A CRM is one of the most important systems in any business. It keeps your contact data organized, supports your sales process, and gives you visibility into what’s working (and what isn’t) across marketing and customer communication.
Last updated: December 20, 2025
Two popular options that often come up—especially for growing businesses—are HubSpot and Keap (formerly Infusionsoft). Both can manage contacts and pipelines, automate follow-ups, and help you stay on top of leads. But they’re designed for different operating models.
In this guide, we’ll compare HubSpot vs Keap so you can decide which platform fits your goals, your team structure, and how you want to run sales + marketing automation.
What Companies Are Best Suited for HubSpot?
HubSpot is a CRM-first customer platform that brings together marketing, sales, service, content, and data tools on one shared database. It’s widely used by SMB and mid-market companies, but it also scales into enterprise environments when governance and reporting requirements grow.
HubSpot is often the best fit if you want:
- A modern CRM that’s easy to adopt across teams
- Marketing automation that connects directly to sales pipelines and lifecycle reporting
- Native tools for landing pages, forms, email marketing, reporting, and customer support workflows
- A platform that can start simple and expand as your team grows
HubSpot’s free tools are a common starting point for companies that want centralized contact management without committing to a paid plan on day one. As needs expand (automation depth, segmentation, reporting, permissions), teams typically upgrade into paid tiers.
Overview of Keap
Keap is a CRM and automation platform built primarily for small businesses that want an all-in-one system to manage: contact records, pipelines, follow-ups, email automation, and often text messaging and scheduling.
Keap is often the best fit if you want:
- A simple CRM plus automation focused on follow-up and lead nurturing
- Text messaging workflows and appointment scheduling as core parts of your process
- A platform built for small teams that need structure and automation fast
Keap is especially common among service businesses and owner-led teams that want to reduce manual work and ensure leads don’t fall through the cracks.
Where HubSpot and Keap Overlap (and What Actually Matters)
On paper, HubSpot and Keap both include CRM + automation—so the real decision is about how deep you need to go, how many teams will use the system, and how important advanced reporting and web/marketing tooling is to your strategy.
Contact management + pipeline tracking
Both platforms allow you to manage contacts and companies, track activities, and move deals through a pipeline. If your needs are basic CRM functionality, either can work.
Automation + follow-up sequences
Both platforms support automated follow-ups (email-based, and in Keap’s case often SMS-centric workflows too). If your main objective is making sure leads get consistent follow-up and reminders, both can deliver value.
Marketing tools (forms, landing pages, attribution)
HubSpot generally provides a broader marketing toolset inside the platform—especially around content, web conversion, and reporting tied to lifecycle and revenue. Keap can support campaigns and landing pages, but it’s typically chosen for small-business automation rather than full inbound marketing and attribution.
Scale, governance, and reporting depth
As teams grow, reporting requirements tend to get more complex: lifecycle definitions, multi-touch attribution, funnel reporting, forecasting, permissions, and cross-team governance. This is where HubSpot typically becomes a stronger fit, especially for organizations with multiple marketers, sales reps, and service users.
Feature Comparison: HubSpot vs Keap
| Category | HubSpot | Keap |
|---|---|---|
| Best for | SMB → mid-market → enterprise teams needing a CRM-first platform across marketing, sales, and service | Small businesses needing CRM + follow-up automation (often with SMS and scheduling) |
| Free option | Yes (free CRM tools available) | No free plan (trial/demo options available) |
| Marketing + web tools | Strong native tools (forms, landing pages, email, reporting, and content tooling depending on subscriptions) | Good automation focus; web + inbound capabilities are typically lighter than HubSpot |
| Automation | Strong automation that scales with tier and use case across teams | Strong small-business automation, especially for follow-up and task-driven workflows |
| SMS + scheduling emphasis | Possible via add-ons/integrations, but not the core identity | Often a core strength for small-business workflows |
| Reporting depth | Generally stronger for lifecycle + revenue reporting, especially at higher tiers | Solid reporting for small-business needs; typically less enterprise-grade depth |
| Team scalability | Built to scale across departments with stronger governance options at higher tiers | Best for small teams; costs can rise as contacts/users expand |
Pricing Comparison
Pricing changes over time, so the most accurate approach is to confirm current costs directly on each vendor’s pricing page. That said, here’s the practical difference most buyers experience:
- HubSpot offers a free starting point, and paid plans scale based on the products (Hubs) you need, usage limits (like marketing contacts), and seat types in some tiers.
- Keap does not offer a free plan and is generally priced as an all-in-one small business platform. Current base pricing starts at $249/month, and pricing increases as you add contacts and users.
A quick rule of thumb: if you need a platform that can scale across multiple teams with deeper reporting and inbound tooling, HubSpot often provides better long-term flexibility. If you’re a small team that mainly needs follow-up automation and simple CRM structure, Keap can be effective—just plan for cost increases as your database and team grow.
Onboarding and Training
HubSpot is known for extensive self-serve enablement through documentation and training content, and it also offers paid onboarding services depending on your tier and product mix. Many teams can become productive quickly due to ease of use.
Keap provides onboarding resources and support pathways as well, but it’s typically positioned for small-business implementation. If your business has complex lifecycle reporting or multi-team handoffs, you’ll want to plan your data model and automation carefully regardless of platform.
If you want hands-on help implementing HubSpot—data model, pipelines, automation, reporting, integrations—teams often work with a partner like No Bounds Digital to accelerate time-to-value and avoid costly rework.
Migration Options
CRM migrations are rarely “just import contacts.” A successful migration usually includes:
- cleaning and mapping fields (including custom properties)
- rebuilding pipelines and stages
- recreating automations, templates, and sequences
- validating reporting and attribution
- integrating forms, scheduling, or payment tools where needed
If you’re moving from Keap to HubSpot, the biggest win is usually building a cleaner CRM architecture and stronger reporting. If you’re moving from HubSpot to Keap, it’s typically because you want a smaller-team platform with a strong follow-up automation focus.
Customer Service Experience
Support availability varies by plan and contract. In general:
- HubSpot provides support channels that scale by subscription level (knowledge base and community at all levels, with chat/email/phone depending on plan).
- Keap provides support channels including chat and phone, with hours and options that may vary by region and plan.
If support is a deciding factor for you, verify the exact channels and coverage you’ll receive on the plan you’re considering— especially if you expect to need fast help during critical launches or migrations.
Conclusion: HubSpot vs Keap
If you want a CRM-first platform that can unify marketing, sales, service, content, and reporting—and scale with your organization— HubSpot is often the stronger long-term choice.
If you’re a small business that wants an all-in-one system focused on follow-up automation (often including SMS and scheduling) and you’re comfortable with pricing that grows as your contacts/users grow, Keap can be a solid fit.
If you’re unsure, the best next step is to map your goals to your required workflows: lead capture → nurturing → sales handoff → pipeline management → reporting. The platform that supports that end-to-end flow with the least friction is usually the right choice.
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