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      Use Case: AI-Powered News Analysis for Lead Scoring in HubSpot

      This article outlines a powerful custom use case that leverages custom workflow actions, AI models, and news analysis to improve lead scoring and sales prioritization in HubSpot.

      What’s Being Built?

      We’re exploring a custom integration (or rather, a custom workflow action) that:

      • Uses public web data to search for recent news about a company.

      • Passes that data through an LLM (like ChatGPT) to classify the company as:

        • Bullish – Positive traction

        • Neutral – No significant change

        • Bearish – Negative traction

      • Saves this result back into HubSpot for use in lead scoring or sales prioritization workflows.

      Sentiment Classifications – Going Deeper

      Instead of just three sentiment tags, you could offer extended classifications or allow for configurable tones, such as:

      • Momentum Score: Quantifies how much media buzz is building

      • Category of News: Funding, layoffs, partnerships, legal issues, etc.

      • Alert Triggers: Option to flag companies with sharp negative turns

      This opens up room for future enhancements or tiered offerings.

      Example Workflow Flow

      1. Trigger: A workflow is triggered on a company (e.g., weekly).

      2. Action: A custom action queries news articles related to the company’s domain.

      3. AI Analysis: An LLM summarizes and scores the company’s current market sentiment.

      4. Update: The result is saved to a custom property in HubSpot (e.g., "AI Sentiment Score").

      5. Follow-up: Sales workflows use this to prioritize leads based on real-time news relevance.

      Who’s It For?

      • HubSpot partners and agencies offering AI or data services

      • Sales teams managing large lead databases (e.g., 100k+ companies)

      • Clients looking for smarter lead scoring and prioritization beyond traditional data enrichment

      Sample Use Cases

      • A sales rep sees “Bearish” status on a lead and decides to deprioritize it for now

      • A partner agency uses this to pitch AI services that actually drive sales performance

      • A revops team integrates sentiment into multi-step lead scoring formulas

      Real-World Scenarios

      This approach isn’t just for one niche — it has broad use across industries:

      • Venture Capital Firms
        Automatically monitor portfolio companies or prospects for market sentiment shifts.

      • B2B SaaS Companies
        Prioritize outbound outreach based on whether target accounts are experiencing growth or PR issues.

      • Recruitment Agencies
        Track companies making headlines for expansion, funding, or layoffs — and time their outreach accordingly.

      Prompting Logic Example

      Here’s how the LLM might be prompted inside the custom action:

      “Summarize recent news from the past 7 days about the company "Company Name", based on its domain "Company Domain".
      Then classify the tone of the news as Bullish, Neutral, or Bearish and explain why.”

      Example Output:

      Sentiment: Bullish
      Summary: “The company announced a $20M Series B funding round and plans to expand into Asia-Pacific. Multiple outlets highlighted their rapid growth and strong customer retention.”
      Reasoning: Positive funding and expansion signals.

      Key Benefits

      • Automates company research and sentiment detection.

      • Keeps CRM data fresh and relevant using scheduled news checks.

      • Enhances lead scoring and helps reps focus on the most promising leads.

      • Enables agencies and partners to sell AI consulting services backed by automation.

      Differentiator vs Other “AI” Tools

      Most “AI integrations” in the CRM world either:

      • Just analyze what’s already inside the CRM (e.g. email body, notes)

      • Don’t bring in external context about the lead’s market activity

      This action bridges that gap, making HubSpot feel like it knows what’s going on outside your CRM too.

      How Often Can It Run?

      This custom action is designed to run on a schedule—like weekly re-enrollment—to refresh insights regularly for large databases.

      For example:

      “If they have 100,000 companies and re-enroll every week to get news insights and adjust prioritization, it becomes an ongoing, high-value process.”

      Why It’s Lucrative

      • Sticky: Companies rely on ongoing insights to prioritize leads.

      • Scalable: The action runs across large company datasets.

      • Smart: Adds true value by automating the “next best lead” logic.

      Not Just an Integration — A Strategic AI Action

      This isn’t about syncing two tools — it's about creating a new capability inside HubSpot. The action doesn’t just enrich data — it makes sense of the outside world and embeds that intelligence directly into sales workflows.

      Perfect for clients needing:

      • Deep research automation

      • AI-backed insights

      • Scalable weekly processing

      Qualification Checklist

      Use this to see if it's a good fit:

      • Do you manage 10,000+ companies in HubSpot?

      • Are you already using workflows for lead scoring?

      • Do you want more context than just industry and size?

      • Are your sales reps struggling with prioritization?

      Getting Started with AI Sentiment Actions

      Want to explore this for your team or clients?

      • Contact us to scope a custom workflow action.

      • We’ll work with you to define:

        • Search method (Google News, Bing, etc.)

        • LLM provider (OpenAI, Claude, etc.)

        • Where sentiment scores are stored and how they’re used