We’re moving our business to a subscription model, and rather than building our own database we’re considering relying on a SaaS solution, for the following reasons:
1. No need to manage/admin our db servers
2. No need to develop everything from scratch with a huge learning curve
3. No need to maintain and solve the thousands of bugs that might arise in a user management like this.
We’re wondering if Hubspot + API connection to our billing software can do this. We’ll need hubspot to manage:
1. User passwords / login (optional)
2. User subscriptions (which subscription is active, upgrading from Plan A (“silver”) to B (“Gold”, etc).
3. Payment methods management (i.e. notices like “please update your patment method” for expired credit cards etc).
I am just going to touch on each point you brought up on the pros and cons of using HubSpot as the database for your service.
1. HubSpot should not be used to store passwords or any sort of login information. All information in HubSpot is accessible to any user of your HubSpot portal, which even with hashed salted and peppered passwords is a security risk, as any marketer on your team would have access to all of these.
2. This is where HubSpot makes the most sense, I am currently working with a client to manage subscriptions through HubSpot. Ideally, the use of either deals or custom objects to represent the subscription with custom properties unique to your service would allow for easy track of the subscription details. This would allow the use of HubSpot robust reporting software, and their email marketing software as well.
3. HubSpot itself does not do payment handling, but it has many integrations with outside services that handle all steps of the payment processing pipeline. Some services that integrate with HubSpot are Stripe, and Deposit Fix. I have not used either of these integrations personally but they are good to keep in mind.
HubSpot also has a very extensive API that can let you control most aspects of the data in the system, as well as automation through workflows. This means with a good development team and access to other data or outside APIs most data can be synced within HubSpot for use of their reporting and emails.
Best,
Josh
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I don’t have personal experience with either of these, but they both do look promising. You will need to ask someone that knows more about these than me.
