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Home › Start here › Run client work at an agency
Start here · Team & projects

How to choose agency project management and client portal software

Running client work at an agency means tracking tasks and deadlines per client, getting files and approvals to and from clients, logging time and billing for it. The software for it spans project management, a client portal or guest view, time tracking, and accounting for invoices. Marketing agencies may also use an agency platform that bundles CRM, funnels and client reporting.

By Bill Belcamino · Page updated September 23, 2026 · Our methodologyResearched and fact-checked by the HelpCompare team
How to choose agency project management and client portal software
Bill Belcamino
Bottom line up frontby Bill Belcamino, founder of HelpCompare
Editorial assessment

Bottom line up front: What software does an agency need to run client projects, approvals and billing?

Project management plus time tracking logged against each client, with an all-in-one agency platform only if you'll really use its CRM and funnels.

Project tools bill per seat (Asana from $10.99/seat/mo, ClickUp from $7/seat/mo), Clockify is free for up to 5 users, and GoHighLevel is $97/mo per account with unlimited users. Years on the agency side taught me that software rarely decides profit: unlogged small requests do. Have everyone log time against the client from day one, including the quick calls and revisions nobody plans to bill, then compare each client's fee with the hours behind it every month, because the account that feels busy but fine is often the one losing money. Write the number of revision rounds into the scope, so your approval step has a limit to enforce and extra rounds become a change request. Test it all with one real deliverable in a trial before you invite clients.

My read of the verified data on this page, checked against vendor sources on September 23, 2026. Disagree or spot an error? Tell Bill

How to run client work at an agency, step by step

The software this job takes

What to look for

Common mistakes to avoid

What to settle before you buy

Frequently asked questions

What is the best project management software for a creative agency?

Look for one that handles client approvals, project templates and time against budget in a way your team will keep up with. Compare guest access, proofing and how time reaches invoicing, then price it on your staff headcount. The table above shows each tool's verified entry price and billing unit.

What is a client portal, and does a small business need one?

A client portal is a shared space where a client sees status, files, approvals and sometimes invoices for their work. If you spend time answering status emails or chasing approvals, a portal or a guest view in your project tool can replace that.

What is agency management software?

The term covers different things. For marketing agencies it often means a platform bundling CRM, funnels and client reporting, but many results are systems for insurance or travel agencies. Check a tool is built for the kind of agency you run before comparing prices.

How we built this page

We start from the job, not the product. The phrasings people search for this job (for example “best agency project management software”) come from our research into how small and mid-size teams describe it. Which software categories the job takes is our editorial judgment. Every tool, entry price, billing unit and date comes from HelpCompare’s open dataset, recorded from each vendor’s own pricing page; nothing is estimated, and where a vendor publishes no price we say so. We take no affiliate commissions and publish no scores of our own. See our methodology or download the data from Open Data.

More jobs in Team & projects

Cite this page: HelpCompare, “How to choose agency project management and client portal software”, helpcompare.com/start/run-client-agency/ (updated ).

Source links on this site are checked every month; last check . How sources are checked.

From shortlist to switched

Built for the leader who owns the selection, answers for the spend, drives the rollout, and lives with the results. HelpCompare covers the whole decision, not just the first step.

01 · CompareWhich tool fits your team, side by side.133 comparisons 02 · Price & approveSourced, dated pricing and a one-page brief for sign-off.Decision brief 03 · SwitchWhat moves, what you rebuild, what it costs.264 guides 04 · ShareDownload and cite the data. CC BY 4.0.Open data
Bill Belcamino, founder of HelpCompare
About the author

Bill Belcamino

Founder and author, HelpCompare

Engineer by training, operator by experience, marketer by choice. Bill spent eight and a half years as an engineer at HP, was COO of Auctiva (the number one third-party selling platform on eBay, past 200,000 users) and ran Google’s $70M/year search syndication partnership at Alot.com. Then he spent 13 years building his own web properties with his own money at stake. He has bought, trialled, integrated and cancelled more SaaS tools than he can count, and started HelpCompare because the real cost of switching tools is the part nobody covers.

“I’ve sat on both sides of the table: the agency recommending the tool and the client paying for it.”

Researched and fact-checked by the HelpCompare team. No paid sponsorships, no affiliate commissions.

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