ABM Email Strategy & HubSpot Automation — 2026-04-05
Overview
Weekly call with AviaryAI to finalize the automated ABM email strategy and scope upcoming work. The team aligned on using a custom AWS SES solution for outbound email automation, with full email body logging in HubSpot to satisfy Blessing's visibility requirements. Additional projects were scoped: HubSpot workflow automation, an AI-powered proposal generator, a 71k-contact database cleanup, and a potential DNS migration to Cloudflare.
Attendees:
- Asymmetric: Mark Hope, Sebastian Gant, Avokerie Onorimuo, Karly Oykhman
- AviaryAI: Aaron Grossman, Abraham Blesson (Blessing), Justin Dwyer
Key Decisions
✅ AWS SES for ABM Email Automation (Approved)
A custom AWS SES solution will replace manual Outlook-based sending for Tier 1 ABM emails. Decision rationale:
- Avoids paid tool costs (SendGrid, HubSpot Marketing Pro)
- Integrates with HubSpot via webhooks to log opens, clicks, and sends in the activity feed
- Critical requirement: Full email body must appear in HubSpot's activity stream, mirroring the current Outlook integration that Blessing uses to review Aaron's outreach
- Built to scale to Tier 2/3 volume (1,000+ emails/week)
"I don't care how it gets out there. As long as I don't have to look at every single one." — Aaron Grossman
"The only criteria you stated today was that you want to be able to see every email that's sent in HubSpot, including the content." — Mark Hope
✅ HubSpot Workflow Automation (Scoped)
Aaron will define trigger/action pairs for HubSpot workflows. Agreed approach: use automated lists (queues) rather than individual tasks to prevent task overload.
Confirmed use cases:
- Contract reminder: Auto-send reminder email after ~5 days if contract is unsigned
- Closed Won infographic: On deal moved to Closed Won, trigger a partner announcement infographic for Blessing to post on LinkedIn (potentially AI-generated)
✅ AI Proposal Generator (Scoped)
Build an AI tool using AviaryAI's standard 5-page proposal template. Workflow:
1. Aaron answers a set of intake questions
2. AI populates the template
3. Aaron reviews and sends from HubSpot
Aaron will annotate the template with field-level guidance and send to Mark.
✅ HubSpot Database Cleanup (Approved)
The 71k-contact database requires cleanup before high-volume campaigns can launch. Sebastian will lead using Clay and Apollo.
🔄 Cloudflare DNS Migration (Pending CTO Approval)
Moving DNS to Cloudflare would enable WAF, bot protection, and security headers (not configurable directly in Webflow). Justin will check with AviaryAI's CTO for potential conflicts with other domains using the same DNS.
Database Cleanup Plan
| Issue | Action |
|---|---|
| ~20k VC contacts (Blessing's old data dump) | Identify via missing "financial institution" tag; move to "Other" |
| Contacts with no names (broken automation artifact) | Remove or enrich via Clay/Apollo |
| Duplicate records | Deduplicate |
| Stale/invalid email addresses | Run email hygiene check to reduce bounce risk |
Target categories after cleanup:
- Credit Unions
- Community Banks
- Insurance Companies
- Other (uncategorized, for separate review)
Budget: $1,000/month learning budget approved for initial campaign testing. Mark and Sebastian to align on KPIs and daily spend allocation.
Website & SEO
- "Journey" page: Ready to launch. Justin confirmed minor heading tweaks can be made post-launch. Publishing unblocks the broader SEO content push.
- Use-case pages: Two additional use-case pages to be built in the same format as the journey page.
- SEO content: Blog posts targeting terms without dedicated landing pages to be created in parallel.
- Press releases: Newswire (~$325/release) recommended for new client win announcements. Generates backlinks (Bloomberg, Fox News, financial press) and "as seen on" credibility. AviaryAI contracts include a clause allowing them to promote new partnerships unless redlined by the client.
- LinkedIn Ads: Karly flagged as a future channel. Justin prefers building out organic presence first before adding paid social.
Action Items
| Owner | Action | Due |
|---|---|---|
| Mark | Build AWS SES outbound email automation with HubSpot webhook logging (include email body) | ASAP / end of week |
| Mark | Slack Aaron when first emails are sent | On send |
| Mark | Send client brain logins to Aaron, Justin, Karly, Sebastian | — |
| Mark | Align with Sebastian on $1k/month learning budget and KPIs | — |
| Aaron | Send HubSpot workflow requirements (trigger/action wishlist) to Mark by EOD Feb 19 | EOD Feb 19 |
| Aaron | Send annotated proposal template + AI prompt notes to Mark by EOD Feb 19 | EOD Feb 19 |
| Justin | Check with CTO re: Cloudflare DNS migration; report back to Mark/Sebastian | — |
| Sebastian | Clean and categorize 71k-contact database (dedupe, fill names, tag CU/Bank/Insurance, hygiene check) | — |
| Sebastian | Publish journey page; build 2 use-case pages + SEO blog content | — |
Transcript Highlights
On the core email requirement:
"I think because Blessing is the way he is, he would want to have the emails in HubSpot. Not just, did they send an email, did they open the email? The actual content of the email." — Aaron Grossman
On automation philosophy:
"As you create those automated tasks, pretty soon you've got 75 tasks and you can't keep up with them and you just start ignoring them. So another alternative would be to create a workflow that says, when this happens, add this person to a list. Then you just go to the list and work the queue." — Mark Hope
On email volume goals:
"I could only send out, at one point, it was only 50 emails a day, and then it got bumped up to 100. And then our numbers weren't at that statistically significant level to see if the open rate and the message was right. So let's go." — Aaron Grossman
On the AI proposal generator:
"You should, as you're working and doing your job, identify things that you're doing over and over that are a pain and tell us about them and we'll try to figure out how to automate them away." — Mark Hope
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