Subscribe
Share
Share
Embed
HubSpot CEO Brian Halligan has seen a huge shift in the marketing industry since he co-founded his company HubSpot with Dharmesh Shah in 2006. I sit down with him to discuss why he started HubSpot, whether Inbound marketing still works, why he retired the funnel in favour of the flywheel and what the future marketer looks like.
You probably know Brian Halligan as the co-founder and CEO of HubSpot. Or as the person who coined the term ‘inbound marketing’. Brian is one of the B2B world’s most sought-after CEOs. He took HubSpot from a scrappy startup to a profitable (and enduring) public company. He knows what it takes to not only build a great company, but transform an industry in the process.
Support this podcast by buying me a coffee (or 3...) ☕
In our conversation we cover a lot of ground talking all things marketing. We start off with a whistlestop tour of Brian's career and why he started HubSpot, to then getting into the weeds of marketing in 2019.
0:01 - Intro
0:47 - Brian's background and career
2:02 - Why did Brian (and Dharmesh) start HubSpot?
4:00 - How Brian met his co-founder Dharmesh
5:48 - What is the dynamic like between Dharmesh and Brian
7:18 - Do you need to find a co-founder with complimentary skills?
9:19 - How did HubSpot get the early customers? Brians FOB.
10:50 - Was Inbound a thing before they started HubSpot?
11:56 - What is inbound?
13:05 - It's so cheap to start making content these days
13:43 - What was it like introducing a brand new category?
15:51 - Is it still a good strategy to start your own category?
17:25 - Is there marketing buzzword fatigue in 2019
18:33 - The agency partner program - why did HubSpot put so much emphasis on it?
20:36 - Build out an in house team or use agencies?
21:33 - What does the future marketer look like?
22:39 - All marketers should learn how to code
23:33 - Why we're living in a great age for learning
24:28 - The HubSpot Academy. Why did they invest in the acedemy? Give away a lot and use that content to pull people in
25:38 - What are Brian's thoughts on Freemium?
27:30 - You'd be batshit crazy not to use HubSpot
27:47 - What is next for HubSpot?
31:07 - When did HubSpot start to shift to an all-on-one-platform?
33:00 - Adding value to HubSpot instead of competing with tools. "You're either a Hub or a Spoke"
33:58 - How does HubSpot stay agile to compete with smaller companies, or are they trying to work with them?
35:18 - Does inbound marketing still work?
36:47 - Success in marketing is very much the width of your brain, not the width of your wallet.
37:59 - How can new companies use content marketing to grow. It's a quality over quantity game.
40:05 - Why did HubSpot retire the funnel and introduce the flywheel
Twitter: https://twitter.com/jmckinven
Brains's Twitter: https://twitter.com/bhalligan
The weekly marketing and entrepreneurship podcast where I jump into interviews with some of the most interesting people I have met throughout my career. From CMOs and agency founders to social media executives and freelancers, you'll hear their different perspectives on marketing and how to build a brand.