10 Key Takeaways From the 2025 HubSpot Inbound Conference

Last month, Kevin (my husband and Wild Fig’s Chief Propeller Head) and I attended the HubSpot Inbound conference in San Francisco…and came home with a whole lot of information and fresh ideas! Here are just a handful of our biggest takeaways from the conference. Stay tuned for much more to come!

1. It’s Time To Move From SEO to GEO

Many companies are seeing less traffic to their websites, but higher rates of conversion. The reason for that? Zero-click or AI-mode traffic (for example, those AI summaries you see when you do a Google search, or Google’s new AI mode for search—more on that in a minute). 

This traffic tends to convert better than traditional website traffic, because it reduces friction, handles objections up front, steers user intent, and carries built-in trust (or, at least, growing trust). 

So what does this mean for you? It means the effectiveness of traditional SEO is waning, and you need to start focusing more on GEO, or Generative Engine Optimization.

GEO (also sometimes called AEO and several other acronyms…seems like there’s not yet a consensus on what to call it) is primarily a content strategy discipline (not a technical one). It’s more difficult and less predictable than classic SEO, yet it shines for brand visibility, reputation management, and direct conversions. GEO is still an emerging discipline, so there aren’t many proven, reliable strategies for bringing in revenue with GEO yet. The name of the game right now is to use what’s already working for you while you experiment. 

Here are some things to keep in mind as you adopt new GEO strategies:

• Set your focus on building presence in ChatGPT and Google’s AI Mode. ChatGPT usage is exploding right now, but Google AI Mode is expected to overtake it in volume in the near future.
• Create assets that AI can cite and summarize. The customer journey is changing: Mid-funnel discovery and education is increasingly happening inside Google or generative AI platforms, not just on your website.
• Use LLMs as a market research engine. Use AI to mine Reddit and other niche forums, call notes, and support logs, and extract customer search intents, micro-topics, language, and objections.
• Use the VECTOR framework to optimize your content for how AI builds answers:
  • Verify intents. Interview users, mine online communities, and build buyer persona variants
  • Expand relevance. Publish persona-targeted micro-topic content, lead with core information backed by specifics, and use AI to enrich semantics.
  • Clarify answers. Write concise, self-contained passages that directly answer a specific question, such as FAQs, pros/cons, and comparisons.
  • Target mentions. Earn brand mentions in authoritative sources and monitor third party messaging.
  • Optimize assembly. Structure pages with clear hierarchy and schema, write passages for each persona intent, and use lists, tables, and comparisons.
  • Refresh passages. Update top pages with recent developments, and clearly date and time-scope facts.
• Train your teams to research customer search intents and earn co-citations with digital PR.
• Use AI-driven content workflows

2. Humans Lead; AI Accelerates

Successful marketing teams see AI as a coworker or assistant, not a threat. As amazing as AI is, it can’t replace a human touch, so there’s no need to be threatened by it. Instead, use AI tools to enhance your work and make it more efficient.

Handing over some of your tasks to AI can give you more time and energy to spend on creativity and connection—the things that need a human touch. It’s all about knowing which tasks to give to AI and which are better done by a human.

For example, AI is a great tool to help you brainstorm and kick-start the creative process. Try using generative AI tools to create blog outlines or write drafts for emails or social posts. Then add your own perspective and voice to complete the content. 

Working with AI as a partner, not a replacement, will help you continue to stand out online.

Learn more about maintaining a human touch in your content.

3. Loop Marketing

AI has changed how we need to market. HubSpot’s answer to this change is their new Loop Marketing Playbook. We’ll dive deeper into Loop marketing in a future blog (there’s a LOT to talk about!), but here’s the gist, in HubSpot’s own words:

“Loop Marketing is a new four-stage approach that combines AI efficiency and human authenticity to drive growth.”

The stages are:

1. Express your message. Use your ideal customer profile to create a style guide for your campaigns.
2. Tailor it to your audience. Use AI to personalize audience interactions.
3. Amplify it across channels. Diversify your content across channels for humans (social media, email, etc) and AI (LLMs, search, etc).
4. Evolve it in real time. Use AI to quickly and effectively repeat the process.

This is an approach that means constantly editing and adapting your message based on audience engagement. Loop marketing delivers faster go-to-market, deeper customer connection, lower acquisition costs, and continuous optimization with AI that learns and improves with every campaign.

4. HubSpot AI Agents 

Hubspot now offers out-of-the box and customizable AI agents. These agents can help you with everything from identifying new prospects to scrubbing and updating your prospect data to qualifying leads and monitoring the health of your clients to learn who might be at risk of dropping (and so much more!).

Here are just some of the things HubSpot’s AI agents can help you do:

• Automatically generate proposals and documents
• Proposal review and cost-coverage analysis
• Summarize reports
• Transcribe meetings
• Deliver highly personalized client insights
• SEO research
• Content drafts
• Data analysis and reporting
• Personalizing content
• Speed up your sales process

Find more information about HubSpot AI agents here.

5. Relational Intelligence Is a Critical Skill

As AI adoption increases, the skill of relational intelligence is what will give you an edge over the competition.

Relational intelligence is the ability to listen, build trust, and create and maintain genuine relationships that lead change. This kind of emotional connection drives loyalty and builds culture—it’s what makes people excited to work with you!

While AI can tackle some of the tasks we do every day, it can’t hold a candle to the human touch necessary to build real relationships—with prospects, clients, coworkers, industry partners…anyone you work with. 

Relational intelligence is what will bridge the gap between AI and humans. It is the critical skill we’ll all need to maintain to stay competitive in the AI age.

6. Use AI To Measure Your Marketing Effectiveness

We’ve been big fans of Jay Schwedelson for a long time now—in fact, if you’re on our email list, you’ve probably seen our “best days to post this month” calendars. Well, those come from Jay! At Inbound, Jay showed us some fantastic ways to use AI to measure the effectiveness of marketing campaigns.

He showed us how to use AI to: 

• Do a competitor and market analysis (asking it to scan competitor websites and return whatever data you’re looking for)
• Scan Reddit or social media platforms to gain unfiltered audience sentiment and/or identify trends, and
• Build prioritized account-based lists

But our favorite new tip from Jay was how to use AI to create a color-coded heatmap of your inbox to show the likelihood of each email being opened, and why. He simply gave ChatGPT a screenshot of his inbox and asked it to create the heatmap. Check it out:

This is mind-blowing…and completely fascinating!

One final tip from Jay: Write your CTA buttons in first-person. For example, instead of “Register today,” say something like, “I want in!” This adds an element of personal connection to your audience and makes them more likely to click that button.

7. Show—Don’t Gate—Your Content

So many things have changed in how people consume content and make the decision to buy. One big change is that it’s now more effective to show your content for free—instead of gating it behind a paywall.

Gated content is now considered a big turn-off. It’s more effective to present yourself as a resource, providing at least one or two pieces of free content before gating the rest. One Inbound speaker shared that she experimented with this on LinkedIn: She ungated her content and saw a 10% increase in organic content, 10-20% more leads, and 2.5x engagement!

I’d say that’s worth a few pieces of free content!

Another note on changes in the content marketing sphere: Providing “fun-sized” content is a better move to draw in prospects. Shorter content is more engaging and appealing, and leaves them wanting more. (Think pizza samples at Costco…talk about an effective marketing tool!)

8. The 2/11 Matrix™

We live in an attention economy, and memory is currency—meaning that making your brand memorable is worth its weight in gold. The 2/11 Matrix™ is a marketing strategy focused on creating memorable brand experiences that drive engagement and growth. Leveraging human psychology, this six-component system helps you build lasting brand connections that influence future purchasing decisions.

Here’s a great example of memorable brands: At Inbound, the speaker for this session put up a slide with photos of Coke and Pepsi on it, and asked us to raise our hands when we knew which one we wanted. Every person in the room raised their hands within seconds. 

Here are a few of the key aspects of the 2/11 Matrix™:

• Solves the Memory Problem: Traditional marketing messages are easily forgotten. The 2/11 Matrix™ addresses this by focusing on creating memorable experiences.
• Based on Human Psychology: The framework incorporates aspects of human psychology to help you build connections that last.
• Six-Component System: This strategy provides a structured system for developing memorable brand connections.
• Focus on Lasting Connections: The goal of the 2/11 Matrix™ is to create a lasting relationship with your audience that influences their future purchasing decisions.
• No More "In-the-Moment" Messaging: This framework emphasizes moving beyond temporary awareness to build long-term engagement and influence.

9. Google AI Mode

Did you know that Google has an AI mode that’s more thorough and effective than traditional search? Google AI Mode uses Gemini 2.5’s advanced reasoning, thinking, and multimodal capabilities to answer your search queries. AI Mode searches give you AI-powered responses, with the ability to ask follow-up questions and view helpful web links.

AI Mode is particularly helpful for questions that need more exploration, comparison, and reasoning. You can even ask nuanced questions that would typically take multiple searches to answer. Plus, you can use type, talk, or an image to search.

And for searches where you want an even more thorough response, there’s a Deep Search option within AI Mode. Deep Search “browses hundreds of sites and reasons across them, crafting a comprehensive, fully-cited report in just minutes.” (Deep Search mode is available to Google AI subscribers.)

10. LinkedIn Ads Stats

Finally, we heard some interesting new statistics about LinkedIn Ads that we found helpful. If you’re thinking about running LI ads for your business, keep these stats in mind:

• Optimal cost per click: $10-16
• Optimal conversion for downloaded content ads: 10-15%
• Optimal conversion for meeting with you ads: 1-4%

Overall, we had a great time at the HubSpot Inbound conference and learned so much that we’re now working to implement. As a certified HubSpot partner, we’re here to answer all your HubSpot questions and help ensure you’re getting the most out of the platform. Want to explore working with us? Simply schedule an exploratory call to chat about your needs and how we can help.