Hi everyone! I'm tasked with getting a new tool (probably a CRM or a project tracker) set up for our marketing team. We're about 10 people, all remote.
I've never done this before and terms like "change management" and "early-warning metrics" are a bit overwhelming 😅. Where is the absolute best place to start? Do I focus on training first, or picking the tool, or getting everyone excited? A simple first step would be really helpful.
Learning the ropes
I'm on a 12-person marketing team, we're also remote, and I was in your shoes last year. We currently run HubSpot Marketing Hub and Notion in production.
Focus on the tool pick first. Here's the breakdown I wish I had:
**Target audience fit**: HubSpot's free CRM tier is cut for teams under 10. You get contacts, deals, and email marketing for free, but the reporting gets thin fast. Notion is generic, so you'll configure everything from scratch, but that's also the appeal.
**Real pricing**: HubSpot's free plan is genuinely free for core CRM and basic email. Adding marketing automation (workflows, forms) jumps to ~$45/month per seat for the Starter tier. Notion is $8/user/month for their Team plan, flat, which covers all features.
**Deployment effort**: For HubSpot, you can be sending your first email campaign in an afternoon. The hard part is migrating contact lists. Notion took us about 2 weeks of dedicated setup time to build project boards, SOP templates, and a content calendar everyone would actually use.
**Honest limitation**: HubSpot gets expensive quickly if you need advanced features, and custom reporting is clunky without a higher tier. Notion has no native email marketing or lead tracking, so you can't manage campaigns end-to-end within it.
My pick is HubSpot's free tier to start. It bundles a simple CRM, basic email, and forms together, which covers 80% of a marketing team's operational needs out of the gate. If your main need is strictly project tracking and document sharing, Notion is the cleaner choice. Tell us: are you doing more email campaigns and lead management, or more content planning and workflow coordination?
MartechStruggles
You're right to feel overwhelmed. I'd say don't even think about training or change management yet.
Before you pick any tool, write down the three biggest daily annoyances your team has right now. Is it losing track of customer emails, not knowing project status, or something else?
That list will tell you what to shop for. Ignore the fancy features until you know which annoyance you're solving.
Oh that's so relatable, the jargon is what gets me too.
I actually disagree with picking the tool first. I got really excited about a fancy project tracker once, but then nobody used it. Now I think user663 has the right idea about listing annoyances.
Maybe talk to 2 or 3 people on your team first and ask them what wastes their time? That's a pretty simple first step and it keeps you from getting lost in feature lists right away. What's one thing that slows your team down most often?
Totally get that overwhelmed feeling. I was there last month.
I like the suggestion about talking to a few team members first, but maybe frame it more positively. Instead of just "what wastes your time," maybe ask "what's one piece of information you always find yourself digging for?" Could be a campaign's latest draft or a client's last email.
That small reframe made my team way more open to the convo. Good luck!
Learning every day
That "overwhelmed" feeling is so common, and you're smart to ask for a simple first step. I think the best step is right in your post: you've already been *tasked* with this.
Before you dive into tools or surveys, take five minutes to clarify that task with whoever gave it to you. Ask, "What's the one main problem we're trying to solve with a new system?" Getting that single objective in writing is your true starting point. It turns a vague project into a specific goal, and it'll make every decision after that much clearer.
Keep it real, keep it kind.
That's a solid administrative checkpoint, but it often yields a frustratingly high-level answer like "improve efficiency" or "get organized." The real constraint usually isn't the stated goal, it's the unspoken one: what they're willing to spend or the timeline they're imagining.
Before that five-minute chat, I'd decide what two pieces of metadata you need from them: the budget range (even if it's "as close to free as possible") and the go-live date. When you ask for the single objective, immediately follow with, "And to frame the options, are we thinking in terms of a solution costing hundreds per month or thousands, and is this needed next quarter or next week?" Their reaction to those numbers will tell you more than the objective.
Measure twice, cut once.