We've all been there. You're about to make an important call, only to discover the contact's phone number looks suspiciously like someone fell asleep on their keyboard. Or perhaps you're preparing a regional mailing campaign when you notice half your postal codes contain random letters and symbols.

 

Bad data isn't just annoying, it's expensive. Research shows that poor data quality costs organisations an average of $12.9 million annually. It wastes your team's time, undermines trust in your CRM, and ultimately impacts your bottom line through missed connections and lost opportunities.

HubSpot's latest updates directly address this challenge with two powerful new features that automatically clean and validate your data at the point of entry. Let's explore how these tools will transform your data management approach.

Phone Number Property Validations: The End of Mystery Digits

The first update tackles one of the most common data quality issues: inconsistent and invalid phone numbers. HubSpot now gives administrators the power to enforce strict validation rules that prevent problematic phone data from ever entering your CRM.

Enforcing the Global Standard

With this update, you can now require that all phone numbers match the E.164 format—the international standard that ensures consistency and dialability. This format requires:

  • A plus sign (+) at the beginning
  • A valid country code
  • The correct number of digits for that country's phone system
  • No letters, special characters, or emojis

When enabled, this validation acts as a gatekeeper, rejecting entries that don't meet these requirements and prompting users to correct the information before it can be saved.

Why This Matters for Your Team

This seemingly simple change delivers significant benefits:

  • Sales efficiency: No more time wasted on "detective work" to figure out how to dial a number
  • Improved connection rates: Every number in your system becomes actually dialable
  • Better analytics: Consistent formatting enables more accurate reporting on call activities
  • Enhanced automation: Properly formatted numbers work seamlessly with calling tools and SMS marketing

For international businesses, this feature is particularly valuable, as it eliminates confusion around country codes and dialing formats across different regions.

Default Country Code Assignment: Filling in the Blanks

Complementing the validation rules is a clever new feature that automatically adds missing country codes to phone numbers that otherwise meet formatting requirements.

How It Works

Administrators can specify a default country code that HubSpot will automatically apply to any phone number that:

  • Lacks a country code
  • Otherwise follows proper formatting rules
  • Matches the expected pattern for that country

For example, if you set +61 (Australia) as your default country code, a number entered as (03) 1234 5678 would automatically be standardised to +61312345678 without any manual intervention.

Auto-Formatting at Entry: Subtle Cleanup in Real-Time

The second major update extends beyond phone numbers to address formatting issues across various text properties in your CRM. This feature automatically strips unwanted characters from fields as data is entered or imported.

Invisible Data Polishing

With auto-formatting, you can configure text properties to silently remove problematic characters without bothering the user with error messages. For example:

  • Postal code fields can automatically strip out letters and special characters
  • City fields can remove numbers and symbols
  • Custom fields can be configured to accept only the specific character types you need

The beauty of this approach is that it happens invisibly, if someone enters "02114ABC" into a postal code field configured to accept only numbers, it's automatically cleaned to "02114" without requiring any additional action.

The Bottom Line: Prevention Over Correction

What makes these updates particularly valuable is their preventative approach. Rather than requiring periodic data cleanup projects (which are time-consuming and never-ending), HubSpot now helps you maintain quality standards continuously by addressing issues at the source.

It's like having a digital bouncer at the door of your CRM, checking IDs and politely asking dodgy entries to try again. The result? A cleaner database, fewer headaches, and more time for your team to focus on what really matters.

 

Ready to elevate your data quality? Head to Settings > Properties > Edit Property today and start enforcing the standards your CRM deserves.