Solutions / Digital marketing agencies
The retainer, and the work that is not in it.
Oct 24, 2026
Performance, lifecycle, and landing pages share one client and three tools. The invoice is rebuilt when the month is already late.
Where the month leaks
The signed scope is a retainer. The work is a landing page, a campaign that was “just this once,” and a report someone promised in Slack. Hours sit in a timer. The proposal sits in a deck. Finance meets the gap on invoice day.
Media spend and the agency fee get mixed in the same thread. The client asks what they paid for. The answer is a screenshot, not the signed month.
One job for the retainer
CRM holds the retainer and the next renewal. Projects hold the month’s work. Resources hold the hours and the rate. Finance reads those links and drafts the invoice from the signed lines, the billable time, and the expenses.
Work that was not in the retainer becomes a change order. The client signs with a typed name on a link. Ask AI can draft the note. It does not send it. An owner hits Approve.
What the client opens
They do not get a seat. They get a link and a PIN: project status, tickets, invoices, and a change order to sign. A ticket they file lands on the account.
If they call, a known contact hears their own work. An unknown caller hears the services you marked sayable, and the published price. The line does not read another client.
Seats and the voice line are on the pricing page. Clients are not seats. Book a demo to see the job on one record.
Questions
- Can a marketing retainer and a one-off landing page live on the same client?
- Yes. The client is one account. The retainer is the signed scope. The landing page is a change order on that job, then a line on the invoice.
- Do our clients need a login to see the report or the invoice?
- No. They open a unique link with a PIN. Status, tickets, invoices, and signatures sit on that link. They never get an account.
- Does the agency have to run this from Slack?
- No. Slack is optional capture. The job, the change order, and the invoice live in Blinkdots. An owner still approves anything that leaves the studio.