Many Drift users use HubSpot to manage sales and marketing automation and maintain contact records. With our integration, you can send captured leads and activity in Drift over to your HubSpot instance! 

Billing Plan: Our HubSpot integration is available only on Drift's Premium, Advanced and Enterprise plans.

In this article, we'll cover:

• Installing on HubSpot hosted pages
• Requirements for the integration
• Functionalities of the integration
• Identifying known HubSpot users 
• Configuring the HubSpot integration
• Disconnecting and Uninstalling HubSpot from Drift
• FAQs and Troubleshooting

Installing on HubSpot Hosted Pages

If you'd like to connect Drift to your HubSpot hosted page you can follow the directions here and copy the JavaScript snippet from Drift here to insert. 

Requirements

• Our HubSpot integration is available only on Drift's Premium Plan and above.
• This integration requires a HubSpot account with API access turned on (should be all plans).
• The user who connects this integration also needs to be a superadmin in HubSpot. 

HubSpot Integration Functionalities

The Drift/HubSpot integration keeps your leads and accounts synced with your HubSpot contacts and companies, according to the settings configured in the previous section. Syncs run at least every 5 minutes. No manual actions are required after your setup.

• All new contacts added into Drift, from the moment you connect the integration and forward, will be automatically synced in to HubSpot's database as soon as they provide their email. If you would like to to delay this, you can do that in your HubSpot Sync Settings. 
• If you have contacts in HubSpot, those contacts will be recognized by Drift as well using HubSpot's cookie!
• When a conversation is closed in Drift, we sync attributes for the contact.
• We also log the Drift conversation link as an event on the HubSpot record.

Figure 1: Infogram of syncing contacts

HubSpot events are only available on the HubSpot Pro and HubSpot Enterprise plans. To use HubSpot events as triggers, you will need to have the HubSpot Enterprise plan. 

Automatically identify users via the HubSpot cookie

• After integrating HubSpot with Drift, if somebody gets cookied via HubSpot (they filled out a HubSpot form, clicked on a link from a HubSpot email), the next time they come to your site, we'll already know who they are and their email address - it's like magic!
• If somebody is cookied but there is no contact email in HubSpot, when they do provide an email within a conversation, we'll create a form in HubSpot named "Drift" and make a submission to that form with that email and cookie.
• Note: This will only work from the moment this is turned on and forwards. It will not work with historically identified contacts.
• Note: HubSpot will not identify contacts from Drift that have been added to Drift via a CSV upload.

If cookie identification is disabled or a contact did not have the HubSpot cookie, created contacts will be labeled in HubSpot as "Offline Source"

Figure 2: Infogram of user lookup flow

Things to Note: A HubSpot form will NOT be submitted if the site visitor is already a known contact in HubSpot and they are not assigned a HubSpot cookie. Even if, the site visitor provides their email address in the conversation, once this conversation closes a new HubSpot form will not be submitted. 

Below is what the Drift event looks like in the HubSpot timeline. To learn more about HubSpot Events, click here!

Figure 3: Drift events in the HubSpot timeline

Since we’re sending events to HubSpot, you’ll also be able to create lists based on:

• New conversations
• Messages being sent

If you want to learn more about what Drift properties in HubSpot mean, click here.

Configuring the HubSpot integration

To setup the HubSpot integration:

1. Head to Settings > App Settings > Integrations > HubSpot, or, click here.

Figure 4: Highlighting the HubSpot integration tile

 

2. Log in with your HubSpot credentials.

 

Synced HubSpot Data

Under Synced HubSpot Data, you can choose to sync leads, set lead ownership, send Drift activity and/or chat transcripts to HubSpot.

Figure 5: The HubSpot synced data settings in Drift

 

With HubSpot, you also have the option to create the contact only when the conversation is closed.  If this box is checked, your contacts will be pushed upon a conversation closed status.   Left unchecked, contacts will be pushed to HubSpot immediately when an email is captured. All other attributes and data will be pushed at the time the conversation is closed.

You can also filter which leads get synced to HubSpot by setting a minimum CQL score.  Simply click the checkbox and you can set the CQL threshold of your choosing. If left unchecked we will sync conversations with a negative CQL. The only time we would not sync over a conversation with a negative CQL is if this check box is enabled with a CQL score of 1 or higher.
 

Using the HubSpot Cookie

You can elect to Identify Drift visitors with the HubSpot cookie so that when a user you've identified in HubSpot engages with your greeting or Playbook, we'll have their email address pre-populated in the conversation view. 
This is also under Synced HubSpot Data.

Things to Note: HubSpot does not support cookie emails from HubSpot sales. Emails must be sent with HubSpot marketing for the tracking cookie to be sent along with a link click.

Mapped HubSpot Attributes

You'll most likely want to sync many pieces of contact data onto your HubSpot records. Mapping attributes will ensure you get the most data out of Drift and into HubSpot.

Figure 6: The HubSpot integration mapped attribute screen in Drift

For the full doc on mapping attributes in HubSpot, click here.

Mapped HubSpot Users

Under Mapped HubSpot Users, is where you map your HubSpot users to Drift users for the purposes of lead ownership. Clicking Map New HubSpot Users will add more fields so you can add additional teammates. Please ensure that your mapped users have their first and last name filled out in their HubSpot profile. This step must be completed for the integration to function properly.

Things to Note: If you leave your user mappings blank, the integration between Drift and HubSpot will not work properly. This step  must be completed to have a functioning connection.

Figure 7: The Mapped users screen in Drift

The Event Log

To check the activity that you're syncing to HubSpot, you can always check your Event Log. You can sort by time period, and activity, including errors. Errors will appear in red.

Figure 8: HubSpot integration Event Log in Drift

Disconnecting and Uninstalling HubSpot from Drift

To disconnect the connection between Drift and HubSpot:

1. Log into Drift and go to the Settings > Integrations > HubSpot and click Disconnect.

Figure 9: Highlighting the Disconnect button in the Drift HubSpot Integration settings page

To uninstall Drift from your HubSpot account, we recommend you follow the instructions in this HubSpot Knowledge Base article.

Things to note: If you disconnect your HubSpot account from Drift, lead & account data will no longer sync to HubSpot contacts & companies and vice versa. Existing data will remain on your HubSpot records.

FAQs and Troubleshooting

Why don't I see a lead/contact created in Drift synced to HubSpot?

First, go to the most recent conversation with this contact in Drift. If you enabled Create contact only on conversation closed, make sure that this conversation was closed either by the bot or by a user in your organization. 

Then, check the event log. Sort by date and time and check to see if there's an event for that lead or contact. Check both the time at which the conversation started and the time at which the conversation was closed (you can see these timestamps in the conversation view). If you see an error, you can try to re-open and re-close the conversation to try the sync again, or you'll see helpful information about why the sync failed, i.e., improper permissions or field type access. If you don't see an error, check the conversation and make sure that the lead or contact meets your Sync settings, such as minimum CQL score, if you're using that feature.