Hubspot vs. SharpSpring: A Web Development Company’s View

Many companies are undergoing a digital transformation. Perhaps you’re among them and understand the value of leveraging digital tools to enhance your business. As a premier web development company in New York City, an increasing number of our clients come to us, curious about implementing robust, automated marketing solutions. That’s understandable because companies trying to market their brand often face new hurdles in the modern, interconnected world.

Both Hubspot or SharpSpring will provide your company with a competitive advantage by automating marketing and customer management activities. Here, we will evaluate what solution might best suit your company.
 

What is Marketing Automation and Customer Relationship Management?

Before diving into the relative trade-offs between these two powerful platforms, let’s define some common but misunderstood terms: marketing automation and consumer relationship management (CRM). The confusion with these terms stems from the fact that they have a significant overlap between them. Indeed, both Hubspot and SharpSpring are both marketing automation and CRM platforms. When considering integrating one of these platforms, knowing the difference will help you get the features you’ll need.

Marketing automation: These are software platforms that automate your marketing efforts. When you implement an email marketing campaign, you’re using marketing automation. These platforms help your company effectively market across many online channels, like email, social media, etc. They also streamline many repetitive marketing tasks.

Customer relationship management: CRMs are also software platforms. However, these platforms emphasize collating data to provide a deeper understanding of your current or potential customers’ journey. The data you gather from a CRM can be used to customize your marketing efforts and improve your relationships with your customers, which results in customer retention and sales growth.
 
 

Pros and Cons of Hubspot

Hubspot is unquestionably the biggest name in automated marketing, and their CRM tools are developing rapidly. They are ideally suited for businesses looking for an easy, off-the-shelf solution requiring little to no coding. If you’re looking for a full-featured, easy to use solution, Hubspot could be a perfect choice. Find out more about Hubspot here.

Pros–

• It offers an intuitive, easy to use platform.
• It provides its customers with a wealth of knowledge about online marketing.
• It has a rich set of tools that encompass virtually everything you could want in a CRM.

Cons–

• It’s expensive. As you add to your list, the price can increase significantly.
• You’ll need to sign a 12-month contract for the marketing platform.
• It doesn’t have SAP or Oracle integrations, which could hinder your ability to use the platform to its fullest.

Pros and Cons of SharpSpring

SharpSpring is relatively new to the game but is already making its way to the big leagues. It offers integrations to many leading third-party packages and provides a full picture of end-to-end ROI. SharpSpring works well for companies that need greater customization and access to a broader suite of tools. Find out more about SharpSpring here.

Pros–

• It’s about a third of the cost of its competitors.
• As an automated marketing platform, it can integrate with many other CRMs. It also comes with a built-in CRM that’s available to all users.
• It offers month-to-month contracts.
• The platform is rebrandable, with single sign-on for users, as well as easy client management tools.

Cons–

• The knowledge base isn’t as robust as Hubspot’s.
• It doesn’t offer SMS marketing or personalized web content.
• It doesn’t provide predictive analytics.

Our Analysis as a Web Development Company

We selected Hubspot and SharpSpring for comparison because they are both exceptional platforms. Both offer a wide range of features and benefits. Both also have deficiencies. Our suggestion, therefore, is a simple one: use the platform that most closely aligns with your company’s marketing goals.

Of course, knowing which solution is the right one for you may be easier said than done. We can help. In our 16+ years as a custom software and web development company, we’ve honed a process that will help to uncover some of your organization’s hidden assumptions. We are technology agnostic, and, after a thorough evaluation, we will provide expert recommendations for the technologies that will best fit your needs, whether that’s Hubspot, SharpSpring, or something else entirely. Let’s start the conversation.