Certification Day, October 2026: 40 new HubSpot certifications

Zooma’s Certification Day is a half-day learning event held four times a year. Every Zoomer gets four hours to build knowledge, refresh existing skills and explore something new.

On October 7, we closed our calendars for the latest one. By lunchtime, the team had completed 40 new HubSpot certifications, plus certifications and courses from OpenAI Academy, Claude Academy, Magnific AI, and LinkedIn.

How Certification Day works

Certification Day started six years ago with a simple idea: if learning matters, you need to make time for it. Four mornings a year, from 08:00 to 12:00, we keep our calendars free of external meetings and focus on learning relevant to our roles, customers, and work.

We protect those four hours from external meetings and everyday tasks, but urgent customer matters still take priority when needed.

What Zoomers learned in October

Zoomers spent much of the morning in HubSpot Academy. The team completed 40 new HubSpot certifications, bringing Zooma’s total to 171 active HubSpot certifications.

Some of the certifications and courses Zoomers completed during Certification Day in October 2026.

The rest of the team worked through courses on AI and workflows, marketing measurement, account-based marketing, and new ways to work with AI tools.

Magnific Academy focused on practical AI capabilities for visual and creative work, while Claude Academy gave Zoomers a chance to broaden their AI knowledge and explore different ways to work effectively with AI.

The OpenAI Academy course on Agents and Workflows stood out. Rather than just explaining AI concepts, the course paired theory with practical exercises on real, repeatable workflows: defining an outcome, providing the right context, setting boundaries and review points, and deciding where human judgement is still needed.

One takeaway from the morning was simple:

AI learning becomes much more useful when theory and hands-on practice come together.

Learning that shows up in customer work

Certifications aren't a side project for us. We apply what we learn in everyday work. HubSpot knowledge, for example, feeds directly into how we configure the platform, improve processes and advise customers on how marketing, sales and service can work better together.

Keeping that knowledge current matters. HubSpot and the wider digital landscape keep changing, so advice based on what worked a year ago isn't always enough today. Certification Day gives us a recurring opportunity to revisit what we know and take new knowledge back into customer projects.

Why do we keep making time for it?

Forty new certifications are a good result, but the number isn't really the point. The platforms, tools and methods we use change quickly. Certification Day gives us a recurring opportunity to see what's changed, refresh what we already know, and explore ways to improve how we work.

Doing it together also removes a simple barrier: finding the time. Instead of asking everyone to fit learning around customer work and meetings, we set aside four mornings a year for it.

What six years have taught us

Saying learning is important isn't the same as creating the conditions for it. When everyone gets the same four hours, learning doesn't have to compete with meetings for calendar space.

That doesn't mean all learning happens on Certification Day. It continues through everyday work, collaboration and customer projects. Certification Day simply guarantees recurring moments that get our full attention.

Four mornings a year, together. Then we get back to work and put some of it into practice.