7 Proven HubSpot Sequences Best Practices

If you’re reaching out to prospect leads directly, then HubSpot sequences are one of the best tools to educate, engage, and convert qualified leads to meetings.

On average, it takes eight touchpoints to close a sale. However, every prospect is different, so this number can vary. If you’re working with many leads, managing your database while ensuring you meet all your touchpoints can be challenging.

Failing to do so can result in decreasing conversion rates.

That’s where HubSpot sequences can become a valuable tool. HubSpot sequences allow you to create multi-touch, multi-channel steps to engage prospects. Your company must use the Sales Hub Starter to access this feature.

To learn more about HubSpot sequences, read below about their benefits and how your sales team can use them to reach prospects.

What are HubSpot Sequences?

HubSpot sequences is a sales engagement tool that allows you to send a series of targeted email templates–personalized and automated, calls and LinkedIn connection requests to increase sales productivity. 

Remember that sequences are only available in Sales Pro and Sales Enterprise. You can sign up for a free trial of HubSpot here.

Typically, every HubSpot sequence includes five core elements:

1. Steps: The total number of touchpoints to establish contact.
2. Media: The communication channel.
3. Duration: The time between the first and last step.
4. Spacing: The time between two subsequent steps.
5. Content: The messaging and content deployed to engage leads.

HubSpot email sequences are used for various reasons in a sales process. One of the most common is following up on inbound leads. For example, if a Marketing Qualified Lead (MQL) requests a demo, you can follow up accordingly through email and calls to schedule a meeting.

Additionally, HubSpot provides a handful of out-of-box sequences for different situations, such as post-event follow-up, content downloads, and outbound prospecting.

Using sequences in HubSpot provides an efficient and seamless way for your sales team to sell and market to new customers. All this without extra manual work or effort to engage potential customers. When employed with best practices, it helps engage potential customers at scale.

HubSpot Sequence Example

One typical example of using a HubSpot email sequence would be following up with Marketing Qualified leads (MQL) that have downloaded a content offer. 

A sequence will help your sales team reach out to start a conversation. Here’s how a sequence would be structured to reach out to an outbound prospect.

Benefits of HubSpot sequences

HubSpot Sequences allow you to:

• Follow up on leads promptly by adding tasks.
• Create email templates to send leads so you don’t have to rewrite emails every time. When creating a sales template, you can categorize them based on templates.
• Customize the timing of your sales touchpoints and space them out. For example, you can customize when an automated email will be sent and how many days apart the next task will need to be completed.
• Nurture prospects throughout a set time.
• Use a mix of content types and formats that a sales rep may have otherwise missed or not even considered.

7 effective HubSpot sequence best practices

The best practice is to create a Hubspot email sequence strategy based on your go-to-market strategy. Specific characteristics of your strategy would influence your sequences, such as your ideal customer profile, target market, and sales process.

All those insights can be gathered by collaborating closely with your sales to build the sequences. Additionally, look at your sales data to identify what works and doesn’t. 

Below are several best practices to think about when building your sequence strategy.

1. Understand your ideal customer profile

Focus on what message, channels, and touchpoints resonate with your ideal customer profile (ICP). Although you can broadcast to a broad audience, this will result in a low conversion rate and waste time and resources.

Understanding your (ICP) can help you write email templates that resonate with your buyer’s pain points and challenges. Additionally, document information such as what communication channels work with your ICP.

2. Gather insights from your sales team

Get input from your sales team on what message resonates with prospects which will help you craft your email templates. Determine which communication channels your prospects will have a higher conversion rate, such as email, social media, or phone calls. 

The message and channel will play a critical role in your sequence strategy.

3. Use data to inform decisions

Use data to determine how long a typical sales cycle takes to ensure your sequence has the right amount of steps across an ideal time frame. 

HubSpot sequences give you data such as open rates, click rates, response rates, and meeting rates to see which email templates convert. Additionally, you’ll have data for which touchpoint and step number converted a lead into a meeting.

This valuable performance will help you craft your sequence by adding email templates that convert. 

4. Mix personalized and automated email templates

One of the benefits of HubSpot email sequences is that it allows you to add personalized and automated emails to your outreach.

Email automation can help you streamline your sales efforts, improve productivity and ensure you never miss an email. 

Although there are countless benefits to automated email templates, personalized emails can dramatically increase response rates.

Personalized emails can strengthen your prospecting efforts and stand out in your prospect’s inbox with highly relevant messaging. They can reference relevant information, especially any recently released news. 

The one drawback of personalization is that it takes much more time to research and write an email.

An effective sequence gives you the best of both worlds by mixing automated and personalized emails.

5. Use personalization tokens in email templates

HubSpot sequences allow you to add personalization tokens to your email templates. These tokens are snippets of information such as job title, company name, industry, and recent activity, such as the last website page visited.

These tokens make your emails sound personalized without the need to research or write the email. You’ll want to use the personalization tokens in the email editor to personalize your email.

They’re a great way to save hours of your week while adding a personal element to your emails.

6. Insert relevant content, meeting links, and snippets

When creating an email template, you can add various elements to improve the quality of your email. There are four key elements that you can insert by using your email editor: snippets, documents, meeting links, and videos.

• Snippets: Add single sentences or paragraphs frequently used in your emails. Snippets replace frequently written text, such as sales proposal information, contact details, customer stories, or onboarding instructions.
• Documents: Attach documents such as eBooks, whitepapers, or PDFs to an email template. This makes it easier for your prospect to find the content.
• Meeting links: Include a link for your email recipient to book a meeting on your calendar directly.
• Video: Record and embed video content right into your sales email.

7. Include a cold call or voicemail script

HubSpot sequences provide a section where you can leave a cold call or voicemail script for your sales team. Use this to your advantage by leaving a script or instructions for your sales team on what to do.

By eliminating any guessing, your sales team will be confident in knowing the actions to take and what to say.

What is the difference between HubSpot workflows and sequences?

If you’ve used HubSpot’s workflow feature before, you may have noticed some similarities to sequences.

Workflows can accomplish many of the same goals, such as lead nurturing, sales engagement, and automated emails. However, sequences are used for direct one-to-one communication with prospects, while workflows are best for one-to-many communications. 

Here’s a breakdown of some of the critical differences between sequences and workflows:

	Sequences	Workflows
Main Users	Sales reps	Marketers
Goals	1:1 communication used to convert prospects to meetings and deals	1:many communication sued to nurture and engage leads before they're handed off to sales
Use Case	Book meeting, close deals, engage prospects	Nurture leads, convert leads to prospects
Number of Contacts	Small number of qualified leads	Large number of leads
Type of Content	Sales emails, light content and text heavy. Use of calls and social media.	Well-designed emails.
End of Process	Contact unenrolled after they reply to an email, or book a meeting.	Contacts exit upon finishing workflow, or other triggers.

How to create a HubSpot sequence

Now that you’ve created a sequence strategy, it’s time to execute!

Here are a few things to consider before creating a HubSpot sequence:

• You need an assigned Sales Hub Professional, Enterprise, Service Hub Professional, or Enterprise seat.
• A connected email address 
• Permission to create and edit Sequences 

1. Select a type of sequence

HubSpot Sequences provides a handful of out-of-the-box sequences that can be used for several use cases, such as demo request follow-up, content download, and post-event follow-up. You can also start from scratch. 

By starting from scratch, you have many options, such as the number of automated emails, duration of the sequence, and timing. 

I recommend starting from scratch and building a sequence that matches your go-to-market strategy.

However, starting from a template will also be helpful if you’re entirely new to sales outreach. For this walkthrough, we’ll learn how to edit an existing sequence.

Once you’ve selected your option, click Create Sequence.

2. Build the sequence

You can change and edit multiple things once you’ve selected a sequence. 

First, you can rename your sequence to make it more relevant. I’d recommend using a naming convention that gives you an idea of the sequence. For example, if this sequence is specifically for demo request follow-up, then naming it “Demo Request” will be helpful.

As you scroll down, you’ll see that you have the option to edit the actual content of each step as well as the timing. For example, you are editing the email templates in an automated email. After editing the total number of business days, the task will be actioned.

3. Add tasks

You’ll be a plus (+) sign between each step in the sequence. Click on it to add a step between the existing steps in your sequence. 

Once you’ve clicked, you’ll see on the right-hand side numerous step options, including: 

• Automated email
• Email
• Call
• To-do
• LinkedIn Navigator – Send InMail (LinkedIn Sales Navigator license needed)
• LinkedIn Navigator – Connection Request (LinkedIn Sales Navigator license needed)

You can select different email templates to add or even phone calls. One helpful task to add is a prospect research to-do. It’s an excellent reminder to research them on LinkedIn before sending an email to make your message relevant. 

4. Customize email templates

You have the option to write your email templates. 

To do so, select the Automated email or Email task option, which will prompt an email editor window. It’s a blank canvas ready for you to write your message.

Additionally, you can add personalization tokens to include job titles or industries, which will automatically pull the correct data for each lead.

5. Complete your sequence

Lastly, edit or add all of the appropriate steps within your sequence. Consider the spacing between each step as well. For example, some days you’ll want three steps; on others, one customized email may be enough. 

Build an effective HubSpot email sequence by keeping the five elements mentioned above: steps, media, duration, spacing, and content.

6. Enroll contacts in a sequence

The last step, certainly not least, is enrolling your contacts into a completed sequence. Once you’ve finished creating your sequence, you’ll be directed to the main sequence page, where you can click “Enrolled contacts” in the top right to add contacts.

After enrolling contacts, your “Total Enrollments” number should increase. Now you can start engaging your prospects directly.

Measure sequence performance

HubSpot sequences provide robust analytics and data about your performance. Each sequence has a dashboard view that gives you a sense of its performance. The best practice is to measure how your sequence performs every week and tweak anything that needs optimizing.

It includes metrics such as:

• Total Enrollments
• Open Rate
• Reply Rate
• Meeting Rate
• No Response
• Bounce Rate

Top Tips When Using HubSpot Sequences

Using HubSpot sequences effectively can improve your sales process, ensuring more consistent follow-ups and land more meetings.

Here are some top tips to help you get the most out of HubSpot sequences.

1. Prepare Your Email Templates First

Before diving into sequence creation, make sure all your email templates are ready. This preparation saves you from the frustration of switching back and forth between creating sequences and templates.

Have a clear map of your sequence’s flow and craft each email to align with the progression of your sales process.

2. Manage Your Tasks Wisely

If you’re planning to enroll a large volume of contacts in sequences, be mindful of the tasks generated by these sequences.

Overloading your sequences with tasks can overwhelm you, defeating the purpose of automation. Prioritize essential and manageable tasks to ensure that nothing slips through the cracks. Remember, automated tasks should simplify your life, not complicate it.

3. Use a Flowchart to Visualize Your Sales Process

Map out your sales process with a flowchart and identify where sequences can automate repetitive tasks or follow-ups.

This visualization helps you see the sequential steps and potential branches in your process. Automating at these junctures can significantly enhance efficiency, ensuring no lead is neglected.

4. Track Sequence Impact with Custom Reports

Although HubSpot’s reporting on sequences can be limited, you can still gain valuable insights. Use the “Now in Sequence” field to create custom reports that track how sequences impact your sales, particularly Closed Won deals.

Set filters appropriately to capture all relevant data. This tracking is crucial for understanding the effectiveness of your sequences and refining them over time.

5. Post-Sale Engagement

Consider deploying sequences not just for closing sales but also for nurturing customer relationships post-sale.

For example, maintaining contact is crucial in industries like real estate, where the gap between sale and final closure is significant. A well-structured sequence can keep the buyer engaged and informed throughout the process, enhancing their experience and your reputation.

Getting started with HubSpot sequences

Hopefully, you’ve learned what HubSpot sequences are and how they can be used in your sales process. It’s a valuable tool for one-to-one communications with prospects and allows for numerous ways to reach your prospects, such as emails, phone calls, social media touchpoints, and more.

If you’re reaching out to warm leads, sequences allow you to send personalized and strategic messages.

With a robust sequences strategy, you should be able to increase your reply rates and meeting rates and win new customers. Now that you’ve learned about sequences, it’s time to get selling!

Frequently Asked Questions

What are HubSpot Sequences?

HubSpot sequences are a powerful tool for automating your sales outreach. They allow you to send a series of targeted email messages, phone calls and LinkedIn touchpoints to nurture leads and help move them down your sales funnel. Essentially, sequences help you maintain consistent communication with your leads, ensuring you send the right message at the right time without having to manage each step manually.

What is the difference between a workflow and a sequence in HubSpot?

While both workflows and sequences in HubSpot aim to automate tasks, they’re used for different purposes. Workflows are primarily used for broader marketing automation and can handle a variety of tasks beyond emails, such as updating contact properties, sending internal notifications, or even triggering webhooks. Workflows are ideal for larger-scale, more complex automation across different channels and can be triggered by a wide range of criteria.

Sequences, on the other hand, are more focused on one-to-one communication with prospects. They’re perfect for sales outreach where personalized, timely emails are crucial. Sequences work by enrolling contacts manually or through CRM integrations, and they stop automatically if the contact replies, ensuring a personalized interaction.

How do I trigger a sequence in HubSpot?

Triggering a sequence in HubSpot is straightforward. You can manually enroll contacts into a sequence from the contact record, company record, or deal record. Alternatively, sequences can also be triggered by using the HubSpot Sales Chrome extension or the HubSpot Sales Office 365 add-in. This flexibility means starting a sequence directly from your inbox is incredibly handy for maintaining workflow fluidity and context.

How many emails can you send in a sequence in HubSpot?

HubSpot allows you to build sequences with up to 50 emails. Planning each sequence thoughtfully is important to maintain engagement without overwhelming your contacts. Most effective sequences are much shorter, usually around 5 to 7 emails, spaced out over days or weeks, depending on your contacts’ sales cycle and engagement level. Each email in the sequence should offer value and guide your contact to the next step in their buyer’s journey.