google tools for web masters, and whatever traffic tracker you are using, you should be able to get the same information that these others want you to shell out $250+ per month for.

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