topic Re: contact communication preferences in Tips, Tricks & Best Practices

contact communication preferences

Susanne12 — Fri, 23 Feb 2024 08:33:20 GMT

Hi,

does anyone have an idea on how to manage a contact's communications preferences (not newsletters in particular) - i.e. the contact does not wish to receive mails from the sales staff, or he does not wish to receive advertising by mail, phone calls, ...

Our first idea was to create custom properties, though I am not sure if there is a better way.

Thanks!

Re: contact communication preferences

karstenkoehler — Fri, 23 Feb 2024 08:44:16 GMT

Hi @Susanne12,

The best way to do this is by using subscription types. This is explained in detail here: https://knowledge.hubspot.com/records/manage-your-subscription-preferences-and-types

Subscription types can be set up by following these instructions: https://knowledge.hubspot.com/marketing-email/set-up-email-subscription-types

Let me know if you have any follow-up questions!

Re: contact communication preferences

Susanne12 — Fri, 23 Feb 2024 08:46:21 GMT

@karstenkoehler we do not want to use subscription types as it is not possible to filter by subscription type in the contacts view plus our sales team will not view the subscription overview on the contact...

Re: contact communication preferences

karstenkoehler — Fri, 23 Feb 2024 08:50:40 GMT

@Susanne12 in that case, yes, you'll have to work with custom properties but I would advise against it for a few reasons:

These preferences will be displayed only but not enforced by HubSpot. If a custom property contains the value "do not email", HubSpot will still let you email the contact.
Preferences could be changed against the will of the contact. If a contact fully unsubscribes from all communication via subscription types, this cannot be bypassed by CRM users.

That's why I'd recommend training your users accordingly rather than building a workaround with custom properties. Filtering is still possible via contact lists and once you have these lists, you could also build filtered contact views.

Re: contact communication preferences

JGrayson6 — Thu, 25 Sep 2025 17:21:46 GMT

Hello,

Is there a report we can run to show the # of contacts over a given time period that have opted out of each of our communication selctions ? Thanks!

Re: contact communication preferences

STierney — Thu, 25 Sep 2025 19:41:18 GMT

Hey @JGrayson6 - thanks for posting in the Community!

I'm wondering if @karstenkoehler has any follow-up insight on this type of report!

Shane, Community Manager

Re: contact communication preferences

JGrayson6 — Mon, 29 Sep 2025 16:56:35 GMT

@STierney thanks for tagging @karstenkoehler . I'm wondering if we can run a report to show the # of contacts, over a given time period, that have opted out of each of our communication selctions. I would love ot be able to see this but can't figure out how through custom reporting. Thanks!

Re: contact communication preferences

karstenkoehler — Mon, 29 Sep 2025 17:39:46 GMT

@JGrayson6 as far as I know, not out of the box, no. You would have to create a date property per subscription type, then use a workflow that enrolls contacts when 'Opted out of...' is true, then uses 'Edit record' to set the current date into the new date property – which means that it will not work retroactively, unfortunately. But, no time like the present: If you set it up now, it'll start collecting data and in a couple of weeks / months you'll have substantial data to look back on.

Re: contact communication preferences

JGrayson6 — Wed, 01 Oct 2025 13:41:09 GMT

Thank you, @karstenkoehler . I appreciate your help.