Centralizing 40+ Global Industrial Sites: A HubDB-Driven Migration from Kentico to HubSpot CMS
A global industrial mining firm was losing organic authority across 40+ regional Kentico microsites.
We moved their digital footprint onto HubSpot CMS. A dynamic HubDB architecture and cookie-based routing now manage regional product availability and complex Arabic RTL formatting.
Executive Summary
Context
A global industrial abrasive mining and distribution firm operates across the Americas, APAC, Europe, and the Middle East. Its regional marketing was fragmented. Website activity had no connection to the sales pipeline.
What We Built
We built a centralized, multi-lingual HubSpot CMS architecture. HubDB dynamically serves regional product variations and distributor data across 40+ global domains.
Tech Stack
- HubSpot CMS Hub (Tiers 1, 2, and 3)
- HubDB for dynamic product and distributor mapping
- Kentico (Legacy Source)
- GDPR-compliant routing workflows
Not a fit for organizations with a single-region presence or those with simple product catalogs that do not vary by geography or language.
The Challenge
40+ legacy microsites on Kentico had become unmanageable. Page sizes of 9.9MB were causing serious performance failures, and over 52,000 unmanaged backlinks made a direct cutover risky. Regional General Managers each needed distinct product catalogs, but the legacy system had no way to centralize those updates, so every change meant manual duplication.
The Arabic-language site brought its own technical hurdles: right-to-left (RTL) punctuation and text-wrapping bugs that standard HubSpot templates couldn’t fix out of the box.
Our Approach
We first planned to build every global site at once. The volume of translations and regional product variances forced a pivot to a "Tiered" deployment model. Tier 1 (North America and Australia) launched first to set the architectural baseline, then Tier 2 (translated sites) and Tier 3 (specialized microsites) followed.
We used HubDB to create a single source of truth for the global product catalog. That let regional teams toggle product visibility based on local availability without a separate page build for each one. A browser-language and 30-day cookie-based region switcher routes users automatically to the correct localized site based on their geography.
Impact
38.96% Increase in Global Traffic
Top 3 Rankings Up from 234 to 481
19,728 Inactive Contacts Isolated
The migration isolated 19,728 inactive contacts. That improved database performance and cut licensing costs.
Unified Global Presence
A centralized architecture replaced the fragmented Kentico sites. Lead routing is now standardized across all major global regions.
A centralized database structure maps products to specific regions: Region, then Country, then State. One module serves different content dynamically from that structure.
Custom browser-language logic redirects users based on location data. It remembers that choice for 30 days across sessions.
Custom CSS fixes handle Arabic punctuation and text wrapping. HubDB table adjustments handle character alignment.
Workflows copy data from legacy "State" and "Country" properties into unified fields. That triggers accurate "Business Unit" routing for leads.
A centralized digital footprint consolidated onto HubSpot CMS using a dynamic HubDB architecture. It utilizes cookie-based routing to seamlessly manage regional product availability across global microsites, enforcing standard governance while accommodating complex multi-lingual requirements like Arabic RTL formatting.
FAQ
We use a centralized HubDB architecture. Product visibility toggles by region-specific identifiers. That means we don’t need 40+ cloned pages: a single template renders unique product lists based on the user’s regional cookie or IP.
A tiered deployment model (Tier 1, 2, and 3) works best for managing high translation volumes. Launch core markets first. Then use a centralized database for localized content like product specs and distributor lists. That way, teams keep a unified brand and still allow regional nuance.
