Each year, HubSpot's INBOUND conference drives conversations and inspires new thinking in the marketing, sales, revenue operations, and customer success world. This year’s INBOUND 2024 delivered once again. As we dive into the key takeaways from this pivotal event, we'll uncover the strategies revenue leaders must adopt, the pitfalls they must avoid, and the opportunities they can't afford to miss.
AI is the top investment for revenue leaders
With AI disrupting traditional inbound tactics and profitability at the top of revenue leaders' minds across all segments and industries. In fact, AI is the top investment for revenue leaders globally — 10% higher than the second-highest investment. At the same time, revenue leaders shared that they are feeling challenged in keeping up with new technology and integrating AI into business processes. HubSpot’s response to this is to make AI easier to use, as seen in its latest AI features, Breeze Intelligence, Breeze Copilot, and Breeze Agents.
Leveraging HubSpot as a Data Powerhouse
Having a data strategy aligned to a deep understanding of the customer lifecycle is absolutely key to the future of sales, marketing, customer success, and revenue operations. This was a constant theme throughout INBOUND24. Of note is the importance of data relative to AI. The question for leaders is: how can AI help increase sales productivity, provide you with insights, and support customer connections if you don’t have data that is clean, integrated, and purposeful? HubSpot is playing a pivotal role in addressing this challenge by helping companies manage and act on that data effectively.
Is Inbound marketing dead?
To set the record straight: inbound isn’t dead—it’s evolving. It's clear that inbound remains a cornerstone when combined with other tactics like outbound and customer-led growth. As technology capabilities expand and AI transforms how we approach marketing, companies are discovering new ways to integrate inbound strategies that better align with buyer behavior. A discussion with Sam Jacobs highlighted the critical role of AI in enhancing inbound efforts. By leveraging AI-driven insights, companies can refine content production and analytics, making inbound more effective than ever. The top performers aren't abandoning inbound; they’re making it smarter, more data-driven, and more responsive to customer needs.
A Focus on Durable Growth and the Customer
One of the standout topics at INBOUND24 was the focus on durable growth. Successful companies aren’t just chasing new business—they're equally committed to retention, expansion, and profitability. When asked about their top priorities, leading revenue, marketing, and customer success teams emphasized balancing these goals to achieve sustainable success. This echoes what we found in our State of HubSpot 2024 Report: Revenue leaders rank profitability and net revenue retention as the most important metrics they are tracking today, and customer marketing as their second highest investment priority.
Conclusion: Thriving in a Disrupted Landscape
The takeaway from INBOUND24 is clear: the best aren’t just surviving—they're thriving by adapting their strategies, leveraging data, embracing new technologies like AI, and focusing on the customer. Inbound isn’t dead; it’s being reimagined to meet the needs of today’s buyers.
Key actions revenue leaders should consider as we move toward 2025 include:
- Invest in holistic data, including first-party data, to get the most out of AI.
- Focus on the customer, net-revenue retention complemented by new business excellence.
- Align around the metrics that matter for your organization and your customers.
Thank you to the 12,000+ revenue leaders that came together to talk about how to do things differently to win in the dawn of AI. The passion for HubSpot, the customer, data, and embracing technology among the entire ecosystem was inspiring, and New Breed is ready to unlock meaningful growth as we evolve for the future.
