Hubspot Platform Consulting Certification Exam Answers

Hubspot Platform Consulting Certification Exam Answers

Exam

• There are 45 questions.
• It should take 1 hour to complete.
• You must answer 32 questions correctly to pass.
• You must wait 12 hours between attempts.
• You have 3 hours to finish the exam.

 

 

Questions:

 

A platform refers to:

• An individual company's tech stack
• A collection of technology tools that help businesses to operate
• A collection of SaaS apps
• All of the above

 

Which of the following statements about app turnover is most accurate, according to Blissfully’s 2019 SaaS Trends Report?

• App turnover was higher than employee turnover
• App turnover was lower than employee turnover
• App turnover increased as employee turnover increased
• If the app turnover rate increases, employee turnover should also increase

 

Which of the following is true, based on the interview with Blissfully CEO Ariel Diaz?

• As companies grow, their platforms also grow in complexity.
• A significant portion of any company’s business platform will be different within 2 years.
• Leaders often unilaterally add technologies that don’t necessarily fit together.
• All of the above

 

True or False? Having more billing owners makes it easier for a company to manage its technology stack or platform.

• True
• False

 

True or False? According to Blissfully’s report, as company size increases, the number of billing owners also tends to increase.

• True
• False

 

Which of the following statements about technology audits is accurate?

• Partners should strictly avoid performing technology audits for the clients, and focus on hands-off consulting and guidance
• Partners should always try to replace their client’s existing technology platform at the start of a project
• Partners could provide platform auditing both as a standalone service and as an addition to existing services
• Platform auditing is extremely easy for companies to do internally, and partners’ auditing services are only required for larger firms with greater access to resources

 

True or False? Partners should avoid collaborating with other partners to meet client needs.

• True
• False

 

With a Solution Partner’s help for platform consulting and auditing, a client will be able to:

• Save time by having the partner run the platform audit
• Save money by identifying apps that aren’t providing sufficient ROI
• Cancel multiple software contracts easily and without pain
• Save more than 50% of last year's platform budget
• A & B

 

In comparison to the traditional platform consulting playbook, the approach recommended by HubSpot is to focus on:

• Focus on how, where, and when an app is used in a business process, rather than the raw number of apps
• Focus on how ingrained an app is in the business’ operations, and how much it would cost to move to a different system
• Focus on identifying each app’s potential to meet more than one need for a company
• All of the above

 

True or false? HubSpot’s approach to platform consulting values quality over quantity.

• True
• False

 

By discussing platform consulting with your clients, you can:

• Demonstrate business acumen and build brand-equity
• Build long-term trust
• Convince the client to sign a larger contract
• Convince the client to shift their entire platform to HubSpot
• A & B

 

Which of the following is NOT a good question to ask your client in your platform audit?

• How, where, and when is a given app used?
• What metrics can be tracked through a given app?
• How quickly do you want to reduce the number of apps your company is using by 50%?
• What objects does this app touch most frequently?

or

• How much would it cost to move to a different system?
• If this app were removed, what processes would be disrupted?
• How much are competitors charging for this same functionality?
• None of the above. They’re all good questions.

 

Scenario: A client’s CEO wants to replace their CMS (Content Management System) within one month because it isn’t meeting all of the organization’s needs. When you interview the day-to-day users, you realize that the CMS is deeply ingrained into the company’s business process, and is being used heavily. You know that it will likely take over 6 months, at the very least, to replatform to a new CMS. What should you tell the client’s CEO?

• Be straightforward with the CEO. She may not be satisfied with the CMS, but it’s too deeply ingrained to replace quickly. It will take time and money to properly replace it with a new CMS.
• Decline the project and move on. Let the CEO know you cannot meet their timeline, and therefore they aren’t a good fit for your services. Tell the CEO to buy a HubSpot technical consulting package.
• Tell the CEO to buy a HubSpot technical consulting package.
• Tell the CEO that they should forget about replacing the CMS, and should focus on replacing their CRM system instead.

 

Scenario: A client’s Sales VP wants your help to implement Salesforce for their team’s CRM needs, but they already have an instance of HubSpot CRM and Sales professional that one of their Sales divisions is using. The Sales VP is simply unaware of HubSpot’s CRM and sales tools, and hasn’t considered the costs and benefits of getting more HubSpot Sales seats vs. a new Salesforce instance. What should you do?

• Remind the Sales VP about the existing HubSpot Sales + CRM instance, and remind her of its capabilities. Ask if there is a specific reason they need Salesforce rather than what they already have, and suggest doing a cost benefit analysis that includes not only the price of both tools, but also how ingrained the existing HubSpot Sales tool is, and what it would cost in terms of time/money to implement Salesforce.
• Remind the Sales VP gently, but remember that your job is to implement what the Sales VP needs in order to maintain a productive business relationship. Don’t linger on the topic and risk offending her. Skip over doing any kind of discovery, and move on towards implementing Salesforce. This is a large company, and it won’t hurt them too much if they have more than one tool for doing the same thing.
• Suggest that the Sales VP forego the CRM idea altogether. Their team is too disorganized to benefit from a CRM, and are better off organizing their process in excel. Don’t mention the limited HubSpot instance their team is already using, because you want to avoid muddying the waters too much with complexity. Focus on Sales consulting, and try and convince the Sales VP to look beyond the need for a CRM.
• Take an educational approach towards consulting them on this issue, rather than pushing for any particular solution aggressively at first. Find out if it makes monetary and temporal sense to expand the existing HubSpot Sales instance vs. implementing Salesforce. Once you've made your decision regarding what's best for their tech stack, remind the client that they're obligated to follow your recommendations if they wish to retain you as a partner.

 

True or False? After you’ve performed a few platform or tech stack evaluations, you can skip over the discovery questions and jump to solutions quicker for each subsequent client your firm works with.

• True
• False

 

True or False? Proactive conversations are planned ahead of time, allowing you to gather adequate background information and prepare appropriate questions for your platform conversation with your client.

• True
• False

 

True or False? It is ideal to have all technology stakeholders and billing owners at your client’s company join your platform conversations.

• True
• False

 

Which of the following is NOT a best practice for stakeholder calls on the topic of platform auditing?

• Center the conversation around the business process
• Center the conversation around their specific CRM product
• Ask specific questions to get to technology-business impact
• Conclude with data-supported recommendations

 

Scenario: You’re discussing platform goals with your prospect for the first time, and they suddenly start expressing doubt about some of the ideas you’ve suggested. While it seemed like they were initially excited about cancelling unnecessary SaaS app subscriptions, they’re worried about the downstream impact on their business. How do you reassure them and avoid derailing your discussion?

• Remind them that this is just an exploratory discussion, and that you won’t make any decisions without thoroughly understanding each app’s use case within their platform
• Remind them that they’re losing money because of unnecessary app subscriptions, and need to act decisively to save their company time and money
• Share a scary story with them about how a business lost hundreds of thousands of dollars because of unnecessary app subscriptions
• If they’re having doubts, they might not be a good fit for your service. Tell them to reach out to you when they’re confident they want to move ahead and remove unnecessary apps from their platform

 

Why are clients sometimes uncomfortable discussing the “why” behind a particular business process, and more comfortable discussing individual technologies?

• They may not understand the value of a platform audit yet. Take time to educate them on the benefits of platform auditing
• They might be unclear as to why they need to do an audit if they already feel strongly about removing/adding a particular app from/to their platform
• They might be unaware of opportunities to integrate a given technology with HubSpot
• All of the above

 

True or False? Reactive conversations require you, the Solutions Partner, to defend HubSpot’s platform, technology, and services against negative perspectives, no matter what the perspective is.

• True
• False

 

Scenario: You’re halfway through an important discovery conversation with your client’s entire team of stakeholders. Suddenly, the Sales Director interrupts with a question about whether they can transition their entire sales organization to Sales Hub from a legacy CRM. This is a pivotal moment in your relationship with this client, but you weren’t prepared to answer this question. How should you react to avoid derailing the conversation while still keeping the client interested in Sales Hub?

• Explain that you’ll reach out to them privately to continue this discussion, but you’re not prepared to have this conversation yet, and don’t want to give them false information.
• Ignore the question and transition to discussing the CMS Hub, which is a product you’re more familiar with and more prepared to discuss.
• Ask the Sales Director if she would be willing to tell you more about how their current CRM fits into their business process, and express your willingness to discuss how Sales Hub could potentially play a role.
• Attack the credibility of their legacy CRM immediately, and recite memorized soundbites about the power of Sales Hub.

 

True or False? A need gap analysis is just another term for a sales demo. Your goal is to replace all non-HubSpot technologies with HubSpot technologies.

• True
• False

 

Research shows that clients are most successful on HubSpot when they have between ___ and __ integrations.

• 7 and 10
• 3 and 2
• 40 and 57
• 77 and 110

 

Scenario: After understanding your client’s platform in detail, you’re ready to make recommendations about integrating, replacing, or keeping various technologies. Even though the client wants to completely transition away from their legacy CRM tool, you don’t think that’s an effective solution, given how deeply the legacy CRM is ingrained in their business operations. Which one of the following could be a prudent recommendation and rationale in this situation?

• Because it would cost too much time and money to completely replace the legacy CRM at the moment, you can help the client develop a plan to gradually transfer to a new CRM system. In the meantime, if key stakeholders are eager to benefit from certain features in the new CRM, they could try running a small test pilot with just a few users to see if the new tool could have a positive impact. Provide data to help the client make a more educated and measured decision.
• The client’s wishes matter more than any analysis you’ve performed. Regardless of whether or not it’s too expensive to transition to a new CRM, your role is to help make it possible for the client. Rather than trying to challenge the client’s wishes, help them design a plan that would enable them to transition away from the legacy CRM as quickly as possible, even if all stakeholders don’t understand the full downstream impact of this change yet.
• Pivot to discussing another platform technology, given that the CRM issue is obviously generating some tension. The best strategy is to divert the client’s attention to a more easily resolvable problem, and hopefully they’ll forget about the CRM issue and shift their focus entirely.
• Resign from the project, and recommend that the client hire another firm to meet their requirements, because any and all conflict is potentially damaging to your firm’s recommendation.

 

True or False? Data shows that more integrations with HubSpot lead to better long term results for HubSpot customers, so you should always push your clients to pursue as many integrations as possible.

• True
• False

 

True or False? Integrating two technologies can never negatively impact a client’s data integrity, so you should always recommend integrating as many technologies as possible.

• True
• False

 

True or False? Even if two different technologies used by the client perform a similar function, you may want to avoid consolidating them if both are deeply ingrained in certain client business processes.

• True
• False

 

True or False? If a technology provides a key functionality that HubSpot does not offer, you’re better off recommending that the client eliminate the technology from their platform.

• True
• False

 

True or False? If a non-HubSpot technology provides a key functionality that HubSpot already includes at no extra cost to the client, you may want to explore the possibility of replacing the technology with HubSpot’s solution.

• True
• False

 

Which of the following is NOT one of the recommended key variables you should use to prioritize your platform recommendations for clients?

• ROI
• Time
• Available resources
• Metaphysical preparedness

 

True or False? All HubSpot integrations are designed to take less than 10 minutes to set up, so you shouldn’t worry about this when making recommendations to your clients.

• True
• False

 

Which of the following is a valid reason to consider time as a factor in determining the relative priority of an integration?

• HubSpot native integrations are always faster to install than custom integrations.
• A native integration may require you to fire employees who are no longer required to maintain the custom integration.
• A native integration may require training employees to work from a new system, whereas custom integrations may just pass data along.
• Technology is advancing at a very fast pace, and AI-driven integrations will replace ALL native integrations within a short period of time.

 

True or False? Only highly technical organizations can effectively manage integrations or audit their platform.

• True
• False

 

True or False? If the client is considering using PieSync or another iPaaS solution, you should make sure their IT team has the necessary bandwidth to oversee the solution.

• True
• False

 

Scenario: A client needs you to build a custom integration between HubSpot and their proprietary data analysis technology. You realize that while your firm has the resources to successfully complete one part of the project, you’ll need someone with a data science background to help with the second part of the development work. One of your fellow Solutions Partners is a good fit for this requirement. What should you do?

• Consider the possibility of designing a mutually beneficial project plan with your fellow partner to help the client see success.
• Figure out how to handle all aspects of the project yourself. Your firm should be able to do everything by itself, without asking for help.
• Quit the project, because partner with another firm is a sign of weakness.
• Report the client to HubSpot and have them blacklisted.

 

True or False? You can avoid derailing the sales or consulting process by proactively bringing key people up to speed right from the beginning of the process.

• True
• False

 

Which of the following does NOT accurately describe a need-gap analysis?

• An opportunity to show the prospect or client precisely how HubSpot’s platform ecosystem will support their goals and solve their business problems
• A diagnostic approach for determining what client needs you need to address
• A method of determining how much to charge the client for a retainer in the future
• A part of your due diligence to accurate assess your client’s needs

 

True or False? The less expensive technology is always the better choice, when picking between two technologies that perform virtually the same function.

• True
• False

 

Which of the following is a benefit associated with educating your prospect or client early in the sales or consulting process?

• Level setting with all stakeholders
• Setting the stage for a need-gap analysis
• Differentiating HubSpot and your consulting service from the competition
• All of the above

 

True or False? In the context of your client’s tech stack, the term "platform" is not the same thing as the HubSpot platform, which refers to HubSpot’s ecosystem of connected apps.

• True
• False

 

Which of the following is an example of an internally-facing team at a company?

• HR
• Sales
• Customer Success
• Customer Support

 

Which of the following is NOT a good description of a flywheel and/or the flywheel model?

• A cyclical buyer’s journey
• An energy-efficient wheel that spins faster when you add force and remove friction
• A reference to HubSpot's obsession with frisbees
• A more accurate model than the traditional funnel model

 

Which of the following is a key benefit of HubSpot’s app marketplace?

• Clear context for more informed integration decisions, including pricing information, data flow structure, and demo videos
• Easy discovery of relevant apps for HubSpot users
• Decreased friction and improved discoverability for app developers
• All of the above