Salesforce vs. HubSpot
Individuals, SMBs, and enterprises use CRMs to manage their relationships with potential and existing customers. In a market filled with many different types of CRMs, it can be difficult to choose the best one for you and your business.
We’ve written this guide to help you understand the main differences between Salesforce and HubSpot. Below, we describe how each platform differs in terms of features, pricing, usability, and customer type each is best suited for.
All of our recommendations are based upon extensive research, discussions with CRM users, and dozens of hours spent hand-testing the leading CRM software platforms. The details of our research process can be found on our CRM category page.
Comparison Summary
Salesforce and HubSpot are two of the most popular CRM solutions. We rated Salesforce 81 out of 100 and HubSpot 91 out of 100, respectively.
HubSpot was rated higher than Salesforce because HubSpot is better for small businesses. Both are advanced solutions, but HubSpot is much more user-friendly, is more of an all-in-one solution, and offers high-quality in-platform marketing tools. Salesforce was rated lower because its platform has a steep learning curve and is generally better for enterprises.
This breakdown shows our review criteria and the ratings that Salesforce and HubSpot received for each category.
| Criteria | Analyst Rating | Features | Usability | Pricing | Customer Support |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Salesforce | 81 | 8.75 | 7.5 | 7.5 | 8 |
| HubSpot | 91 | 9.5 | 9.5 | 8 | 9 |
Overall, both Salesforce and HubSpot are fairly expensive solutions. However, without the purchase of additional functionalities, Salesforce is more affordable than HubSpot.
Salesforce’s most popular plan costs $150 per month and its most expensive plan costs $300 per month. In contrast, HubSpot’s most expensive plan costs $4,000 per month. However, it should be noted that HubSpot offers a robust free CRM plan, while Salesforce does not.
Both Salesforce and HubSpot offer standard CRM features. This includes tools for lead capture, contact and deal management, workflow automation, and insights reporting. Overall, HubSpot offers higher quality versions of almost all of the features listed above, except for lead capture through live chat and insights reporting.
Overall, Salesforce is best for those who are looking to scale their business to an enterprise level. It is also one of the more customizable CRMs available, making it an ideal solution for those who have unique workflows and need specialized features.
HubSpot is ideal for medium and large businesses that need an all-in-one CRM solution to support complex workflows. However, its platform is user-friendly enough for those who are newer to CRM software. It is also beneficial for those who need high-quality digital marketing tools – including for email and social media.
Here’s a few key differences between the solutions to determine which is best for you:
- You want to scale your business to an enterprise level
- You want a highly customizable CRM platform
- You want a solution that is HIPAA compliant
- You want a solution that better supports SMBs
- You want a more user-friendly, advanced CRM solution
- You need high-quality digital marketing tools
Table of Contents
- Comparison Summary
- Salesforce & HubSpot Price Comparison
- Salesforce & HubSpot Feature Comparison
- Salesforce & HubSpot Top Feature Comparison
- Bottom Line
Salesforce & HubSpot Price Comparison
Overall, without the purchase of additional functionalities, Salesforce is cheaper than HubSpot. Salesforce’s most expensive plan costs $300 per month. In contrast, HubSpot’s most expensive plan costs $4000 per month. However, it should be noted that HubSpot offers a robust free plan, while Salesforce does not.
Salesforce Pricing Details
Salesforce’s pricing ranges from $25 to $300 per month. All Salesforce plans are charged on an annual basis. Salesforce also offers a free 30-day trial for each plan.
Here’s an overview of Salesforce’s pricing plans:
| Salesforce Plan | Pricing |
|---|---|
| Essentials | $25 per month |
| Professional | $75 per month |
| Enterprise | $150 per month |
| Unlimited | $300 per month |
HubSpot Pricing Details
HubSpot’s pricing ranges from $50 to $4,000 per month. You can also save up to 10% if you pay for the annual subscription of the Starter or Professional plan upfront. HubSpot also offers a free trial of its individual products and a free CRM plan.
Here’s an overview of HubSpot’s plans and pricing:
| HubSpot Plan | Pricing |
|---|---|
| Starter | $50 per month |
| Professional | $1780 per month |
| Enterprise | $4000 per month |
Salesforce & HubSpot Feature Comparison
Salesforce and HubSpot offer standard and advanced CRM features. This includes those for lead capture, contact and deal management, workflow automation, and insights reporting.
You’ll notice below that Salesforce and HubSpot offer the same CRM features. Therefore, it’s imperative that when comparing the two solutions, you focus on the quality of each platform’s features, which we describe later on.
For a full analysis of each solution’s features, read our Salesforce review and HubSpot review.
| Feature | Salesforce | HubSpot |
|---|---|---|
| Lead Capture Forms | Yes | Yes |
| Lead Capture Social Media | Yes | Yes |
| Lead Capture Live Chat | Yes | Yes |
| Lead Capture Email | Yes | Yes |
| Contact Profiles | Yes | Yes |
| Custom Contact Fields | Yes | Yes |
| Contact Activity Feed | Yes | Yes |
| Contact List Segmentation | Yes | Yes |
| Contact Tags/ Categories | Yes | Yes |
| Email Marketing | Yes | Yes |
| Social Media Marketing | Yes | Yes |
| Direct Messaging | Yes | Yes |
| Phone Calls | Yes | Yes |
| Pipelines | Yes | Yes |
| Tasks | Yes | Yes |
| Task Reminders | Yes | Yes |
| Lead Scoring | Yes | Yes |
| Triggered Events | Yes | Yes |
| Insights Reporting | Yes | Yes |
| Mobile CRM | Yes | Yes |
| Integrations | Yes | Yes |
Salesforce & HubSpot Top Feature Comparison
Below we provide our in-depth analysis of the five key feature categories that are included in Salesforce and HubSpot – lead capture, contact and deal management, workflow automation, and insights reporting.
Overall, when compared to Salesforce, HubSpot is the better choice for all of these feature categories except insights reporting. HubSpot’s features are also more user-friendly, especially for an advanced CRM.
Lead Capture
Salesforce and HubSpot offer similar lead capture methods – forms, social media, live chat, and email. Both offer Facebook Lead Ads, and a Chrome email extension that captures information from the emails you’ve sent and received.
They mainly differ in terms of lead capture forms, which is of higher quality in HubSpot, and lead capture by live chat, which is of higher quality in Salesforce.
Lead Capture Forms
HubSpot’s lead capture form feature lets you create simple and complex forms including embedded, standalone page, and pop-up box forms. Salesforce only lets you create simple, embeddable forms.
Also, an advantage of HubSpot’s lead forms is that you can customize the appearance of your forms through the use of templates, and preview what it will look like before you publish it. Salesforce does not offer any of these capabilities.
Lead Capture Through Live Chat
Both Salesforce and HubSpot offer live chat tools that let you capture someone’s information while you are chatting with them. However, Salesforce’s live chat feature is better for handling a large number of live chat requests at once.
As shown above, this is because Salesforce offers key organizational tools, while HubSpot does not. This includes the ability to have multiple chat tabs open at the same time, and to create customized lists of your chats.
Contact Management
Both Salesforce and HubSpot offer robust contact management tools that let you create detailed contact profiles and organize your contacts in an efficient manner. Both solutions are useful for managing over 50 contacts at once. However, HubSpot’s contact management feature is more robust because it offers contact activity feeds that track where someone is in your sales process.
Contact Activity Feed
Being able to track a contact’s activity lets you know which actions are best to take next to make sure someone is progressing through your sales funnel. It also reduces the chance of losing a lead.
HubSpot offers an activity feed for each of your contacts, which can include important information related to the communication channels used, your team, and actions like form submissions and page views.
Deal Management
Deal management within a CRM includes managing pipelines, tasks, and lead scoring. While HubSpot’s pipeline feature is more user-friendly, both are able to support over 50 simultaneous deals at once. The solutions primarily differ in terms of task management and lead scoring, both of which are superior in HubSpot.
Task Management
CRM tasks are actions that need to be taken in order to bring a deal to completion. Overall, HubSpot’s task management feature is more robust than Salesforce’s task management feature.
Unlike Salesforce, HubSpot lets you customize the names of your tasks. You can also set reminders in terms of minutes, weeks, and on a custom date and time. Salesforce only lets you set reminders on a custom date.
Lead Scoring
Salesforce and HubSpot lets you assign numerical values to a lead. This reflects how likely a lead is to become a paying customer, and lets your sales representatives spend their time on the most lucrative deals. Overall, HubSpot’s lead scoring is more robust because you can create unique scoring rules.
Workflow Automation
Salesforce and HubSpot offer workflow automation tools that automate common tasks through the use of tools, apps, and technology. Overall, HubSpot is the better choice for workflow automation because its automation tools are more user-friendly and can be used to create simple and complex workflows.
Both HubSpot and Salesforce offer triggered events, but Salesforce’s triggered events tool is much more limiting. HubSpot lets you perform actions related to internal and external communications, record and task creation, record reassignment, and list, ads, and property management. Salesforce’s triggered events feature only lets you create new tasks, email alerts, and field updates.
As shown below, HubSpot also offers sequences as a workflow automation tool. Sequences let you send automated follow up emails where the content is highly targeted to the potential lead. These are best for maintaining 1:1 relationships between leads and sales representatives.
Insights Reporting
Salesforce and HubSpot both offer important insights reports like deals won and lost, pipeline progression, sales forecasting, and sales funnel performance. Overall, Salesforce’s insights reporting feature is more advanced and robust than HubSpot’s. This is because Salesforce offers more data points, and is better for creating dashboards.
Unlike HubSpot, Salesforce also lets you create reports related to your marketing campaigns, administrative actions like new login locations, and user screen flows. Salesforce also gives you more options as to where you can drag and drop and how much you can resize reports in a dashboard.
Bottom Line
Overall, HubSpot is the better choice for SMBs, even though its platform is one of the most expensive. This is mainly because of its user-friendliness and quality of features. This includes lead capture forms, contact and deal management, and workflow automation.
In contrast, many of Salesforce’s features, except for its live chat and insights reporting feature, have a steeper learning curve and are of lower quality. Overall, Salesforce is better for those who plan to scale their business to an enterprise level. It’s also best for those looking to personalize their CRM with specific features.
If you’re interested, visit Salesforce or HubSpot today to get started.