How to Migrate Your Sales Data to the HubSpot Free CRM

TABLE OF CONTENTS
HubSpot CRM Benefits   |   How to Migrate Sales Data   |   Free HubSpot Tools Checklist

Your customer relationship management (CRM) system is a crucial tool, and the decision to migrate from one platform to another can be a huge undertaking.

If you’re curious about making the switch to HubSpot, don’t let yourself get too overwhelmed to take the first step. With proper planning and the right game plan, you can make the onboarding process as painless as possible and reap a whole host of system benefits.

Before starting the migration process, it's crucial to ensure that the benefits align with your organization's needs.

HubSpot provides a comprehensive CRM integration that connects seamlessly with its full range of features, giving you a complete view of your leads and customers. This integration allows you to optimize and enhance your client relationship management effectively.

Let’s dive into how the free HubSpot CRM can benefit your team as a whole and how to begin tackling your sales data migration.

Benefits of HubSpot CRM Software

HubSpot was designed with your sales team’s ease of use in mind, making it an ideal option for businesses across multiple industries. Designed to streamline the sales process from start to finish, it benefits your entire team, from sales leaders to end-users.

Certain characteristics set the HubSpot CRM system apart from competing products:

Automated

When it comes to data migration, the amount of manual data entry you’ll need to execute is limited with HubSpot. The system features tools that make it easy to upload your existing data, and many updates can be done quickly and intuitively.

Customizable

HubSpot supports custom objects that allow your team to fully customize your data schema. This gives you the flexibility to define objects as your organization requires, with all the same functionality as the standard options (contacts, companies, deals, etc.). Custom objects can be accessed by all users for use in reporting and marketing campaigns.

Integrated

Unlike other SaaS products, the HubSpot team has developed all of the platform’s solutions themselves, creating an easy-to-use interface with consistent functionality throughout the platform. This reduces the software your team must use and minimizes data inconsistencies.

Plus, HubSpot supports a variety of integrations to connect other tools for email, video conferencing, webinars, events, accounting, and more. Centralizing these systems simplifies your day-to-day process and creates a single source of truth for your customer data.

6 Steps to a Successful HubSpot CRM Migration

1. Plan Your CRM Migration

Keep in mind that migrating your CRM is not a quick afternoon activity, even for a small business. Taking the time to plan effectively will ensure limited downtime for your sales team and a smooth transition from one platform to another.

First things first? You have to get your team on board. Before you make any major changes, you’ll need to demonstrate how the change will streamline your sales processes and benefit the entire organization.

You should also make the project collaborative — any change to your CRM will likely impact several people who should all be part of the process. This ensures your data is set up to make the most sense for your team and can easily produce quality reporting.

2. Choose Your Contacts Import Method

There are several ways to import your data into the HubSpot CRM tool, so you’ll need to identify the import method that makes the most sense for your team and your data.

Once you’ve decided whether to tackle your data import on your own or consult a third party, you’ll be able to determine which steps your team will be responsible for going forward.

Find a HubSpot CRM Migration Service Provider

You could work with a company whose sole focus is migrating CRMs from one platform to another. Finding a third-party service that fits within your allocated resources (time and budget) is an excellent way to take the labor of data migration off your team.

Use Your Internal Team

With the right knowledge and tools, your organization could tackle the data migration process on its own. CSV import solutions and API endpoints are popular methods of transferring your CRM if your team has the internal power to do so.

Work With a HubSpot Partner

When you partner with a HubSpot Platinum Solutions Partner like LAIRE, you’ll receive expert guidance that goes beyond simply migrating your data.

As your dedicated HubSpot CRM consultant, we help ensure that none of your valuable contacts fall through the cracks. We can also assist your team in integrating your inbound marketing strategy into the HubSpot ecosystem, empowering you to maximize the variety of tools that come with it.

3. Scrub Your Data

When you migrate to the HubSpot CRM suite, not every piece of existing data will make the cut — nor should it.

This is the ideal moment to take inventory of your CRM and dive into the details, determining which data you’ll import and getting rid of everything else. If you ignore this step, you’ll still have a cluttered database, just in fancy new packaging.

• DON’T cling to contacts: Use an email verification tool to get rid of any invalid or outdated email addresses. You should clean out any duplicates, and you could also remove contacts without a clear owner, associated company, or other crucial pieces of data. Don’t be afraid to get rid of what you no longer need.
• DON’T dredge up the past: Leads and deals that went cold may become opportunities in the future, but holding onto irrelevant, historical data only brings unnecessary clutter into your new system.
• DO consult your team: Include both your sales and marketing teams while scrubbing your contacts to ensure the data you keep is both accurate and valuable.

This is also an ideal time to follow up with your leads and determine which are viable while extracting any missing data like contact information, business size, or lifecycle stage. By taking this key step, you help ensure a smooth migration with only the data that is truly valuable.

4. Prep Your HubSpot CRM

Before you begin the migration, you’ll need to cover a few HubSpot CRM basics. Consider it like turning on the water and electricity in your new home before you move in — you don’t want to live there until it’s fully functional.

Following these few simple steps will help ensure the accuracy of your HubSpot migration and create a tidy system that empowers your team to effectively use your CRM going forward.

Set Up Users

Everyone on your sales team should be set up as a user in your HubSpot CRM. HubSpot offers customizable permissions for each team member so they can access only the tools and contacts they need.

Add Custom Properties

Your old CRM may feature fields that house specific data essential to your business but aren’t standard in HubSpot. This will require new custom properties in HubSpot first to properly retain that data during migration.

Integrate External Tools

HubSpot offers several integrations to help centralize your marketing and sales processes, but too many can still clutter your new system. Take inventory of the tools you use and assess what data will enhance your CRM.

Train Your Team

You’re putting in plenty of work to make sure your HubSpot CRM is a powerful, highly organized tool, but your team has to know how to use it. Without a proper understanding of the software, integrations, and processes you’re designing for their success, your data will quickly lose value.

5. Set Your Deadline

Salespeople are often creatures of habit — until you sunset your old CRM, they’ll be tempted to keep using it. Set a definitive deadline that dictates when your team is officially cut off from the old CRM.

When you allow your transition to become drawn out and messy, important pieces of data are more likely to get lost in the move, potentially resulting in unhappy team members who are frantically searching for their hard-earned leads.

6. Launch Your CRM Migration

Congratulations! You’re now officially ready to migrate your data. After taking the appropriate steps to prepare, there should be little left to do on migration day but adhere to a few HubSpot CRM best practices to make the transition as seamless as possible.

Stay Engaged and Available

Even if you’ve invested in a consultant or third-party service to manage your migration, it’s crucial to remain present while the migration is running. Make yourself available for any questions or concerns as your transition team works with your data.

Take the initiative to be as involved as possible, and periodically check in with how the data appears as it’s uploaded into your HubSpot CRM. By remaining attentive, you can take action immediately if any errors arise and avoid as much downtime as possible.

Plan for Problems

Even with thorough planning, mistakes can happen. Don’t panic if your migration results in unanticipated errors. Instead, plan your approach to any issues that may arise. Ask yourself how best to face any day-of issues and stick to that strategy. Consider questions like:

• Will you attempt to resolve individual problems in real-time, or wait until post-migration to tackle a complete list?
• Who from your team will be enlisted to help resolve errors?
• At what level of error would you decide to reassess and restart migration, rather than resolving post-migration?

You’ve put in the work for a smooth transition, but by planning for all possible outcomes you can approach any errors with confidence and clarity.

Celebrate

Remember that for any team, major process changes can be stressful. Keep morale high by taking the time to recognize the hard work your team has done to get to this point.

Remember that this transition was completed with your team’s ease of use and success in mind, across all departments. Take a moment to celebrate a new chapter!

Get Even More From HubSpot's Tools

HubSpot is an excellent CRM system, but don’t forget there are several other Hubs to organize and support your team’s work. From sales and marketing automation to client support and operations, you can make your HubSpot portal a system that makes everything easier and more efficient.

Don’t worry about allocating valuable time to exploring all the features the software has to offer — our experts at LAIRE have done the work for you. To maximize how your team benefits from HubSpot, download our free checklist.