Partner Forum, 20 October 2026: Portal Redesign, Grok Bot and What's Next

Every week partners join us online at the Partner Forum to hear what is new, what is coming and what we are talking about. Here is a short round up of Tuesday 20 October. The full slides and the session page have everything in detail.

Updates

• One toolkit. The old agentic toolkit has been retired. The connected toolkit is now the only one to use: connect Claude to HubPeople, then ask Claude to install it. How to get set up.
• Sign up cards. Member faces are now off by default, and only show where a page asks for them.
• Smarter email engagement. A tuned email flow, tested on over 200,000 users, sent 66.4% fewer introductory emails without reducing organic email activity. The 1 day upgrade rate rose 5.51%, the 3 day upgrade rate rose 6.52% and profile deletions fell 4.01%. It is fully rolled out on Affinity, with Excite still on a 50/50 test.

Portal Design and UX Improvements

We shared the long term direction for the portal: mobile first, more clarity on every page, the things that need your attention brought to the top, and easier ways to find your way around, with brand filters now and custom dashboards in the future. Work has started on the brands list and the single brand view. The screens shown came from a prototype and are not live yet, so if something slows you down in the portal today, tell us.

Working with Grok Bot

Grok Bot is an always on AI agent from xAI with its own cloud computer, so it keeps working when you log off, including through the HubPeople connector. Getting started takes four steps: install it from x.ai, connect it to HubPeople, ask it to install the toolkit, then add any other connectors you need. Good jobs to hand it include checking every brand overnight and leaving a list of fixes, or writing a page for each town on a list for you to review before it goes live.

Watch: Working with Grok Bot (just over 3 minutes).

What We Are Working On

• Metrics through the connector, matched to the campaign report.
• Founders data through the connector, starting with creating and managing polls.
• Better pricing pages, built around an indicative price list with careful wording, since prices change and can be dynamic.

Members Area Roadmap and Market Trends

Martyn Padden, Head of Product, took partners through the members area roadmap for Q4 2026, and Serge shared which geos and niches grew in September compared with August. Both are in the slides.