Have you heard of Hubspot TV?

It’s a weekly online marketing show by Hubspot. Airs every Friday at 4:00pm ET online.

If you’ve not seen it, tune in tomorrow at 4:00pm - it’s airing on Tuesday due to the Thanksgiving holiday.

Do you know the real inside story of HubspotTV? If you’ve watched it, you certainly don’t know what happens behind the scenes.

In addition, I bet our readers would like to understand the business case for the show.

What really happens there and what has Hubspot learned from two years of doing it?

Just a word about Hubspot. They are an inbound marketing software company for small and medium sized companies based in Cambridge, MA.

Their growth has been nothing short of phenomenal. Hubspot is one of the fastest growing companies in America today. The Fearless Competitor is a HUGE fan of this company.

I’ve a unique perspective. On November 19th, the the featured guest on the show was the business to business lead generation expert, Jeff Ogden, the Fearless Competitor and President of Find New Customers (@fearlesscomp).

This past Friday, I joined host Mike Volpe, VP of Marketing at Hubspot and Karen Rubin, his co-host for the show. And we had a live studio audience, including a big group of very well dressed kids - MBA students from the Johnson School at Cornell.

Here are some key observations from my firsthand experience as the featured guest on HubspotTV:

• A LOT of planning goes into the show - probably a lot more than the viewers think. (scripts, developing content to use during the show, setting up microphones, aligning on camera talent, warming up the studio audience, etc.) It’s not easy to do. Takes a real commitment. But as Mike told me, a weekly show enforces real discipline on the marketing team - one cannot skip a show, when you have a committed audience for the show.
• The technology is simple and cost-effective, but impressive in how it is being used, e.g. recording and publishing to the web (Livestream) at the same time.
• As an on-air “talent” this past week, it sure did not feel like anything was happening. (No big cameras with big red lights as one finds with standard television cameras.)

Equipment

Three small HD Canon video cameras (one of the three was pointed at the audience), connected via FireWire to a Mac and control board. Two large photo lights. A table and three stools.  Three high quality microphones. A young producer controls the switching from camera to camera during the show.

The show is recorded on the Mac and streamed to LiveStream at the same time for publishing to the web for the live show. (You must use cameras that are capable of recording and outputing via FireWire simultaneously.)

But I think my readers are looking for an answer to this question.

“What benefits has Hubspot gotten from the show?”

Here are the things they told me before and after the show. (And the results make me wonder why more companies don’t do something similar.)

1. You cannot measure HubSpot TV by the normal marketing metrics including leads, qualified sales opportunities, and customer wins. After all, no registration is required to watch live or afterwards.
   Actually, Hubspot TV uses the “Free Your Content” approach espoused by David Meerman Scott, Seth Godin and Tom Peters. (Click the link to learn more about freeing your content.)
2. While leads don’t register, Hubspot can see number of visitors. Popularity’s good but not overwhelming. (25-100 for the live show - with 50 for the show I was on.) They get  many more viewers to the iTunes (recorded) version than the live show. The show’s not become wildly popular.
3. While the show’s popularity is not overwhelming, their VP of Marketing, Mike Volpe told me the depth of the engagement is likely very high, because they get comments from Sales frequently that prospects are commenting favorably on Hubspot TV. (I find that a very interesting approach. It’s not “Did they view our content?” It’s “What effect did our content have on them?“)
4. Management also gets many positive comments about the show. Their CEO, Brian Halligan, regularly hears from executives about how impressed they are with the show.
5. One key benefit is recruiting. Lots of prospective employees visit the show and sit in the studio audience.
   

   Setting up the cameras for Hubspot TV

6. The benefits in international are impressive. As the show is global, it has given Hubspot tremendous goodwill outside the USA.Mike told us of a hot prospect in Mongolia - impressed with Hubspot because of the show. It seems due to the global nature of the internet, Hubspot developed a base of fans outside the USA. (Companies looking to move internationally should strongly consider an approach like this.)

We hope you found these insights helpful. And I hope you’ll watch the episode above. It’s the the November 19, 2010 show featuring me, the Fearless Competitor.

What do you think? Have you seen the show? If so, what do you think of it? We love your comments and when you share our content on social networks.

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Jeff Ogden, the Fearless Competitor, is President of Fun and Find New Customers “Lead Generation Made Simple” Check out the online show every Friday at 11am ET, “Laugh and Learn with the Fearless Competitor.”

Find New Customers helps businesses develop and implement marketing lead generation programs to improve the way they find and acquire sales leads using best practices in lead generation.