HubSpot recruited top Apple Store employees into customer support with better pay and a clear path to leadership roles. The company offered $40K for seated work instead of standing all day, then promoted support staff into account management and product roles. The current head of product started as a support representative.
We made customer support sexy. Most of the hires were from Apple Stores. So I would go to an Apple Store, upgrade my phone, and if the guy or gal was good, they got an offer within a week. And it got to the point where I would walk into the Apple Store in Cambridge and be like, you, out. And they were good. And the value prop was really simple. Like, you're making whatever, $40K and standing on your feet all day. How'd you like to make $40K and sit down all day? Turns out that was pretty appealing. The other part of it is we promoted out of support, sort of hiring a CSM or an account manager, product manager. Every other role in the company was full of people we hired from the Apple Store into support through the rest of the org. And eventually the guy who is our head, head of product was started as a support rep, and that's still true today. So we made it very sexy inside of HubSpot to be in support.
