HubSpot Ideas

Jems212

Update/Overwrite/Append Data Options for Contact Property Fields

Basically for each property I want 3 options to choose from:
1) Update value if blank
2) Append to value
3) Overwrite value

 

Sample use case(s):
Append Option: Notes Field
I have a comments field on my contact form where someone sends us a query. If that contact later submits another query I don't want to lose the previous info from my records. I want to see the new information appended to that field.  (Can't keep creating new properties and using smart properties). 

 

Overwrite Option 
Standard as happens curently with most fields, if a contact enters a new phone number it overrides the previous data to keep it updated with the latest information.

 

Update if Blank option - Lead Source
When a lead comes in, I assign the Lead Source to it, but I only want that updated if there is no previous Lead Source assigned to it. I don't want subsequent forms to overwrite the value. Smart Field(s) works only partially because if I use the API to submit forms, smart fields do not stop it from being overwritten.

 

Thanks 

HubSpot Updates
Not Currently Planned
April 10, 2020 03:01 PM

Hello HubSpot Community, 

Thank you as always for your continued feedback, it helps us build a great product.

We are constantly evaluating and re-evaluating our priorities and roadmap to deliver as much value to our customers as possible. It is currently possible to append data to a multiple checkbox property. Here is an article that describes that functionality. However, at this time, adding additional functionality to our import tool is not something our team is currently planning to build natively into HubSpot. This is certainly subject to change in the future and we will update this idea if that becomes the case. 

136 Replies
SBenfield
Participant

Voting for this as well since we have a need to append a contact property instead of allowing a form submission to overwrite the field completely. 

teamgi
Participant | Diamond Partner

This is very much needed. It would make it so much easier to manage email subscription types, which currently isn't possible without Pro level due to the automation needed.

sneha72003
Participant

Hello HubSpot

 

We recently shifted on HubSpot and realized this is the issue for us as well.

 

We want to keep our previous commnets history from the contacts as our contacts uses different services at different stages and this is really crucial information for us.

 

Please let us know if this feature is added in your near future product releases.

 

Thank you

Regards

RZhang
Member

why already 4 years. there is no function about it....

Let's say I put this note field in the form, then a person fills it for the first time, and there is a note he fills again for the second time, then will the first note be overwritten before that.

 

 

QQ截图20210611003106.png

MoreLeadsPlz
Participant

@RZhang brings up a 2nd point that is also a big flaw of Hubspot - the note card that sits in contact's newsfeeds is completely unlinked from any notes field in the contact properties, so those notes cannot be reported on, cannot be shown as previews from other objects, cannot be exported, basically cannot be treated like a field in any way. The note cards also create separate instances each time you take a note, and these cannot be linked or appended together.

This causes misalignment between sales and marketing, because marketing often creates a notes property on contact objects that appears in the left-hand sidebar on contacts in order to view and report on notes from anywhere, but the UI prompts sales to leave notes in the unusable note cards that appear in contact newsfeeds, where information gets lost and buried underneath reems of contact activity that happens after those notes.

 

Hubspot's notes set-up leads to a loss of context and data for go to market teams, diminshed collaboration, and increased organizational friction between marketing and sales.

jenrankin
Participant

This is a huge issue for our use cases and creates so much manual work on our end that it's debilitating. 

NAylward
Member

adding a big ol' +1 to this!! this is also entirely unrelated to the import tool also - not satisfied that the most recent reply to this actually understands the issue in this thread.

 

for our use case; we'd love to be have something like this in order to work reliably with the profitwell integration. 

 

for some of our bigger customers; they could have several teams / departments with individual accounts and stripe subscriptions - all of which map to *unique contacts* in hubspot that are associated to the *same company*. we'd love to be able to:

 

1) roll up the MRR for multiple contacts associated to a single company, to get an overall figure. currently, we have a workflow that copies the value from the contact to the associated company, and the profitwell fields are simply overwritten to match the most recently altered subscription.

 

2) list the plan types associated with the customer, rather than them being overwritten, such that we can use "where Plans (Profitwell) contains <plan_name>" with confidence.

 

in it's current state, we're working under the knowledge that hubspot will also be fluctuating around the truth, rather than being able to provide it reliably

amanda-robo
Participant

This feature is desperately needed. Especially in the case of form fill outs and keeping a history of what was logged in properties in the past. I find this is an issue across the hubspot platform as well (for example, the recurring revenue analytics tools update the revenue value for monthly recurring revenue even for past dates once you update the amount). It basically erases the old data which is sometimes vital for historical account knowledge and reporting in some cases.

anandk
Participant

agreed! 

TDN
Member

The values of the multiples checkboxes gets overwritten by the new values of any subsequent forms submission. We need the ability to append values globally on any properties!

Sami_Sharaf
Participant | Elite Partner

We found a workaround to this...

 

2 new fields:-

- 'field'

- 'field history'

 

On form submission 'field' is updated

Workflow triggered on changes to 'field', ie. When 'field' is Known

Trigger webhook to append 'field' to 'field history' prepended with a comma

So that 'field history' lists all changes to 'field' separated by a comma

danielrnorris
Contributor | Elite Partner

Yes I am eagerly waiting for the Append feature to be rolled out across HubSpot as a whole. Seems like a pretty big deal for data integrity in a CRM.

danielrnorris
Contributor | Elite Partner

Yes I think the Append, especially for Multi Select checkboxes is a major hole in the CRM functionality. I know there are ways to do it with workflows but this function should be in Lists when bulk editing and in Forms.

HBenham
Member

Yes, we would greatly benefit from this feature as well! 

BHolden
Member

This functionality exists in Marketo and there are many true business use cases that require this functionality. It allows for data to into one field multiple times instead of having to create a new task in Salesforce.

victoriadubinsk
Member

It would be great to append this! Sometimes the property is cumulative over time and it would be nice to be able to just append information vs overwrite it.

stephsurns
Participant

Agreed! Will this be revisited as Hubspot is bringing on larger clients?

MoreLeadsPlz
Participant

@Sami_Sharaf Have you considered how posting information like this hurts Marketing Operations professionals? Many of us have invented this exact solution before you, without guidance from our managers or colleagues; some even solved this in the first 1-2 years of our professional careers. A potentially stressful experience. But now, you have given away the information for free. Giving away monetizable trade secrets has a cost to professionals who have earned this solution.

danielrnorris
Contributor | Elite Partner

@Sami_Sharaf that is a great workaround that I have implemented with a few clients. Though definitely think it is time HubSpot made Appending a universal feature across the tools. Anyways appreciate you sharing though. @MoreLeadsPlz that is what this community is all about, a simple workaround is not a trade secret and should hardly be considered an invention. My clients dont hire me because I hide solutions from them, my clients hire me because i help them find solutions and am there to help solve all their future problems. There is no shortage of problems clients need our help with.

Alysha_TW
Top Contributor | Platinum Partner

Agreed, we need this. Tickets can come in multiples, so you need to be able to have the fields for one Ticket record to save on that ticket and for those same properties to populate on the new ticket. Zendesk has it. My clients are saying this gap does not meet industry expectations for Customer Service software.