Community-Driven Growth in 2025

In a world overflowing with content and competition, the most powerful differentiator might just be connection. In this Avidly Talks episode, Paul sits down with Oscar Robles to unpack what it really means to build community—particularly through programs like HubSpot’s HUGs. They explore the role of trust, personal relationships, and purpose-driven engagement in creating communities that last. Whether you're just starting out or looking to deepen existing relationships, this conversation offers practical steps for turning customers and peers into loyal advocates. Let’s explore the key insights from their discussion.

Listen to the Full Episode here

Listen on Spotify

Takeaways from this episode:

• Building trust is essential for community engagement.
• Community can be defined as a group of people with a common interest.
• Starting small and focused is better than trying to reach everyone at once.
• Community leaders create conditions for connection to happen.
• Customer advisory councils can provide valuable feedback and insights.
• Measuring success in community engagement takes time and should be gradual.
• Engaged customers can help foster a thriving community.
• Community building can lead to increased customer retention and satisfaction.
• Personal connections enhance the value of community interactions.
• Niche communities can be more effective than broad ones.

Chapters 

00:00 Introduction to Community Building and HUGS
10:10 The Importance of Trust in Community
16:02 Defining Community and Its Expressions
22:40 Starting and Growing a Community
23:24 Setting Goals for Community Engagement
28:02 Practical Steps for Community Building

Building Communities That Matter: Insights from Avidly Talks with Oscar Eriksson

In an increasingly digital and dispersed world, one thing remains powerful: community. In this episode of Avidly Talks, Paul is joined by Oscar Eriksson to unpack what it really takes to build meaningful communities—especially within the HubSpot ecosystem.

From defining what a community actually is to outlining practical strategies for sparking and sustaining engagement, this conversation dives deep into why trust, consistency, and real human connection are more important than ever. Whether you're nurturing a local HubSpot User Group (HUG) or building a customer advisory council, the principles remain the same: start small, stay focused, and always lead with value.

Let’s explore the key takeaways from this episode.

1. Community Starts with Trust

At its core, a community is a network of people who feel connected by a shared purpose. Oscar emphasizes that trust is the foundation—it’s what turns attendees into contributors and customers into advocates. Without trust, you’re just hosting events. With it, you’re building loyalty.

2. What Is a Community, Really?

Oscar challenges listeners to think beyond vanity metrics and define community by depth, not breadth. A community isn’t a mailing list or a group of followers—it’s an engaged group that shares experiences, offers feedback, and grows together.

3. Small Efforts Create Big Impact

You don’t need hundreds of people to get started. In fact, Oscar encourages small, focused groups where meaningful conversations can happen. Even a dozen people showing up regularly can build momentum that grows over time—especially when those people feel seen and heard.

4. How to Start (and Sustain) a Community

Starting a HUG or community initiative? Here are a few tips from Oscar:

• Start with purpose: Define why this community should exist.

• Be consistent: Regular touchpoints, even small ones, build trust over time.

• Mix formats: Online, in-person, one-on-one—all have value.

• Invite feedback: Community members want to shape the experience too.

5. Set Clear Goals

Without goals, you can’t measure success—or learn from your efforts. Oscar recommends identifying what success looks like for your community. It might be feedback loops, increased customer retention, or even product input via advisory councils. Align your actions with your purpose.

6. Don’t Underestimate Personal Connections

Automation has its place, but nothing beats the power of a personal touch. Reaching out individually, remembering names, and following up post-event aren’t just nice-to-haves—they’re how you turn community into a competitive advantage.

Conclusion: Lead with Empathy, Build with Intention

Community building isn’t about scale. It’s about connection. Whether you’re leading a HUG, running customer events, or nurturing an internal user group, the key is to start with people—not platforms.

As Oscar puts it, the most successful communities are the ones built slowly, with care, intention, and a genuine desire to serve. Ready to get started?

Transcript:

Paul (00:16.86)
Welcome to Avidly Talks. This week we're joined by Oscar Robles, Senior Marketing Manager of the Hugs Program at HubSpot. That's the HubSpot user group. So if you've been to one of our many HubSpot user group events, Oscar is the man behind the scenes who helps us put those on. How you doing, Oscar?

Oscar (01:09.326)
You're doing great. Yeah, thank you for the intro.

Paul (01:11.696)
Where are connecting with you? Where are you?

Oscar (01:14.496)
I'm currently in my house that I just put on the market. I just actually went under contract, so I'm selling my house right now, was a community effort in another way, if you will. But I live in New England. I'm in Connecticut.

Paul (01:32.858)
Nice. And what's sort of, what have I interrupted? What's a normal day look like for you as sort of managing the Hugs program?

Oscar (01:42.592)
yeah, great question. So, you know, on the day to day, I really see myself as like, you know, the hug leader of hug leaders, if you will, right? You know, like you all have your communities and you are my community in a sense. And so part of that is one, just like, you know, being in touch with you all. Like I've actually had, this is my fourth.

conversation with a Hug Leader this week, which I really enjoy. So just getting to know my community in that way and the other communities that are connected to HubSpot the ecosystem at large kind of through those relationships. So on a regular day, I'm probably having a chat with a Hug Leader. I'm checking in on our Hug Leader Slack. I'm talking with some of our other Academy program, like my colleagues in our Academy programs team. It's like what's happening over at boot camps, what's happening with Community Champions, kind of being

connected to my colleagues there. So I can see if there's opportunities to share or cross-pollinate engagement between our different buckets of work. So that's something I'm also looking for. I also lately have been really involved in the data capture of the efficacy of what our work is doing in Hugs and how are we connecting the activity that's happening in our HubSpot user groups and the events that are taking place there with a customer's engagement with our product.

tools, right? So are we really kind of threading the needle between what happens when a customer attends a hug and does their usage of HubSpot go up in the next 30, 60, 90 days? So I'm looking at kind of the story there with the data. And then also after or before someone connects to HubSpot user group, like what's the customer journey behind that? know, do we send them to a boot camp? Do we try to engage them as a community champion? Do we elevate them for an opportunity to lead a hug at some point in

future, you know? Are they part of our Solutions Partner program, right? And so are there connections to be made there? So some of my time during the day is also spent looking at that and looking for opportunities like that, whether it's with our Strategic Partnerships team, our Solutions Partner team. But you know, HUGS really exists at this intersection within HubSpot's ecosystem that's really unique and gives a lot of opportunity to connect with other areas of the business.

Paul (03:58.95)
Let me think, do you get many HubSpot user group leaders who aren't HubSpot app or solutions partners like we are?

Oscar (04:07.704)
We have had a few. We have a few direct customers who are H.U.G. which I always think is an interesting perspective to have in the cohort.

Paul (04:15.281)
Yeah.

Oscar (04:16.43)
because they themselves, they're maybe receiving a lot of those services from solutions or app partners, right? And they're using the product in a very unique and specific way to grow their own business, right? There's something different about having a direct customer be engaged with a hug or a community champion be engaged with a hug, right? Like their relationship to HubSpot is valuable to have kind of like in the orb or the planet of, the sole system even of the

that use a group community.

Paul (04:47.782)
You couldn't get even, you couldn't get more of an evangelist of the product either. as anybody who comes to one of our user group events knows, we're there to, you know, market the product and help people with the product. Not everybody who joins one of the communities is one of our customers. In fact, quite the opposite. And we're not there to get everybody as a customer, but it is one of the by-product benefits for someone like Avidly. But it's not an aim.

Oscar (04:51.842)
That's right.

Paul (05:15.898)
Whereas if you're just a direct user, it's just for love of the product. So I guess that's just a great community ethos, which made me think as well of just to illustrate how much you buy into this for people listening and perhaps are aware of your role behind the scenes. If you've been to Inbound and you've seen the HUG meetup area and you've seen the HUG's...

No pun intended, but the hugs being dished out by you Oscar and the goodies being given away and you really do buy into looking after your community.

Oscar (05:43.864)
Yeah.

Oscar (05:48.366)
Yeah, absolutely. And I love inbound for those moments where because the program's global, international program, you're across the pond, if you will, for me, right? We have a big presence in EMEA, in Latam, in APAC even. Some of our strongest HUC leaders, our most engaged community members are abroad. And so the opportunity to connect with you all face to face and in person at inbound has been really special for me.

put real faces and bodies to names, know, and see behind the screens or get beyond the screen even. And I really enjoyed those moments to connect with you all for sure. And in those moments too, like I've had people come up to me and say like, I attended a hug and XYZ happened or it helped me learn how to do this. And I was able to share it with my teammate. And now we have, you know, we saw this growth in this area or we saw the ease of use in this area. And like, that's also something I really love about having, you know,

space at inbound for our HubSpot user group program because not only are HUG leaders coming together and connecting and I'm having that opportunity to connect with you all, but I'm also having the opportunity to connect with customers who attend HUBs because I don't really get that experience that often, right? Because I'm so maybe like two or three steps removed as the program manager of it, right? And I love those moments too. And I've had a handful that have been really special, like anecdotal data, if you will, on the power and the impact that the user group program has.

Paul (07:17.926)
No, they definitely do on your, essentially your end users, your HubSpot customers, the, I'm picturing people who come to one of our physical ones regularly. They come every time. They're not, they don't work with Avidly. They don't partner with Avidly, they answer other people's questions. They recommend, I don't know, join this online hug as well. And yeah, it really is a cultivated community.

Oscar (07:42.68)
Yeah, I love that.

Paul (07:43.888)
well worth joining. If you are a HubSpot user and you're not a member of a HubSpot user group, what's the best way for people to go and find the masker?

Oscar (07:51.598)
Oh, great question. So you can see all of our user groups and all of our upcoming events within the program at events.hubspot.com. Really easy, really simple. It'll take you to our platform where we host our hugs and the virtual events that are happening there. And you'll find information to in-person events if they're happening locally for you. The way that it's kind of broken down, you can search by tag, hashtag if you want, if you're looking for a particular event on, let's just say, sales.

marketing alignment or on generative AI or on one of our hubs service hub you know you can search those hashtags and you know if you're connecting virtually the way to connect virtually is right there on that site and then as I mentioned if there are events that are being hosted in person it'll tell you all the details related to that as well you can learn more about the hug program overall on that site too it's it's a way to get access to the events and the groups for sure but if you want to just learn more about how spot user groups and what we're doing here

with our community-led programming at HubSpot, can get information about that as well.

Paul (08:55.868)
and they're free. I don't think any of them are paid for, are they?

Oscar (08:59.638)
No, they are free. That's right. It's our philosophy that we want to provide the opportunity to connect and learn with each other without the barrier of cost.

Paul (09:12.38)
So this isn't just a sales pitch for better people to join. How many are there by the way? How many hugs are there in the world?

Oscar (09:21.966)
We have about 125 groups worldwide.

Paul (09:24.432)
Wow, nice. Yeah, so find one topic for you. It could be the same topic every time. It could always be about Sales Hub or it could be a particular new feature online that you could go and you'll see the future events that they send out and also.

join some in your local area if they're in person as well, good to network and connect, which is why we're talking to you, Oscar. We want to get your thoughts on community building, events, and the HubSpot community at large here, but through the lens of, like I said at the top, you know, harder and harder to get organic traffic, fewer people sort of trusting companies, people that we know, 70 % of people listen to individuals rather than brands. A community is a big part of that.

Before we talk work, tell us about the dog.

Oscar (10:14.606)
I know right he's being a little distracting he's back here.

Paul (10:18.788)
He's just completely distracting me. just went then.

Oscar (10:21.454)
Yeah, this is my dog Willie. Yeah, he's my coworker, my full-time coworker that I have here. work remotely. He's a box or terrier mix. Yeah. Yeah, he's making an appearance on the show.

Paul (10:29.412)
Is he a colleague?

There he is, I could only see his muzzle. nice.

Paul (10:41.244)
I got a video off my wife today of our Labrador Reggie. She nipped home for something and he was on the sofa and she was, he's not meant to be. She called him out on it and his face was like, shit. Yeah, on camera as well. Yeah, anyway, we were saying communities, important.

Oscar (10:49.954)
Thank

Oscar (10:53.496)
Hahaha

Oscar (10:57.454)
Caught caught red pawed

Paul (11:06.234)
The word of mouth marketing important for supporting your customers, keeping your existing customers happy. They're good for market research. They're good for insights. You're facilitating all these hugs and meetups. Why would you encourage people to start fostering and cultivating their own community, whether they're a restaurant or a B2B widget manufacturer? There's a place for it.

Oscar (11:30.316)
Yeah. Yeah. mean, I think, you know, the first thing that comes to mind for me is the, it's trust, you know, like it's, it's the trust, building trust with, with your community, building trust with your network. I mean, I can't tell you how many times I've done something, went somewhere, purchased something because a friend of mine told me about it and I trust them. So because I trust them, here's a perfect example. Last time I went to a restaurant, I'd never been to before with my friend.

Paul (11:50.011)
Yes.

Oscar (11:58.002)
And I got there like a few minutes after, went with two buddies of mine. And I got there, I was the third person to get there, right? So one buddy was already sitting down, another one, he had to make a phone call. So I sat down and he was like, I got you a beverage. I ordered you a beverage. And I was, because the waitress was coming, she was like, you would you like a drink? And he was like, I got you something already. You're gonna love it. And I was like, okay. You know, and.

It was like a cranberry lime seltzer, which I don't even really drink seltzer like that, but I drank the whole thing. I enjoyed it, you know? And I didn't even question it at all.

Paul (12:29.424)
Yes.

Oscar (12:30.038)
I didn't even push back on like, no, actually I want X, Y, Z, you know, like because I trust him, you know, and then he ordered something on the menu. I got the same thing and it was great. You know, like I, was a sandwich I never would have had before. You know what I mean? and I never would have even went to this place, this restaurant if he hadn't recommended it, but because I trust him and we have community with each other, we have a relationship with each other, I'm willing, you know, to buy and I'll be back. I'll bring someone else because I actually had a really great experience. The food was great, you know? So in addition to the fact that like, you know, I had this trust built in that brought me in the

then I received a positive experience. had a good service, right? Good food, good atmosphere, et cetera. And so I'll be back and I'll be back and I'll probably bring someone else, someone new. You know what mean? So that's a really kind of a simple example of the power of community. when you think about like, know.

expanding your business even, right? But it starts with trust. That's the entry point, you know, and building, being able to build on trust and build on those connections.

is how we maybe even flip on the head or how we get beyond this as you were talking about, like feeling little bit of slugs in the mud, right? Things are really slowing down, like the way that folks are searching, the way that folks are finding opportunities, marketing is changing. AI is really having an influence, positive or negative influence, it's having an influence on the way that we market and the way that we advertise ourselves, the way that we talk about the events that are coming up. so, know, people find certain things even, right? So honestly, I think as the tech

technology is expanding, I'm seeing almost not as like an antithesis to that because I think folks are buying into it. Of course, for sure here at HubSpot, we're building a number of tools that have been really impactful for businesses. At the same time as I see this trend going up, I also see correlated trend of relationships and the peer review of certain things also going up. So it's not just about what

Oscar (14:27.32)
HubSpot does and builds and the products that we build and we make, but what people are saying about them, how people are actually using them. I don't just want to know what the latest feature or tool is. I want to know how...

Stacy used that tool to, to, to, to close 10 deals this week. That's what I want to know. You know what I mean? So what I loved about spotlight, I don't know if you, you checked out some of the content from spotlight that happened last week, right? So what I loved about what the team did around not just talking about the 200 plus features that were being released, but here are three or four solid, like the use cases of these tools, right? Here is this person, this real person, this real business, this real use of the tool.

and it's real impact, it's real outcome. So I think the word of mouth and the community building and the relationship building is, it's almost kind of like we got away from that, right? And if you think about the last 10, 15 years with the social media and everyone kind of being isolated, disconnected, the pandemic, right? People were just very much so apart. It's almost like in the same response as we're seeing, you know.

new technology is coming out, right? The same response to that is we're seeing more desire for connection, more desire for that relationship, more desire for community.

Paul (15:47.972)
Maybe it needs reminding to people, what would you, what are you meaning by a community? Because obviously we have, yeah, no, I won't answer it for you. Define a community for us.

Oscar (16:02.222)
Yeah, I define community as a collection of people regardless of size. like, know, without regardless of size, but a collection of people who are coming together around a common interest, around a common passion, around a common location, or around, you know, something that that's bringing them together, like, you know, whether it's internal or external. So a community for me is like, you know, it can be community or practice, like, hey, we all, you know, we're all marketers here.

right? Or it could be like a community of principle in a way, like you know we all believe in this certain thing, right? And so we're, so those are the ways that I kind of define communities, like people coming together around a common goal, you know we all want to see this outcome, right?

Paul (16:46.3)
So it's not necessarily then a, I mean it could be, but it's not necessarily a WhatsApp group or a Facebook group. It's not necessarily a forum online or a group that meets every Wednesday morning in that coffee shop. It can be those things, but it doesn't have to be.

Oscar (17:03.458)
And I see those, right, exactly. And I see those things as expressions of the community, vehicles in which the community connects with each other. Because the community, it's first and foremost a group of people. Whether those people are, you know, converse over that Facebook group or show up at that coffee shop, it still starts with the people.

Paul (17:24.264)
Now, the HubSpot group community, the HubSpot user group community, it makes sense. the setup there is there are these different user groups that your users can come and join to get support from their peers. You've got a lot of customers around the world. You've got a lot of new software updates. Like you said, 200 last week. There'll be another 100 this month. It's like changes. You need that support.

Have you seen some good communities or can we make a translation to somebody who isn't a big software business with thousands of users and perhaps, we're not talking about somebody connecting with people like themselves. How do you facilitate your customers to meet together? Because you might have customers who have on the face of it nothing in common. How do you find something in common to rally people around?

Oscar (18:21.838)
Well, if they're your customers, that could be the starting point, right? Like let's say you are like a small agency and you have, let's just use like hypothetically speaking, you have 20 customers, you you're a small agency, you work really deeply with these 20 businesses, right, with these 20 customers. The common thread there might be you. You might be the touchstone for that community, you know, and that could be your starting point. And it could simply-

Paul (18:48.346)
Like the restaurant that you talked about earlier, if that's say, I don't know, a vegan restaurant in a neighborhood where it's the only one, there's a really easy community to foster there, isn't there?

Oscar (18:56.44)
Sure.

Totally, yes. That could be a start, right? Because I think something you started to say, you were starting to say something else. And in my brain, the response was coming, if you build it, they will come. You know what I mean? I was having a conversation with a new hug leader who's starting a group in San Francisco. I should even say maybe restarting a group in San Francisco, because we've had a San Francisco hug in the past. But she's new to the program.

She has the amazing opportunity of the fact that we're hosting inbound in San Francisco this year. She's starting this hug right now, you know? And she asked me that question. She's like, you know, what comes first, like the chicken or the egg? You know, like the community or the people? Do I post, like, how do I, basically, like, how do I get started? You know?

And I was telling her, was like, get started with your network, your people that you know. And oftentimes, H.U.G. that come to the program, it's like, hey, I'm running these events. I have this group of people. I want to maybe like, you know, institutionalize it a little bit, or I want to be connected to HubSpot in a more direct way because I'm already doing some of these activities on my own. And so I want to kind of bring it under this umbrella. Or I want to do it like, you know, in community of other people who are doing it, you know? And so it really sometimes starts with, okay,

what's the common thread within you? You maybe, maybe just that example is, okay, you know these 20 people and you know that they care about HubSpot or you know that they're struggling with...

Oscar (20:24.386)
workflows or they're struggling with data migration, you know, because you're you know that because you're the common person between all of them and you're helping them do that in your work with them, right? So that might be the common thread and you bring those people together to do a deep dive or a workshop on a particular common issue that you're seeing and then you have the opportunity you become kind of like the community champion within your own network and that has a lot of a lot of really good foundational like fodder to grow from there, you know, because you don't

Oftentimes, think as myself, as a community organizer, right? I've done community organizing work in a lot of different ways, a lot of different spaces, even prior to HubSpot. I see my role as, or I see the community leader's role as, just creating the conducive conditions for connection to happen. You don't have necessarily any control over what happens after you bring the people to the room.

You don't know where it's going to go. You have hope, but really it's like, you what mean? You're bringing the people together. It's a calm, conducive environment. The temperature climate's good. Maybe you brought some food and beverages. You have a little bit of a program. have everything. You take care of all the creature comforts, right? But then after that, the magic is in the connection. The magic is in the people who don't know each other, learning each other, and then them finding community.

Paul (21:26.448)
Yeah,

Oscar (21:46.752)
with each other, like as an organizer community, that's my favorite moment is when I just brought y'all here and now here you are growing and expanding and just, you know.

sharing with each other, celebrating with each other, commiserating with each other, you know, like there's something in that that I really find very powerful and unique and in community building, community organizing. And I think people sometimes give themselves not enough credit for them, for being, you know, like we are, if we really take a step back.

We can be community leaders within ourselves because we have networks, right? Because we have people that we work with, that we know, and we allow ourselves to take on that mentality. And not like the responsibility, but just the mentality of like, okay, I can bring these people together under this common interest, even if the common bond is that they know me and I work with them. That has power to it.

Paul (22:38.076)
and then.

And you can build it from there, I guess is what you're saying. So yeah, you realize, I don't know, it depends on your industry, but I realize you're all program managers or you're all IT people or you're all sales people in a particular industry, I don't know. And you can foster and cultivate that community. What's a good goal? Let's talk goals now, sort of. They're really nice and...

Oscar (22:43.224)
That's right.

Oscar (23:02.382)
Okay.

Paul (23:05.628)
That sounded bad, they're really genuine things that make you feel good as the community leader. Business-wise, what kind of goals are you trying to strive for? I don't mean your particular KPIs here. mean, as someone setting up a community, is it customer retention? Is it new customers? Is it brand? What we looking at?

Oscar (23:24.654)
Yeah, yes, absolutely. These are powerful questions, you know, because it's one thing to bring people together. It's another thing to kind of show, especially when you're thinking about community building within, you know, at work, right? Like it's one thing to be like, okay, we all play soccer. We're going to play a soccer game. You know, that's community, obviously, but in a very different way. But when we're talking about community building and community organizing within the theme of at your business.

What are the goals that maybe feel like right to have? know, if you have, if you don't have a community at all, the first goal is to start one, you know, and get something off the ground with a regular cadence that has consistency and build from there. Right. Like that's the first step. It's like, okay, we don't have a community for our agency. We're not connecting our customers with each other in any, in any kind of way. But we have like some really strong champions of our product or of our tool. Like, you know, maybe we want to elevate them and like bring them together. Maybe you want to build a customer advisory council that might

be a good first community for a business that doesn't have any community to start. Because what that does is it's like, okay, I'm gonna build a community of my clients or my customers.

to get direct feedback from them, it's gonna help you do your business better, because you're gonna be elevating them to a level. People like to feel like they're being elevated. You know what saying? They like to feel like they're being chosen. They like to feel validated. So you're giving them the opportunity to have that and then to have direct impact maybe on your roadmap or your services and folks like that, and they're able to work with or connect with each other as customers or as clients of yours. I think that's a cool, very

direct impact first kind of community to start if you don't have anything like that at all, right? I will talk a little bit about some of the KPIs that we track for our communities, like for hugs, for instance, I shared this with Hug leaders at the beginning of the year. We have about...

Oscar (25:22.638)
upwards of 45,000 people who RSVP for events over the course of the year, right? Or I should say 45,000 RSVPs, unique attendees is more like 8,000. What I love about that is that is the retention, right? So if I have 45,000 RSVPs, 8,000 unique customers, folks are coming back to the events two or three times over. That's amazing retention right there. I love seeing that. I love knowing the stickiness of it because it shows that people not only like it, but they like it enough to come back.

That's retention. think that's a very good goal for HubSpot. We're really focused on usage. So something else that I'm tracking is, like if you attended this event, let's just say hypothetically on service hub, what is your usage of the service hub tools and product? And is it increasing over 30, 60 and 90 days post your attendance to that event? So that's, that's definitely one that we're tracking that we're looking at is, okay, so folks are coming to the community and our community within the HubSpot user group program is about learning, right? Like it's about learning the product and

using it and getting the ideas on how to implement different strategies and tools within our product. So that's what we care lot about. like those are probably the two. mean, customer dollar retention obviously is definitely related there.

spend within the product. That's obviously the way, but I think if you're not, if you don't have a community at all, you're starting from scratch. Think about that customer advisory council or that like kind of, you know, client advisory council. We have something like that here at Help Spot too, like where you're getting direct feedback, they're having an ability to interact with you in a deeper, more meaningful way. I think that will have really quick turnaround results right away. Maybe you have nothing going on.

Paul (27:03.768)
Nice, some nice steps there as well. start small with a customer you're most engaged. You'll know them. They'll be coming to mind now. They are for me, the people who are more than willing to do a testimonial for you or pick up the phone whenever you ask. Then facilitate the meeting and then cultivate them having a chance to connect and measure returning attendees and then tie that to your own version of.

HubSpot product usage. So what is that? they ordering on time? Are they paying their invoices on time? Are they turning up to meetings? There'll be something that is a nice leading indicator, a warrant there for people that is actually these customers are happy and getting value and it's having an effect on how our delivery team works with them. Nice, have you any guardrails lastly? Cause I know having set up some communities in the past, you can go down the wrong path. So if you any guardrail tips for people.

Oscar (28:02.254)
Hmm start small that's probably the first one, you know, it's better to be It's better to go a mile deep and an inch wide than a mile wide an inch deep, you know Start small. I think there's also not People sometimes maybe can be too general, you know, there's a lot of value in niche communities right now, too, you know

folks that are connecting over something really unique and maybe what might seem to be ambiguous, but like it's very targeted and special to them. Like that's why we have 125 groups, you know, because there's something to like the niche connection around a particular topic or industry even, you know? So start small, don't be afraid to be niche.

And don't try to measure everything at once. We have grown in some of our data collection over the time that I've been here at HubSpot. We've been learning and doing some unique and different things, but that has taken time. And that has only become available as the data has become available. So we didn't really have eyes on that until we started to work with our.

our software solution that we work with to host our hugs. We started unpacking some of the data with them and that was then revealing itself to us. like, we can measure this, we could try this, we could track this, but it grew over time. So don't start small, low and slow, if you will. You know what I mean? don't try to take on too much too soon, especially if you don't have any kind of community engagement or activation within your business. Those would probably be some of my quick tips on that.

Paul (29:36.508)
So just to finish then, to turn that start small into something practical somebody could sort for in May. Are you thinking like a open office hours session, a webinar, a meetup in your office? How small are you thinking? How many people? What kind of event would you put on?

Oscar (29:49.335)
Yeah.

Oscar (29:53.772)
Okay, check it out. if I didn't, if I was starting brand new, right, and I didn't know anything about anything, and we didn't even have a user group program here at HubSpot, we had nothing. We had no, let's just say hypothetically, obviously we do, whereas we know, but let's just say we had nothing. The first thing I would do is I would try to find out who are the most engaged customers that we have here at HubSpot. Like who are they? Like give me a list of 50 people.

Maybe a hundred Mac because we're a big company, right? But let's just say 50 people who are who you talk to a regular basis who I think that I would work with the sales team on that or their customer success team on that. Like who are like, you know, and maybe even like some of our product data folks like to learn like who's using the product, like who's who has who's using all of our hubs, all of our tools. Who are those people? I'm just get a hot list of 50 real quick, right? That would be the first thing. And then of those 50, I would work with maybe like my events team and say, you know, hey, I want to do like some

for this group of super engaged, super users, if you will, of our product. Let's do something for them. Let's get them together. Let's do a talk back with them. Maybe we, as a company, we're releasing, let's just say, we're releasing this new thing. Let's get them and let's do a little preview for them.

you know, and connect with them and learn about them and bring them together. And I would do, yeah, like maybe a meet and greet with Yamini or like a meet and greet with Andy, like head of our product, right? Like something that would draw them, right? And that would make them feel like, oh, not only am I gonna go to this cool event at Health Spot, but like the senior leader is gonna be there. I'm gonna be able to network with them, like give them something like special. I'd have some swag there, you know, like maybe a coffee cup or like a water, something, you know, it would be a cool venue, something nice, some light food.

And then I bring those people together. Maybe a small presentation from Andy or from Yamini, like, you know, thank you so much for being our like top super users. We value you. Well, you know, we want to build a relationship with you because we want to learn directly from you on how we can take HubSpot into 2026 and beyond and do a little bit of like networking and then just kind of like let that happen. That would be the first thing that I did. I just like let that happen.

Oscar (31:59.938)
And then following that, then I might do some kind of one-on-one, like, hey, how was that event? It was great to see you. Whether that's the customer success team or the sales team, just kind of staying in touch with those accounts to be like, how was that? Would you do something like that again? Would you want to be part of a more regular thing? But like I said, all of the bad example I just gave of what I would do if there was nothing from the ground up.

Talks do everything I just said, right? I would start small, low and slow. I would get the most engaged people who are using our tools and our software. I would do a delight, kind of special thing. It would be niche, So like top 50 who are using the product, right? So very small, very niche. And I would make it low stakes, easy barrier to entry for them to participate. And I would do something to attract them to want to do it. So yeah, if I was starting from scratch, that's what I would do.

Paul (32:52.7)
Amazing. I think it's just a straight tactic for somebody to go and try in the next month. So I love that. Oscar, thank you. I'm going to let you carry on with the rest of your day. I've enjoyed chatting as we always do. Thank you very much for coming on.

Oscar (33:03.598)
Yeah, it was awesome to chat with you too, Paul. Have a great rest of your day.

Paul (33:08.572)
So make sure you follow, subscribe, like, leave us a comment, leave us a five star review, depends where you're listening. And if you're watching on LinkedIn, follow us for more of our own HubSpot user group events as well that happen every month live on LinkedIn, as well as in person a few times a year as well. And check out events.hubspot.com and find the relevant or nearest or both HubSpot user group nearest to you. Cheers Oscar.