About this use-case

CloudFiles offers a cool feature to personalize the file link using a URL parameter. This, when combined with HubSpot's personalization tokens for marketing & sales email templates, offers a neat way to collect personalized analytics on any CloudFiles link, without gating it.

This means you can collect precise and detailed file, folder and dataroom analytics right on the HubSpot record, by simply changing a link in your email templates.

In the section below, we detail the elements used to make this use-case possible. We then detail each of the elements so you can edit your own campaigns and collect personalized ungated analytics on your collateral.

Elements of the use-case

This use-case utilizes a couple of features both from HubSpot & CloudFiles. It also utilizes the power of the deep integration between CloudFiles & HubSpot which makes all the information available back in HubSpot.

We talk about link creation, personalization, analytics collection and sending it to HubSpot in the steps below. Refer to the sections below for more detailed information on these steps.

1. Creating a CloudFiles Link - In this step, we create a singular CloudFiles link for our asset that we will use for this specific campaign.
2. Link Personalization in HubSpot Email Templates - In this step, we use HubSpot's personalization token feature in marketing and sales email templates to add create a personalized hyperlink out of our CloudFiles link.
3. Sending test email - In this step, we send a test email to make sure that the personalization parameter was added correctly in the generated email.
4. Collecting Analytics in CloudFiles - We access the link from the email above and see the personalized analytics collected in the CloudFiles dashboard.
5. Collecting Analytics in HubSpot - We see how the analytics gets automatically pushed to HubSpot and can be accessed from the record itself.

1 - Creating a CloudFiles Link

CloudFiles links are secure & publicly shareable links that can collect detailed and drilldown analytics. There are multiple ways of creating this link from within, and outside of HubSpot. Since email campaigns are usually run by marketers, we recommend using our CloudFiles Webapp Dashboard (https://app.cloudfiles.io) to maintain your content library and manage links of your files.

Once on the dashboard, you can follow the simple steps given in our article on Creating file, folder and dataroom links to create a CloudFiles link for your asset(s). While you don't need to update any settings for this use-case, you can choose to configure something on this step if you'd like.



2 - Link Personalization in HubSpot Email Templates

Once you have the link ready, go back to HubSpot and edit one of your marketing or sales email templates. Locate the hyperlink that you'd like to update and add the copied CloudFiles link here. Then, add a personalization parameter as shown below at the end of the link.



3 - Sending test email

You can use HubSpot's test email functionality to send a test email to yourself and see if the link was personalized correctly. The link in the email inbox should have your email appended to it at the end. The format is shown in the graphic below -





4 - Collecting Analytics in CloudFiles

Click on the link that was sent in the email. When you access this link, CloudFiles will not show any email wall but will still collect personalized analytics. Spend a few seconds on your asset for the analytics to build up. Then come back to the CloudFiles interface and view the analytics section of the link details page as shown below.



5 - Collecting Analytics in HubSpot

Since CloudFiles integrates deeply with HubSpot, all of this analytics information is also pushed on the contact associated with that email. If CloudFiles does not find a contact in your HubSpot, it will create a new one and push the analytics on that record.

The analytics can be accessed using the timeline event. The graphic below shows the Timeline event posted by CloudFiles on the record when view happens.



It can also be used in your list filters and workflow triggers to segment your lists based on engagement. The graphic below shows the CloudFiles File Viewed Event that can be used for this purpose.