Revenue & Shipping Forecasting in HubSpot

Background

Helix is a specialist engineering group operating across high-performance electric motors, inverters and advanced drivetrain technologies. Working across technically complex, project-led environments, Helix needed clear visibility not only of future sales opportunities, but also of when those projects are likely to convert into invoicing, shipping and operational workload.

Like many project-based engineering businesses, Helix’s commercial pipeline contains opportunities that may be won at one point in time but delivered, shipped and invoiced over a much longer period. Standard HubSpot forecasting is highly effective for sales forecasting, but there is an important distinction between forecasting the value of deals expected to close and forecasting the timing of future revenue, shipments and operational demand.

Sales forecasting focuses on when orders are expected to be won. Revenue forecasting focuses on when invoices are expected to be raised. Shipping forecasting adds a further operational layer by identifying when products, systems or project milestones are expected to move through fulfilment and out to customers.

For Helix, this distinction was critical. Finance needed a clearer view of future invoicing profiles, while operations needed forward-looking information to support shopfloor capacity planning. A deal might be won in one month, invoiced over several months and shipped in stages depending on build schedules, customer requirements and project milestones.

Wellmeadow worked with Helix to develop a tailored forecasting solution in HubSpot, using existing deal data to generate a more useful forward view of invoicing, shipping and capacity demand.

How we helped

(The Enterprise Licence Solution)

Leveraging Helix’s HubSpot Enterprise licence, Wellmeadow used custom objects to architect the solution. A custom object was created to hold forecast records, allowing each deal to be translated into a forward-looking profile of expected billings and shipping activity.

These forecast records became the foundation for reporting. Rather than relying only on the close date and total value of a deal, the model used custom properties to spread expected invoicing and shipping activity across future periods.

Wellmeadow also used HubSpot workflows to automate key parts of the forecasting process. When relevant forecasting properties were updated on the line items in a deal, workflows were triggered to refresh the forecast records linked to that deal. Previous forecast records were cleared or replaced to avoid double counting, ensuring that the reporting remained current as assumptions changed.

This allowed Helix to move from a simple sales pipeline view to a more operationally useful forecast, showing not only expected future revenue, but also when products or project stages were expected to ship.

Given the complexity of managing multiple opportunities across a group environment, the solution also included bespoke reports and dashboards. These allowed the forecast data to be analysed by revenue category, project type, shipping period, business area and operational demand.

For the finance team, this provided a clearer view of expected invoicing across future months and quarters. For the operations team, it provided valuable capacity planning insight for the shopfloor by highlighting when forecasted work was expected to move through production and fulfilment.

How You Can Do It with Pro

(The Professional Licence Solution)

HubSpot is a constantly evolving platform, and new features are arriving all the time.

Since the original version of this type of solution was created, HubSpot users have gained access to object templates for areas such as services, courses and other structured records. This opens up additional options for building similar forecasting models without always needing the same Enterprise-level custom object architecture.

There is, however, one important distinction. You cannot create custom template object records directly using HubSpot workflows in the same way.

That does not mean the approach is unavailable to Professional licence users. By using the API, it is possible to create, update and delete forecast records in a more flexible way. In some respects, this can be cleaner than a workflow-only approach because old forecast records can be deleted and recreated, rather than simply cleared or overwritten.

This API-led approach can be implemented using tools such as Microsoft Power Automate or Zapier, without needing to build a fully bespoke software application. Wellmeadow can provide support to design the data model, map the process and help configure the automation.

The same principle can then be applied to both invoicing and shipping forecasts, giving businesses a practical way to turn HubSpot deal data into forward-looking financial and operational planning information.

Results

↑Faster reporting | ↑Improved invoicing visibility | ↑Better shopfloor capacity planning

The result was a real-time forecasting model built directly around HubSpot data, reducing the need for external spreadsheets and manual manipulation.

For Helix, this created a clearer view of expected future invoicing, helping finance understand how the sales pipeline translated into future revenue periods. It also added a shipping forecast, giving operations a forward-looking view of expected workload and helping the shopfloor plan capacity more effectively.

By extending HubSpot beyond standard sales forecasting, Wellmeadow helped Helix turn pipeline data into practical business planning information for finance, operations and senior management.