Updating contacts with Zapier

[mikesimonsen]

We're setting up some automation between systems with Zapier.  New to Hubspot, but been using Zapier for years. 

We have a very simple use case that I cannot figure out. If an existing customer upgrades/downgrades/cancels in Stripe, update the contact in hubspot.

The new customer (create) actions are easy (create a contact) and the Zaps work great.

But the lookup and update contact actions we can't figure out. It seems the Hubspot Zapier requires an "Object ID" - the ID number internal to Hubspot for that contact. But all we have at this point (from Stripe for example) is the contact's email address.  How do you update a contact using Zapier and only knowing the contact's email address? 

All the Hubspot Zapier docs seem to only talk about the create action and never address the update. What am I missing?

The internal Contact ID is required for the lookup?

[Groopit · Accepted solution]

We got it to work with the cludgiest work around

1)  We added a delay step.  I saw this other places and we wondered whether Zapier was actually checking in with Hubspot. We added after the trigger and before the events.

2)  Use Find Contact and then check the create new box. This allows you to find the Hubspot ID and find the right record to update in the next step.  It will create a new record if you dont have one.  You'll set that up after you tell it what to find.  Enter Contact Information: Email in Find, then search on the email field from your app. 

3)  Add a Update Record step.  Use the Hubspot ID you "found" in the previous step and then update the fields accordingly.  You may need to do the formatter step mentioned above.  We were only adding one row of data at a time, so we didnt need that.

Good luck.,

[herodotuseduc]

i am seeing a lot of missing Original Sources that are attributed to Zapier (Zapier transfers data to Hubspot AFTER the user lands on the website) instead of the actual and true Original Source. Could this be the reason? Instead of seeing Direct Traffic, Paid Search, etc, i am seeing INTEGRATION (Zapier). Is this because the cookies are not captured and as a result, Hubspot recognises subsequent Contact creation by Zapier as Original Source?

[JamesAllen]

Have you thought about trying alternative integration platforms?

[CLahiff]

Hi!

Do you know how/if you can move meta data and payment info to Hubspot contact info from stripe? Really struggling here. Couldn't figure it out via zapier. 

[RNagel · Accepted solution]

Hi,

you can connect VID (Contact) with ID (Deal) via Create Associations in Hubspot, so no need for a webhook or Get Contact etc.

Cheers

[WendyGoh]

Hey @mikesimonsen,

While it is currently not possible to retrieve contact via email in Zapier, you can use the create or update action to create/update contact in HubSpot via the contact's email:

[DRosier]

What do you actually type into the contact email field? Is it the name of the field in hubspot?

[Groopit]

I'm having a similar prblem.  I am trying to update a custom property, which I have set as multi-line text.  I want to append the new information, rather than replace is.  Is there a way to do this?

[mikesimonsen]

I've never been able to get the Update function to work. I gave up.

I can create but the lookup/update seems to be totally broken in the Hubspot Zapier implementation. Or, I dunno, it could be me. 

[Groopit · Accepted solution]

We got it to work with the cludgiest work around

1)  We added a delay step.  I saw this other places and we wondered whether Zapier was actually checking in with Hubspot. We added after the trigger and before the events.

2)  Use Find Contact and then check the create new box. This allows you to find the Hubspot ID and find the right record to update in the next step.  It will create a new record if you dont have one.  You'll set that up after you tell it what to find.  Enter Contact Information: Email in Find, then search on the email field from your app. 

3)  Add a Update Record step.  Use the Hubspot ID you "found" in the previous step and then update the fields accordingly.  You may need to do the formatter step mentioned above.  We were only adding one row of data at a time, so we didnt need that.

Good luck.,

[LSadowski]

Thanks for this solution, I can confirm this is still the way to do it almost 3 years later 🙄 For the record I didn't find this workaround particularly "cludgy" to set up in Zapier, but will still have to see how it performs in action after I enable it.