Integrating HubSpot contacts with Zoho CRM Leads

[markusarvidsson]

Hi,

I have a use case where i try to sync between Hubspot contacts and ZoHo CRM Leads. If it was contact to contact it would have been much easier but in this case the use case looks like this (notice a lead in Zoho CRM is not hte same as a contact):

1. A lead is created in ZohoCRM
2. The lead is sent to HubSpot and a new contatct is created or an existing contact get some updated on contact properties 
3. Deal i created with additional information about the lead
   (So far everything works fine, below is what I want to add to this)
4. I would like to report back to Zoho CRM if the the Deal is moved to a specific Deal stage in HubSpot. A Lead property in Zoho will change.

The goal is to report back tp Zoho CRM with a change of a property, but how can it be done? (notice that an email address can apperar on multiple  lead in Zoho CRM)

If you know how that can be done or of you have a workaround feel free to reach out to me. 

[mangelet · Accepted solution]

Hey @markusarvidsson , I see you're trying to sync data between ZOHO and HubSpot

So, a lead in ZOHO becomes a contact in HubSpot, right? Then you create a deal in HubSpot and expect it to convert to a contact ZOHO when the deal reaches a certain stage.

My suggestion is to use a synced property as a communication point between ZOHO and HubSpot.

One suitable property could be Lead Status.

You would add a new Lead Status like "qualified lead," which needs to be on both platforms.

So, when the deal reaches the specific stage you're waiting for, update the Lead Status to "qualified lead".

This value will sync with ZOHO, and then you'll have to work your magic there to convert the lead into a contact.

If that's not possible, another option might be using a solution like Zapier or Custom Coded Action in HubSpot to call ZOHO's API for a lead conversion after reaching out your desired deal stage or lead status.

Try it out and let me know how it goes!

[markusarvidsson]

Thank you for your input!

I am thinking of something like this too but I am not sure how to realize it. The diffuclties with using synced conact properties is that the same contact can have several leads in Zoho CRM. I am using Zapier today for the integration to send data to HubSpot.

I will look into using Custom Coded Action to set the right lead status in Zoho CRM. I think the Lead ID from Zoho should be the unique identifier. Let's see how it goes 🙂

[danmoyle]

+1 for adding something like Zapier or upgrading Operations Hub to include custom coded workflow/webhooks. That could help. Good call @mangelet 😊

[mangelet]

Thanks, @danmoyle , for sharing your thoughts! I really appreciate it.

[danmoyle]

@markusarvidsson how is Zoho seeing the lead? It's not a person (contact)? I'm curious how this will work also as I like to keep up on various integrations.

I know when connecting Salesforce and HubSpot, you can choose how to interact with both leads and contacts in SFDC with HubSpot. I didn't realize it was that different in Zoho. 

@Jnix284 have you integrated Zoho before? 

[Jnix284]

@danmoyle I've only done migration from Zoho to HubSpot, I haven't integrated Zoho with HubSpot because there aren't a lot of advantages for doing this, anything Zoho can do, HubSpot can do better...

of course, there is always the challenge of having a legacy CRM and adoption of new systems...

@markusarvidsson typically when I see Zoho connected to HubSpot, it's because Sales is using Zoho and Marketing wants HubSpot - but based on your description of using deals in HubSpot that you want to update leads in Zoho, it sounds like you're using both for sales?

I'd be happy to investigate the integration further with my team to see what's possible to feed back to Zoho.

Would love it if you can provide a little context around how/why you're leveraging each to better understand your use case.

[markusarvidsson]

In this case we are gettings leads from Zoho CRM (another company) and our team works in HubSpot. We would like to report back the status of the lead, or at least if it is a qualifies lead or not. We are handling the leads as Deals in HubSpot. The problem by reporting back is to report back to the specidic lead in Zoho CRM since the same email ID can appear many times. Zoho CRM creates a lead ID for each lead but I do not see a way to make use of that. I have also created a property that adds a unique lead ID for each new lead in Zoho CRM.

Do you think it is possible to make it work the way I want or is it another way to report back?

[danmoyle]

@markusarvidsson it sounds like there's a disconnect on defining the data from the beginning. I like to work from the same foundation, so my apologies if this seems super basic. 

In HubSpot, the human is a Contact, their business is a Company, and the revenue you're working to close is a Deal. 

Contacts are uniquely identified by their email.

For a Company, it's their website (or "company domain name")

For a Deal, HubSpot gives it a record ID, which doesn't exist until it's created. 

So if you're passing a lead (a person) into HubSpot, it's going to defined as a Contact. If you're trying to put that into a Deal, there's going to be confusion. 

Since HubSpot does generate a unique record ID for each Deal, it's possible to use that in an export to check the data and connect it to a record in ZohoCRM. But that would likely be an export situation, which isn't always simple and ideal. 

HubSpot is always making improvements, and there's a chance that this newer functionality may roll out to everyone soon, so here's some info on creating your own unique identifier for Deals. 

You could create a custom property in HubSpot, where the ZohoCRM id gets pushed to, helping you to cross-reference the record in ZohoCRM. That's the only thought I'd add to this. 

[danmoyle]

I knew you'd have value in this conversation @Jnix284 😊