Set contacts as non-marketing

In HubSpot, you store and manage information about your potential customers in contact records. However, you may not need to market to all of them.

Please note: this functionality is currently available on a limited basis for test users in the ANZ region. Reach out to your HubSpot Customer Success Manager for more information.

By setting certain contacts as "marketing", and others as "non-marketing", you can control the number of billable contacts that adds to your contact tier and the contacts your HubSpot account can and cannot send marketing emails and target ads to. Learn how to view the number of marketing contacts in your current contact tier.

While you can preemptively set any contacts as non-marketing during your contract, they will only be preemptively set as non-marketing during the 90 days period prior to a renewal or contract change, and will be effective upon renewal or contract change.

As long as a contact remains as non-marketing (i.e., they were not set as a marketing contact), they will not count towards your contact tier.

Once a contact is set as a marketing contact, you can use marketing tools with them and they will count towards your contact tier in that period. Learn how to view the marketing contact default properties to check a contact's marketing status and how to set contacts as marketing.

Tools that do not work with non-marketing contacts

The following marketing tools in your HubSpot account will not work with your non-marketing contacts:

• Marketing emails
• Ads
• Marketing actions in workflows, such as Send email and Add to or Remove from ads audiences.

Learn what happens when you try using the above tools on a non-marketing contact and how you can set a contact as marketing so the tools work with them.

Please note: other types of emails can still reach your non-marketing contacts, including sales one-to-one emails, chat transcript emails from conversations, registration emails, ticket kickback emails, and customer feedback surveys.

Preemptively set existing contacts as non-marketing

You can preemptively set contacts as non-marketing. This will update their Non-Marketing set on renewal property value to Yes.

Once your HubSpot account is renewed, all contacts with the Yes value in the Non-Marketing set on renewal property will have their Marketing status property value updated to No and be counted as non-marketing contacts. They will then not count towards your billable contact tier limit, unless they're updated to a marketing contact.

When you get access to the feature, you should get a link to the wizard below.

• In the Recommendation step, clear the checkboxes next to Bounced contacts and Unsubscribed contacts if you want to set them as marketing for the next period. Once you've decided, click Next.

• In the Custom step, you can select contacts to be set as non-marketing using a filter or a list.
  • Use a filter: click to select criteria for the contacts you want to set as non-marketing.
  • Use a list: click to select lists for the contacts you want to set as non-marketing.
• Click Next once you've selected your non-marketing contacts.
• In the Review step, review the number of marketing and non-marketing contacts. Once reviewed, click Update Contacts in the bottom right.

This will set the Non-Marketing set on renewal property values for these contacts as Yes. On renewal, their Marketing status property will be updated to No and become non-marketing contacts.

Remove a user's permission to set contacts as marketing

By default, all users have permission to set contacts as marketing. If you want to restrict a specific user:

• In your HubSpot account, click the settings icon settings in the main navigation bar.
• In the left sidebar menu, navigate to Users and teams.
• Click the name of the user you want to grant permissions to.
• Click the More tab and select Account.
• Click the Modify marketing contacts switch to toggle it off.
• In the bottom right, click Save. The user will not be allowed to set contacts as marketing contacts.

Set the default marketing status for new contacts

New contacts created manually

Any contacts created manually will default to No for their Marketing status property. You can only update their Marketing status to Yes after the contacts are created.

New contacts from chatflows

When you create a chatflow, you are creating a live chat or a bot. When a visitor chats with your business, a contact record can sometimes be created when they are new to your business.

For each live chat or bot, you can set the default marketing status of a newly created contact that submits to a form.

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to Conversations > Chatflows.
• Click the chatflow you want to set the default for.
• In the left sidebar menu, click Options.
• In the Marketing contacts section, ensure the Marketing Contacts switch is off if you want contacts created from this chatflow to automatically set the contacts as non-marketing. Otherwise, click to toggle the switch on to set contacts created from this chatflow as marketing.

• Click Save.

New contacts from forms

When a visitor submits to a HubSpot form and they are new to your business, they will be created as a new contact record. For each form, you can set the default marketing status of a newly created contact that submits to a form.

• In your HubSpot account, navigate to Marketing > Lead Capture > Forms.
• Click the form you want to set the default for. If it's a live form, once you click the form, click Edit in the upper right.
• Click the Options tab.
• Click to toggle the All new contacts will be set as marketing switch off if you want contacts created from this form to automatically set the contacts as non-marketing. Otherwise, click to toggle the switch on to set contacts created from this form as marketing.

• To take the form live, or update the existing live form, click the Preview tab and in the upper right, click Publish.

New contacts created via import

When importing contacts, you can set the contacts in the file as marketing contacts or non-marketing contacts. In the Details step:

• To set the contacts in the import file as non-marketing contacts, leave the Set all contacts as marketing contacts checkbox blank. Their Marketing status property will be set as No.
• To set the contacts in the import file as marketing contacts, select the Set all contacts as marketing contacts checkbox. Their Marketing status property will be set as Yes.