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Key Takeaways
- Consulting work arrives through referrals, alumni, and partner firms, so HubSpot should record who introduced whom, not only the deal.
- Store the referral source as a deal property and the referring person as a labeled association, so credit reaches people, not just channels.
- Track two kinds of alumni: people who used to work at your firm and client contacts who have moved on.
- Set follow-ups by relationship tier, measured from a conversation date that email opens and routine activity cannot reset.
- Start planning repeat work before the current engagement ends, with an end date that prompts a review conversation.
A former client changes jobs in March, and by June she has hired a rival firm for her new team. Nobody at your firm saw the move, because the relationship lived in one partner's inbox.
Our earlier guide to using HubSpot for consulting firms covers the broader CRM picture, from business development and delivery context to pipeline management. This article looks more closely at the relationships behind that work: referrals, alumni, partner firms, and the follow-ups that help keep those connections active.
Where does new work come from in a consulting firm?
At a consulting firm, new work often comes from people: past clients, former colleagues, partner firms and personal networks. HubSpot for consulting firms is only useful if it records those people and how they connect to each deal.
Partners often hold that knowledge personally. One knows that a former client just joined a new company. Another knows which accounting firm sent the last two introductions. When it stays in personal inboxes, the firm can't see its own network. Each time a partner leaves, part of that network leaves too.
In many B2B portals we audit, contacts and deals are there, but nobody recorded who referred the work or who owns the relationship. The CRM reports pipeline without explaining where it came from.
What this means for you: ask each partner for the five relationships behind their last few engagements. Compare those names with what HubSpot shows today. The gaps become your setup brief.
How do you record referrals and introductions in HubSpot?
Record two things on every new opportunity: the kind of source, and the specific person behind it.
- Referral source: A deal property with a fixed list, such as client referral, alumni, partner firm, personal network, and inbound.
- Referring person: An association between the deal and the referrer's contact record, with a label such as referred by or introduced by.
The property shows which kinds of relationship bring in work, and the label shows which individuals do. You might find that three former clients account for a large share of new engagements, which a field reading "referral" could never show.
For example, when a former client introduces a partner to a new prospect, associate the prospect's deal with the referring contact, even if that person now works elsewhere. Keep the source category on the deal. The introduction stays visible when the opportunity changes owner or moves through the pipeline.
Then close the loop with the referrer. Where your HubSpot subscription supports workflows, one can create a thank-you task for the relationship owner when a referred deal is created. A second task, when the deal closes, prompts an update on how it went. A referrer who hears the outcome has a good reason to introduce you again.
Association labels and the workflow actions built around them depend on your HubSpot subscription. Confirm availability before relying on a particular reporting or automation setup.
Questions to ask: Could we name the person behind each of our last ten new engagements from HubSpot alone? Who thanked them, and when?
Who owns each relationship, and how often should they follow up?
Give every important contact one relationship owner and a tier, then let the tier set how often that owner follows up. You can use HubSpot's standard Contact owner field, or a separate HubSpot user property when the relationship owner is different from the person responsible for sales. Either way, one person should be accountable, with ownership reassigned when a partner leaves.
A relationship tier property sorts contacts into three groups. As a first pass, we'd suggest following up every 30 days with tier one, every 60 to 90 days with tier two, and every six months with tier three. Treat these as Markivis starting points, not industry benchmarks, and adjust them to your partners' real capacity and the relationship's needs.
The follow-up clock needs to measure real contact. Create a last meaningful conversation date and update it after a call, a meeting, or a substantive exchange. HubSpot's automatic Last activity date can change when tasks are completed or activities are logged, while Last engagement date can reflect one-to-one email opens and other interactions. Marketing email opens are tracked separately. None of these measures, on its own, proves that someone had a useful conversation.
A workflow can compare the custom conversation date with the tier interval and create a task when follow-up is due. Re-enrollment and timing should be tested in your portal; without the required workflow subscription, an owner can use a saved view and task queue instead.
At a glance: a relationship tracking set for consulting firms in HubSpot.
| What to track | Property or object | Why it matters | Follow-up trigger |
|---|---|---|---|
| Referral source | Deal property with a fixed list of values | Shows which kinds of relationship produce work | Thank-you task when a referred deal is created |
| Referring person | Labeled association between the deal and the referring contact | Credits individuals, not only channels | Outcome update task when the deal closes |
| Relationship owner | Contact owner or a separate HubSpot user property | Makes one person at the firm accountable | Reassignment and handover when the owner leaves |
| Relationship tier | Contact property with three tiers | Sets how often the relationship needs attention | Task when the follow-up interval has passed |
| Last meaningful conversation | Custom contact date property | Separates real conversations from routine activity | Reminder based on the date and relationship tier |
| Alumni status | Contact property for firm alumni or client alumni | Flags people who already know your work | Review task after a confirmed employer change |
| Engagement end date | Date property on the engagement deal | Marks when repeat-work conversations should start | Review conversation task before the end date |
A relationship that nobody has spoken to in six months can still look active in a CRM that counts logged tasks and email engagement. That is why consulting firms benefit from a follow-up date that only a real conversation can update.
What this means for you: Ask partners to fill in just three fields: owner, tier, and last real conversation. Let workflows handle the reminders where available, so the setup asks very little of busy people.
How do you track alumni and partner firms in HubSpot?
Use an alumni status property for people and a relationship type property for partner firms.
Consulting firms have two kinds of alumni. Firm alumni are former employees who now work at clients, prospects, or other firms. Client alumni are former client contacts who've moved to a new company and may bring you along. Give the alumni status property both values, and keep the previous company linked with an association label such as former employee, where your subscription supports it.
Keep the person's current employer as the primary company association, and use an appropriately labeled additional association for the former employer. This preserves context without treating a past employer as the current account. Job moves still need a confirmed update from your team or a trusted data source; an alumni property does not detect them automatically.
Partner firms, such as accounting firms, law firms, and software vendors, work differently. Record each as a company with a relationship type property and a named relationship owner at your firm. Then associate the individual contacts there who actually make introductions. A partner then shows up as people and introductions, not a single logo.
For instance, if an alumnus moves from a client company to a prospect account, the contact record can show the new employer alongside the former relationship. The account owner then has the context for a relevant introduction, without assuming the move creates an opportunity by itself.
How do you set up repeat engagements before a project ends?
Record an engagement end date when the work is signed, and let it trigger a review conversation well before the project wraps up. Repeat work is easiest to scope while your team is still engaged.
A workflow can create a task for the engagement lead ahead of that date. The review covers what was delivered, what's still open, and what the client plans next. We'd usually set it 30 days before the end date, leaving time to scope a follow-on. HubSpot supports workflow actions scheduled relative to a date property, subject to the features available in your subscription.
Log follow-on ideas that surface mid-project as notes or tasks linked to the client company and current engagement. When an idea becomes a qualified opportunity, create a separate deal with a repeat work property, so it can be tracked without inflating the pipeline with every tentative suggestion.
After the engagement closes, the client stays in the follow-up rhythm at their tier. Any email between projects should be useful and appropriate to that relationship, not a generic nurture sequence sent simply because the record is still in the CRM.
What this means for you: Add an end date to every active engagement this month, and set the review task before the next one closes.
Which HubSpot reports show which relationships bring in work?
Two reports matter most: where your work comes from, and whether relationships are being looked after.
For the first, group pipeline and closed-won revenue by referral source. Where your HubSpot subscription and report design support it, use the labeled referring-contact association to analyze opportunities and revenue by referring person. Add opportunities from alumni and compare repeat engagement revenue with new client revenue.
Revenue by referring person deserves close attention, since it names the people your partners should stay in contact with. Check the underlying deal associations before trusting the report, particularly where multiple people helped make the introduction. Some reports will require the custom report builder and an appropriate combination of data sources and association labels.
For the second, count overdue follow-ups by relationship owner and tier. A simple dashboard can show how many tier-one contacts have passed their conversation interval and how many important relationships lack an owner or conversation date.
Review both reports quarterly with the partners, and use the owner figures to offer help rather than to rank people. The aim is to see which relationships create work and which may be losing attention, not to turn every conversation into a performance score.
Questions to ask: Which relationship source produced most of last year's revenue, and are we spending time on it? How many tier-one relationships are overdue today?
The Bottom Line
New work at a consulting firm follows relationships, so your CRM has to record them as well as the deals they produce. Once HubSpot shows who referred each engagement, who owns each relationship, and when someone last really talked to them, the firm can see its own network. An end date on each engagement completes the picture. Start with a few fields partners can maintain, then add reminders and reporting around the relationships that matter.
The Markivis Approach
Our first session is a whiteboard of names. Each partner writes down the people behind their recent engagements, and we trace how each one turned into work. The properties, labels, and reminders come from that map, so they match how your firm actually wins business. We keep partner data entry small and automate the rest, because a setup partners won't use records nothing.
The aim is to preserve the context behind referrals, make follow-ups accountable, and give leadership reporting that goes beyond deal totals. Our HubSpot CRM implementation and automation services cover the data structure, workflows, and reporting needed to put that approach into practice.
