Subscription Products Lifecycle Management

[kpmc]

Hi,

We are currently a Salesforce shop using Salesforce CPQ (previously Steelbricks) and we are considering a move to HubSpot.  We are using CPQ to generate order forms for new business deals, expansions and renewals.   We are using NetSuite for billing, and the two systems are not very integrated.  (We have products syncing from salesforce to NS and we have invoices syncing back to Salesforce, but don't have a full quote-to-cash workstream automated).   I don't think our finance team will be willing to leave NetSuite, so moving to a fullly integrated revenue stack that includes billing (e.g. Zuora) isn't an option.

I have done some exploring and research into the options available within the HubSpot ecosystem to replace the current CPQ functionality that we have with Salesforce.   Our product pricing is generally very simple (fixed price, monthly, simple discounts), and, although they'd be nice to have, we could probably get by without configuration rules (dependencies, mutual exclusions, etc) if needed.  But a few things which we do need and which seem difficult to do in Hubspot are:

1. Automatically create renewals for contracts with subscription products.  The way this works in Salesforce CPQ is that the renewal opportunity is automatically created with a close date at the end of the current contract.  This way, we always have a good start for retention/churn forecasting, and can report on renewals, expansions, and new business opportunities in a single report, grouped by opportunity type.  

2. Automatically co-term any expansions and add-ons to the primary contract, and pro-rate accordingly.   

3. Automatically apply existing discounts when adding additional licenses for a product that the customer already has.

I don't think Hubspot can do these tasks out-of-the-box with the Quotes and/or Subscriptions modules, but I'm a Hubspot greenhorn  and certainly could be missing something.  I've started looking into add-ons like DealHub and MobileForce, but the options are a bit overwhelming, so I thought I'd ask the community for any general best practices.   

Would an expert implementation team be able to provide the features I listed above with out-of-the-box Hubspot modules?

If not, is there an add-on you'd recommend that would get us what we need?

Thanks in advance.

Kevin

[RubenBurdin]

If you want to work with the Subscriptions data object, which is pretty new, you're out of luck trying to automate the creation of a subscription renewal, as this action is not yet available in workflows. You can trigger a workflow when a subscription is created, but you can at most create a ticket automatically for someone to then manually create a subscription.

While there is an API endpoint for subscriptions, you can only search and retrieve them at the moment, not create them. You can post an idea on the Ideas forum for the product team to implement this functionality. I assume it's probably in the works and should arrive in the near future.

If you decide to use Deals instead of Subscriptions, the whole process becomes more manageable, and you can automate it more easily.

HubSpot has recently bought a CPQ technology, so there will be updates to this functionality in the near future, but a realistic timeline would be sometime this Fall (they will probably announce it at INBOUND25).

Until then, you can try a more robust CPQ app like quote hapily, I believe it will help you out as its functionality is built to look and feel very native inside HubSpot.

[kpmc]

Thanks, RubenB!  I will take a look at quote happily.  Based on their website, it doesn't look like it is really suited for subscription lifecycle management, but I have booked a demo to see more.   Also looking at DealHub.  

I'm not really sure how we would handle our workflow without some sort of subscription object in the data model.   Perhaps any subscription products included on closed won deals could be treated as our "subscriptions," and then we could automatically pull those items into add-on deals and into renewals, and somehow automatically calculate the pro-ration for mid-contract add-ons, expansions, and amendments.  But that's beyond my capabilities in HubSpot at this point, so hopefully we'll find solution in the marketplace somewhere. 

Very interested in what is coming with Hubspot's CPQ purchase, but it will probably be too late in our project timeline to incorporate it for our go-live.  

Thanks again!

Kevin

[kennedyp]

Hi @kpmc! Welcome to the Community-- happy to have you here 😊

It sounds like your main challenges are automatic renewal creation, co-term expansion handling, and discount applications. I want to invite @ScottPennwood, @emilianovargas, and @franksteiner79 to see if they have any advice or person experience to share!

The Community offers valuable insights from subject matter experts, but for a more comprehensive consultation, consider connecting with a HubSpot Partner in the Solutions Directory.

Best,

Kennedy