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Bauer Media

Scaling success: How Bauer Media standardised CRM processes across eight countries

As Europe’s leading commercial radio operator, Bauer Media Audio connects audiences across multiple countries, creating value for advertisers and listeners. Managing such a vast network of brands and operations presents unique challenges, particularly in aligning sales and customer data across regions. 

To address these complexities, Bauer Media partnered with Avidly, a leading HubSpot solutions partner, to roll out HubSpot in eight EMEA territories.

This case study explores how Avidly and Bauer Media collaborated to tackle data fragmentation, improve operational efficiency, and lay the groundwork for scalable, unified CRM operations across Europe.

The Background

 

Company: Bauer Media
Industry: Audio and radio technology

Bauer Media Group is a world-renowned multimedia company and one of Europe’s largest commercial broadcasters. Operating a portfolio of brands that span radio, print, digital, and TV, Bauer Media reaches millions of consumers daily. 

Bauer Media Audio, the radio arm of the group, connects audiences through a network of stations across Europe, generating revenue via advertising sales and innovative audience engagement strategies such as competitions and promotions.

The Challenge

 

Bauer Media Audio operates in eight European countries, each with its own radio stations, booking systems, and sales processes. Before partnering with Avidly, the lack of a unified CRM created significant challenges, including:

  • Fragmented Systems: Each country used separate platforms and workflows, making cross-border collaboration difficult. Countries either had outdated CRM systems or no system in particular.
  • Limited Visibility: Sales pipelines and performance data were siloed, preventing a cohesive view of operations at a regional or international level.
  • Data Inconsistencies: Country-specific systems and varying processes led to messy data, impacting reporting accuracy and efficiency.

In addition, Bauer Media launched a project to align its CRM with an upgraded SAP instance, which would serve as the company’s master data system. This project required integrating separate HubSpot instances across eight countries with complex middleware solutions and localised booking systems.

The integration project presented several obstacles:

  • A compressed timeline
  • The need to standardise processes across multiple regions
  • Managing diverse booking systems, some of which were outdated or highly localised

The Solution

Avidly worked closely with Bauer Media to deliver a multi-phased solution that addressed these challenges:

HubSpot Implementation Across Regions
Over three years, Avidly onboarded eight countries onto HubSpot, providing training and ensuring consistent usage across regions. The rollout began in Poland in 2021 and concluded with Portugal in 2024. Each country’s portal was configured to accommodate specific local requirements for sales and traffic teams whilst also introducing standardised ways of working, where possible.


More specifically, Avidly supported the implementation by: 

  • Developing a custom solution to handle annual agreements for advertising placements. This was set up as a custom object with  custom-coded workflows that allow Bauer to track the annual YTD spend in real time as new sales orders are processed by the sales team
  • Creating custom objects to house specific information on agencies, projects, and sales orders
  • Integrating country-specific data enrichment platforms such as Vainu, Finstat and Bisnode to pre-fill company data and reduce the required input from sales teams when using HubSpot
  • In-country training for sales teams and superusers was provided in conjunction with CRM Product Manager, Yaniv Kalmek
Integration with SAP
Collaborating with middleware partner BRIX CRM, the project ensured seamless data flow between HubSpot, country-specific booking systems, and SAP.

Key components included:

  • Standardising data properties between systems
  • Automating processes to reduce manual input for sales teams and prevent data entry errors
  • Ensuring accurate, real-time communication between HubSpot and SAP, with automated data feedback loops to validate and clean inputs
  • Enabling SAP to master all data across each HubSpot instance and booking system
Ongoing Support

Post-implementation Avidly continues to support Bauer Media with a retainer agreement. This includes troubleshooting and strategising on new features to enhance HubSpot adoption and utilisation.

The Results

 

The collaboration between Bauer Media and Avidly has delivered tangible results that enhance efficiency and visibility:

Improved Data Quality

The integration standardised processes and properties across eight HubSpot portals, ensuring consistency, and enabling reliable international reporting.

Increased Operational Efficiency

Automation, such as company data enrichment and data transfer to in-country booking systems from the CRM, significantly reduced manual input for sales teams.

Enhanced Visibility

Centralised CRM processes provided Bauer Media with greater transparency into all regions' sales pipelines.

While quantitative outcomes remain part of a larger ongoing evaluation, the HubSpot platform has enabled Bauer Media to:

  • Centralise CRM operations across eight countries
  • Deploy a scalable and automated system aligned with SAP governance standards
  • Launch a unified platform for sales teams that reduces time spent on administrative tasks

“Avidly always tries to deliver, even when the challenges are complex. They’ve been a key partner in navigating our demanding needs, and their commitment to solving problems stands out.” - Yaniv Kalmek, CRM Product Manager, Bauer Media Audio

 

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