--- title: "Loop Marketing vs the HubSpot Flywheel: How They Relate" description: "HubSpot flywheel vs Loop Marketing: see how the two HubSpot models differ, where they overlap and which one your marketing team should start with." image: https://www.finemediabw.com/hubfs/Blog/Loop%20Marketing/Decision/Loop%20Marketing%20vs%20the%20HubSpot%20Flywheel%20-%20How%20the%20Two%20Models%20Relate/loop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel-share-1200x630.png --- [![Fine\_Media\_logo\_Set\_HubSpot Website Logo Stacked](https://www.finemediabw.com/hubfs/Fine_Media_logo_Set_HubSpot%20Website%20Logo%20Stacked.svg "Fine_Media_logo_Set_HubSpot Website Logo Stacked")](https://www.finemediabw.com/) - Solutions - [Inbound Marketing](https://www.finemediabw.com/inbound-marketing) - [Website Design](https://www.finemediabw.com/website-design-and-development) - [Sales Enablement](https://www.finemediabw.com/sales-enablement) - [Customer Success](https://www.finemediabw.com/customer-success) - [HubSpot Services](https://www.finemediabw.com/hubspot-services) - [Insights](https://www.finemediabw.com/blog) - [About](https://www.finemediabw.com/about-us) Show submenu for About - [About us](https://www.finemediabw.com/about-us) - [Meet the Team](https://www.finemediabw.com/our-team) - [Our Story](https://www.finemediabw.com/our-story) - Solutions - [Inbound Marketing](https://www.finemediabw.com/inbound-marketing) - [Website Design](https://www.finemediabw.com/website-design-and-development) - [Sales Enablement](https://www.finemediabw.com/sales-enablement) - [Customer Success](https://www.finemediabw.com/customer-success) - [HubSpot Services](https://www.finemediabw.com/hubspot-services) - [Insights](https://www.finemediabw.com/blog) - [About](https://www.finemediabw.com/about-us) Show submenu for About - [About us](https://www.finemediabw.com/about-us) - [Meet the Team](https://www.finemediabw.com/our-team) - [Our Story](https://www.finemediabw.com/our-story) - [Contact us](https://www.finemediabw.com/contact) - [Contact us](https://www.finemediabw.com/contact) ![Loop Marketing vs the HubSpot Flywheel: How the Two Models Relate. Dark type on a pale blue-grey ground, Propello.](https://www.finemediabw.com/hubfs/Blog/Loop%20Marketing/Decision/Loop%20Marketing%20vs%20the%20HubSpot%20Flywheel%20-%20How%20the%20Two%20Models%20Relate/loop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel-share-1200x630.png) Oct 10, 2026, 8:43:05 AM | [Loop Marketing](https://www.finemediabw.com/blog/tag/loop-marketing) # Loop Marketing vs the HubSpot Flywheel: How the Two Models Relate HubSpot flywheel vs Loop Marketing: see how the two HubSpot models differ, where they overlap and which one your marketing team should start with. Share - [mailto:?&subject=Loop%20Marketing%20vs%20the%20HubSpot%20Flywheel:%20How%20the%20Two%20Models%20Relate&body=Loop%20Marketing%20vs%20the%20HubSpot%20Flywheel:%20How%20the%20Two%20Models%20Relate%0A(https%3A%2F%2Fwww.finemediabw.com%2Fblog%2Floop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel)](mailto:?&subject=Loop%20Marketing%20vs%20the%20HubSpot%20Flywheel:%20How%20the%20Two%20Models%20Relate&body=Loop%20Marketing%20vs%20the%20HubSpot%20Flywheel:%20How%20the%20Two%20Models%20Relate%0A(https%3A%2F%2Fwww.finemediabw.com%2Fblog%2Floop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel)) - - - If you lead marketing or revenue at a growing B2B company, the short answer is this: the HubSpot flywheel shows how your whole business gains momentum from satisfied customers, and Loop Marketing shows how your marketing team learns in the AI era. They are two HubSpot models for different jobs, and they work together. This article is for CEOs, founders, CROs and marketing leaders choosing a marketing model for their marketing strategy. You get a definition of each, a side-by-side table, decision rules and a way to use both.   | **HubSpot Flywheel** The HubSpot flywheel is the growth model HubSpot adapted to show how attract, engage and delight stages feed one another, so that satisfied customers add momentum to the business. | | --- |   | **Loop Marketing** Loop Marketing is HubSpot's four-stage framework for growing in the AI era, in which teams express their brand, tailor content, amplify it across channels and evolve from live results, then repeat. | | --- | ## How the HubSpot flywheel works as a growth model ![HubSpot's flywheel in three phases, attract, engage and delight, each with the forces that add energy and delighted customers adding force back into attract.](https://www.finemediabw.com/hs-fs/hubfs/Blog/Loop%20Marketing/Decision/Loop%20Marketing%20vs%20the%20HubSpot%20Flywheel%20-%20How%20the%20Two%20Models%20Relate/loop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel-hubspot-flywheel-phases-blog-1600x900.png?width=1600&height=900&name=loop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel-hubspot-flywheel-phases-blog-1600x900.png) HubSpot explains the flywheel model on its [flywheel page](https://www.hubspot.com/flywheel) as a model adapted to show the momentum you gain when you align your whole organization around a remarkable customer experience. The image comes from a physical wheel, invented by James Watt, that stores and releases energy efficiently. The energy a flywheel holds depends on three things: how fast you spin it, how much friction it meets and how big it is. Speed comes from the energy you inject into the attract, engage and delight phases, and friction takes it away. That makes flywheel marketing a way to think about force and friction, not just a sequence of steps, and it is why the flywheel model suits a long customer journey. ### The three phases are attract, engage and delight HubSpot redesigned its inbound marketing methodology around the flywheel model, so flywheel marketing runs in three phases: attract, engage and delight. Attract is how you attract potential customers and build website traffic with valuable content, including social media posts. Engage is about engaging customers and establishing ongoing relationships by addressing their needs through personalized communication, and it makes it easy to buy from you on the buyer's timeline and channels. Delight helps customers reach their goals, aims at creating positive customer experiences and is how you develop loyal customers. Each phase carries its own forces, which HubSpot defines as the programs and strategies you add to speed the wheel up. In attract, the forces are inbound marketing strategies such as content marketing, search engine optimization and social media marketing. Customer engagement strategies such as personalization, lead nurturing and marketing automation software sit in engage. Proactive customer service and onboarding sit in delight, and marketing software can support all three phases. ### Force and friction decide how fast the wheel spins Friction is anything that slows the wheel and hinders business growth. HubSpot lists poor internal processes, a lack of communication between teams and misalignment between customers and employees. A buyer who cannot get a straight answer on pricing is friction, and so is a handoff that makes a customer repeat themselves. Reducing friction improves the customer experience, and flywheel marketing only works when marketing, sales and service are aligned. The point of the model is that delighted customers become promoters. They add force back into attract through referrals and repeat purchases, which is why HubSpot says the flywheel model treats existing customers as a driver of business growth. For a fuller comparison with the older model, read our post on the [marketing flywheel vs the funnel](https://www.finemediabw.com/blog/marketing-flywheel-vs-funnel). ### Why the flywheel model changes how teams treat existing customers A traditional marketing funnel ends at the sale, and it often leads to high customer acquisition costs. Everything the team spent on acquisition is gone once the deal closes, and the sales funnel starts again from zero. The flywheel model focuses on keeping the energy in the system, because a satisfied customer creates momentum for the next prospect. That shifts attention to customer retention, customer feedback and the customer experience after the sale. Happy customers stay and give honest feedback, and loyal customers refer peers, write reviews and become brand advocates. Sales and marketing teams then face lower customer acquisition costs, since part of the demand arrives through people who already trust you. A satisfied existing customer base is the most promising marketing asset the flywheel model creates. Success in this model is measured by retention and customer lifetime value, not only by new leads. Customer feedback loops tell marketing and product what to adjust, and word-of-mouth referrals bring in new customers without extra spend. Acquisition, retention and advocacy reinforce one another, so growth compounds through continuous improvement. ## How Loop Marketing works as a marketing model ![HubSpot's Loop Marketing at the centre with a Taste Profile and the four stages around it: Express, Tailor, Amplify and Evolve, run again after every pass.](https://www.finemediabw.com/hs-fs/hubfs/Blog/Loop%20Marketing/Decision/Loop%20Marketing%20vs%20the%20HubSpot%20Flywheel%20-%20How%20the%20Two%20Models%20Relate/loop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel-loop-four-stage-cycle-blog-1600x900.png?width=1600&height=900&name=loop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel-loop-four-stage-cycle-blog-1600x900.png) HubSpot describes Loop Marketing on its [Loop Marketing page](https://www.hubspot.com/loop-marketing) as a four-stage framework any marketing team can use to grow in the AI era. It is built for digital marketing teams that publish across many channels, including social media. HubSpot introduced it in September 2025 as a [new playbook for growth](https://www.hubspot.com/company-news/loop). Our guide to [what Loop Marketing is](https://www.finemediabw.com/blog/what-is-loop-marketing-guide) covers it in full. It sits within HubSpot's wider inbound marketing approach, and HubSpot says it builds on the inbound marketing foundation rather than replacing it. The framework starts with a Taste Profile, which HubSpot describes as a picture of your customer and your brand that gives AI the context to sound like you. From there you run loops, each focused on a specific objective. - Express: define what to say to your target audience, how to say it and why it matters right now. - Tailor: use AI to turn that strategy into content that connects personally, across every format your audience consumes, from video to social media posts. - Amplify: publish across diversified channels, from social media campaigns to communities, optimized for people and for answer engines, so potential customers find you. - Evolve: iterate quickly. HubSpot says AI helps you make changes in days, not quarters. ### Loop Marketing is a marketing model, not a company-wide model Notice what the Loop leaves out. It does not describe how onboarding, renewals or referrals should run, and it does not say how sales and service share a goal. HubSpot builds it for the marketing team, with each cycle making the next campaign sharper. Your marketing efforts get a repeatable way to use customer feedback and live results. That scope is the main difference between the two. The flywheel is about the whole customer experience. The Loop is about how marketing creates, delivers and improves its work. ## Loop Marketing and the HubSpot flywheel compared side by side ![HubSpot's flywheel and Loop Marketing compared in two groups: the flywheel asks how the whole business gains momentum, while Loop Marketing asks how the marketing team creates and improves its work.](https://www.finemediabw.com/hs-fs/hubfs/Blog/Loop%20Marketing/Decision/Loop%20Marketing%20vs%20the%20HubSpot%20Flywheel%20-%20How%20the%20Two%20Models%20Relate/loop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel-loop-inside-flywheel-blog-1600x900.png?width=1600&height=900&name=loop-marketing-vs-hubspot-flywheel-loop-inside-flywheel-blog-1600x900.png) Both models reject the traditional marketing funnel, and both make learning from customers central. The marketing funnel model focuses on moving a buyer toward a sale, and neither of these models stops there. They differ in scope, in what they ask you to do and in how they treat AI. The table sets out the differences. | Criterion | HubSpot flywheel | Loop Marketing | | --- | --- | --- | | Core question | How does the whole business gain momentum from customers? | How does marketing create, publish and improve its work with AI? | | Shape | A wheel: attract, engage, delight | A cycle: Express, Tailor, Amplify, Evolve | | Scope | Marketing, sales and service together | Primarily the marketing team | | What drives it | Force that adds energy and friction that removes it | A Taste Profile and live results that shape each pass | | Role of AI | Not part of the model | Central, especially in Tailor and Evolve | | Role of customers | Promoters who add energy through referrals | A source of data and feedback for each loop | | Main risk | A diagram nobody turns into shared goals | A fast cycle that nobody connects to the wider business | | Origin | A model adapted by HubSpot | A framework HubSpot introduced in September 2025 | The table makes one thing clear. The marketing world often treats a new model as a replacement, but these are different layers of one marketing strategy. Set the strategy first, and a company can hold both models at once. ## Where the two models overlap, and where HubSpot draws the line HubSpot's own comparison, [Loop Marketing vs inbound marketing](https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/loop-marketing-vs-inbound-marketing), maps Express to attract and Evolve to delight, and treats Amplify as reaching beyond traditional inbound channels. The inbound methodology is the foundation, and the Loop adapts that inbound marketing playbook for AI-era digital marketing. Read that as an alignment, not a one-to-one match. Evolve covers more than delight, because it adjusts the whole marketing system in response to results. Our post on [Loop Marketing vs inbound marketing](https://www.finemediabw.com/blog/loop-marketing-vs-inbound-marketing) walks through that mapping in detail. Using the flywheel as the outer view with the Loop running inside it is our reading of how the two fit, not a claim HubSpot makes. ## Decision rules: which model to reach for first Choose by the question you are trying to answer, not by which name is newer. ### If your teams are not working toward the same customer outcome, start with the flywheel Marketing counts leads, sales teams count deals and service counts tickets. The flywheel marketing model gives all three a shared picture of the customer and a shared list of friction, so your sales teams and the rest of the company push in the same direction. HubSpot's [2026 State of Marketing survey](https://blog.hubspot.com/marketing/hubspot-blog-marketing-industry-trends-report) found 27.6% of marketers naming sales-marketing alignment among their top challenges. ### If your marketing is generic or too slow to learn, start with Loop Marketing The team ships work, but it sounds like everyone else's to your target audience and takes quarters to adjust. Express and a Taste Profile force a clearer message, and Evolve builds in a faster review. That is a marketing problem, and the Loop is built for it. ### If customers leave quietly after the sale, start with the flywheel Marketing may be fine while churn, weak referrals and slow adoption hold back growth from your existing customers. The flywheel model's delight phase, customer satisfaction and the idea of promoters point at exactly that gap. A faster content cycle will not fix it, because the problem sits after the purchase and shows up in renewals before it shows up in new revenue. ### If you cannot tell what is working in your marketing, start with the Loop When results arrive too late to act on, the Evolve stage and a habit of reviewing live results give you a place to start. Our guide to [closed-loop marketing and ROI](https://www.finemediabw.com/blog/closed-loop-marketing-roi-plateau) shows how to connect those results to revenue. ## How to use the flywheel and Loop Marketing together The cleanest approach is to let the flywheel set the outer view and the Loop run inside marketing. Treat the flywheel model as the picture of how the business grows, and each loop as one pass of work that adds energy to a specific phase. 1. Draw your flywheel in three phases and map the customer journey through them. 2. List the friction you already know about, such as slow follow-up or unclear handoffs, and use your CRM to monitor customer touchpoints. 3. Pick the phase where friction costs you most, and name one objective for it. 4. Build a Taste Profile for the audience in that phase, then run one loop with that objective. 5. Use Evolve to review live results with sales and service in the room. 6. Feed what you learn back into the flywheel: remove the friction you found, then choose the next objective. These steps are simple flywheel marketing best practices, and they work because each one targets a specific source of friction. Notice that the Loop does not replace anything here. It becomes the way marketing works on the phase you chose. If you want to test each pass without risking revenue, our guide to [running GTM experiments](https://www.finemediabw.com/blog/growth-experiments-gtm) shows how. ## What you gain when this is done properly When the flywheel model gives you the shared view and the Loop gives marketing a way to improve, you stop treating them as rival diagrams. Marketing, sales and customer success work from the same picture of the customer and the same list of what slows growth. ### Sales gets better-prepared buyers and clearer handoffs Potential customers arrive having seen valuable content that matches their situation, and expectations are set early. Sales and marketing teams share a view of why each message is published, and sales can feed back what buyers actually say, which shortens the distance between a campaign and a conversation. ### Marketing gets a shared goal and a faster way to learn The flywheel model tells marketing what the business needs. The Loop gives the team a repeatable way to meet that need. Marketing efforts are judged by the energy they add to a phase, not by the number of assets produced, and each pass makes the next one sharper. ### Customer success gets a place in growth In flywheel marketing, delight is a growth input, so customer success is not an afterthought, and customer satisfaction becomes something the team tracks. What customers say after the sale becomes input for the next loop, and promoters, brand advocates, references and reviews feed attract. Happy customers who have had positive customer experiences are the best source of that proof. That makes customer retention and referrals shared wins, ties business success to the customer experience and helps accelerate business growth. ## Choose the model that matches your problem Use the flywheel marketing model when your question is about business growth across the whole company. Use Loop Marketing when your question is about how marketing works. Most growing B2B companies end up asking both questions, and the answer is to run the Loop inside the flywheel model. Neither model works on weak foundations, and neither replaces a clear marketing strategy. Both need clean customer data, one CRM view of the customer and clear ownership across teams. Without those, a marketing flywheel is a relabeled funnel and a loop is a faster way to repeat the same mistake. Propello designs and builds connected GTM systems on HubSpot, and we are a [HubSpot partner](https://www.finemediabw.com/about-us). If you want help deciding how your marketing, sales and service teams should work from one picture of the customer, an audit is the place to start. [Book a Propello GTM Audit](https://www.finemediabw.com/contact) ## Frequently asked questions What is the difference between Loop Marketing and the HubSpot flywheel? The HubSpot flywheel is a growth model with three phases, attract, engage and delight, that shows how customers add momentum to the whole business. Loop Marketing is a four-stage framework, Express, Tailor, Amplify and Evolve, for how marketing uses AI to learn. One covers the company. The other covers the marketing team. Does Loop Marketing replace the HubSpot flywheel? No. HubSpot presents Loop Marketing as building on its inbound methodology rather than replacing it, and the flywheel is part of that methodology. The two answer different questions. Many teams keep the flywheel as their picture of growth and use the Loop as the way marketing improves each phase. What are the three phases of the flywheel? The three phases are attract, engage and delight. Attract earns attention with useful content. Engage makes it easy to buy from you on the customer's timeline. In flywheel marketing, delight helps customers reach their goals, so they become promoters who add force back into attract through referrals and repeat purchases. Is the HubSpot flywheel the same as a sales funnel? No. A funnel moves a buyer in a line toward a sale and then stops. HubSpot says funnels produce customers but do not consider how those customers can help you grow. The flywheel model keeps going after the sale, because satisfied customers add energy. You can still use funnel charts inside it. Which should a B2B company use first? Start with the model that fits your bottleneck. If teams disagree about the customer or customers leave quietly, use the flywheel. If marketing is generic or slow to learn, use Loop Marketing. Most companies end up using both, with the Loop running inside the flywheel marketing model's attract and engage phases. ![Tumisang Bogwasi](https://app.hubspot.com/settings/avatar/77d7e2eaad8ff71b24463dcc39a31e9e) ### Written By: Tumisang Bogwasi Tumisang Bogwasi is the founder and CEO of Propello, a HubSpot partner that designs and builds connected go-to-market systems. 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