CASE STUDY
HubSpot Commercial Model for an AutomateNow Client
Challenge
An electronics reseller and provider of complementary services needed a more controlled commercial model in HubSpot for product-led deals. Commercial activity, pricing support and commission interpretation were spread across HubSpot and surrounding processes, which made it harder to treat HubSpot as a reliable source of truth for line-item-led deal values, margin visibility and finance review.
Solution
Working with AutomateNow, MPED defined a Phase 1 HubSpot-native commercial model built around a governed product catalogue, line-item-driven deal values, simplified commission visibility and finance-facing reporting. The delivery combined solution architecture, HubSpot configuration design, sandbox validation support and a targeted Azure Function path for margin-based line-item commission calculation and write-back.
System functionality
- Manually maintained HubSpot product catalogue for approved sellable items
- Product-based line items added to deals
- Deal amount driven from line items rather than rough estimates
- Margin-capable commercial structure using sell price, cost, quantity and category context
- Commission model v1 with controlled, simplified logic
- Finance-facing commission review report in HubSpot
- Azure HTTP endpoint that reads HubSpot deals and line items, calculates per-line commission, aggregates totals and writes results back to HubSpot
TECHNICAL SPECIFICATIONS
- HubSpot target model: Product Library to Line Item to Deal to Commission Calculation to Commission Report
- Product structure included native price and cost-of-goods fields plus custom classification fields
- HubSpot-native Phase 1 design supported revenue-based or margin-based deal-level commission in sandbox modelling
- Azure Function v1 implemented the narrowed margin-only line-item calculation path using sell price, quantity, cost snapshot and commission-rate snapshot
- Function outputs covered line-level commission, aggregated commission totals and calculation results
- Commission status remained business-owned in HubSpot and was not overwritten by Azure
- Function authentication stayed at Function level, with secrets held in app settings
- DEV deployment path included IaC, pipeline preparation and authenticated endpoint verification
Technologies
- HubSpot properties, products, line items, workflows and reports
- Azure Functions Flex Consumption
- .NET 8 isolated worker
- Bicep
- Azure CLI
- Azure DevOps YAML pipelines
- xUnit test projects
APPLICATIONS
- Product-based sales opportunities in HubSpot
- Deals combining hardware, software and related services
- Margin-aware commission visibility for finance review
- Controlled sandbox validation before broader rollout
- Future-ready path toward more automated commission handling without introducing a full rules engine in Phase 1
Results
- Defined a practical Phase 1 commercial model in HubSpot built around products, line items, commission visibility and governance
- Produced implementation-ready HubSpot administrator guidance and sandbox validation assets
- Created sample product-library and deal-validation structures for controlled testing
- Delivered a working Azure commission-calculation package with tests, IaC and a DEV deployment path
- Completed DEV deployment of the Azure Function and verified authenticated endpoint behaviour
- Identified the remaining sandbox blocker before full connected smoke testing: required line-item snapshot fields were not yet populated on the dedicated test deal
Summary
For a client of AutomateNow, MPED helped move fragmented product-led selling toward a more structured HubSpot-native commercial model. By combining product catalogue governance, line-item-led deal structure, finance-facing commission visibility and a DEV-ready Azure calculator path, the project created a practical foundation for cleaner commercial control without overstating Phase 1 scope.