If you want your small creative agency to grow and prosper, it’s important to embrace technology and find the right solutions to support your work. Creative agency project management software, for example, is absolutely essential for seeing projects through to completion in the most efficient and effective ways.
But, with such a vast and varied selection of creative agency project management systems and solutions, picking the right one isn’t easy. This guide is here to help exploring seven top-tier options in creative and marketing agency project management software.
The Importance of Selecting the Right Agency Project Management Software
Before we start looking at which agency project management software to pick, it’s important to understand why this matters so much.
If you’re running a small agency or are new to the world of agency work, you may mistakenly assume that all agency project management software is more or less the same. In reality, nothing could be further from the truth. Each piece of software is different, with varying pros, cons, features, functions, and use cases.
Some are aimed at small startups, others for large, established agencies. Some work best in specific niches, like marketing and advertising, while others are more versatile, supporting all sorts of verticals. There are some that are relatively minimalistic, serving as little more than digital checklists, while others are much more robust, with long lists of features and built-in technologies.
This is why it’s so important to make the right call. Pick the wrong creative agency project management software, and you may end up with a tool that doesn’t benefit your team or solve the problems you’re facing. Pick the right tool, however, and your entire agency operations will benefit, becoming slicker, speedier, and more streamlined as a result. Small agencies can also use live streaming methods to attract more clients and revenue.
The Best Agency Project Management Software: 7 Leading Options
Now you know why it’s so crucial to pick the right advertising agency project management software. Next, let’s explore some of the leading solutions on the market today, with a good mixture of tools to suit various budgets, needs, and types of agencies.
Function Fox
Kicking off our list of the best creative agency project management software, we have FunctionFox. The leading choice among creative professionals, FunctionFox is much more than a simple project management app. Instead, it’s a comprehensive, all-in-one agency management application, doing the work of many tools all at once.
Capable of everything from time and budget tracking to report generation, task lists, scheduling, resourcing, and more, FunctionFox brings a lot to the table. It can save agencies a lot of money and hassle, as they only have to pay for and use one app, rather than several, for most, if not all of their agency operations.
Plus, this tool was made specifically for smaller agencies of two 50 staff members. Thanks to that, its pricing shouldn’t feel out-of-reach for your agency, and its many features and functions should align with your needs quite nicely.
When to Choose FunctionFox
You should opt for FunctionFox as your creative agency project management software if you’re enticed by the idea of an all-in-one solution. Rather than having to learn and work with numerous tools, FunctionFox lets you enjoy a much more seamless and straightforward experience, with one single app that goes far beyond the typical remit of a project management platform.
Function Point
Similar in several ways to FunctionFox, Function Point, too, is more of an all-in-one creative agency solution than a simple project management tool. Trusted by hundreds of agencies around the world, this project management software integrates all the key features you need to manage workflows, optimize operations, and streamline projects.
A big part of Function Point is its business intelligence reporting. Through this feature, Function Point aims to empower its users to make more informed decisions for their agencies. After all, without data, insights, and intelligence, it may sometimes feel like you’re moving ahead with projects through guesswork, estimations, or pure blind hope.
Function Point changes all that by delivering actionable data and reports, while also offering all the typical project management functions one would expect. It supports file sharing, time tracking, collaboration, project briefs, and more, with an easy-to-understand central dashboard and separate tabs for agency financials, CRM, and so on.
When to Choose Function Point
Consider Function Point as your go-to ad agency project management software if you want a single solution that does the work of several platforms. It’s a collaboration tool, a project management platform, and a business intelligence solution, all wrapped up in one seamless package, perfect for agencies that want to grow quickly and cleverly. Like Function Fox, Function Point works best for small teams of 50 staff members.
Basecamp
Next up on our list of leading marketing agency project management software we have Harvest. This is a web-based project management and team collaboration tool. It’s since been used by tens of thousands of agencies of different sizes all around the globe to track and manage projects, communicate effectively, and file share efficiently.
At its core, Basecamp is quite simple. Its main functions are project scheduling, reporting, messaging, and task tracking. This simplicity is arguably the tool’s main selling point, and it also makes it versatile enough to be used in all sorts of market verticals, from accounting to advertising, finance, development, and beyond.
When to Choose Basecamp
Basecamp could be the right marketing agency project management tool if your main concern is efficiency and communication. It’s a very useful solution for project tracking, making it easier to meet deadlines and monitor project progress. It also helps to manage communication, even with the customer.
Asana
No list of leading project management software could be complete without mentioning Asana. This is one of the most widely used project management platforms out there right now. Having commercially launched in 2012, it has gained tens of thousands of users since then. It’s famed for its versatility and seamless integrations with other company agency tech tools, like Slack.
No matter what type or size of agency you’re running, Asana is a strong option to consider. It boasts a sleek and visually appealing user interface that creative people enjoy working with, including built-in timesheets and Kanban boards to measure and track projects. It also has plenty of helpful automation tools built-in, giving you the flexibility to use it your way.
When to Choose Asana
Opt for Asana if you’ve already got an established agency tech stack with lots of tools that work well with this platform, like Google Drive and Slack, for example. Also, consider this tool if you foresee rapid growth for your agency, as it’s a highly scalable solution. Asana focuses strictly on collaboration and scheduling, so if that’s what’s most important to you, Asana’s the way to go. However, it doesn’t provide project budgeting, time tracking, rate management, or invoicing, so keep that in mind when making your decision.
Wrike
Wrike is a project management app with a history going back to 2006 when it launched in beta. It offers a single platform to streamline and simplify your many agency workflows, and ease of use is the No. 1 favourable thing users tend to agree on about this platform. With its slick UI and minimalistic design, it doesn’t overwhelm users, keeping things nice and simple.
Feature-wise, there’s a lot that Wrike can do. It offers drag-and-drop project management templates with charts, boards, tables, and calendars that you can customize according to your projects and plans. It also includes automation and AI functions, along with reports and analytics, to get more insight into how your projects are going and how your agency as a whole is faring.
When to Choose Wrike
Small agencies might like to consider Wrike if they want comprehensive creative agency project management software that can integrate seamlessly with other apps and handle project timelines and collaboration. But it’s arguably best suited for slightly bigger agencies with 50+ workers. So, if you’re just starting out with a small team, you may be better off with an alternative. Similar to Asana, Wrike is strictly for collaboration and scheduling with less focus on reporting and time tracking.
Monday.com
Monday.com is a work management platform that markets itself as every agency’s go-to solution for streamlining workflows and improving team visibility. Its versatility makes it a fine fit for various types of agencies, including those in marketing, advertising, development, creative content, and more, and it’s already trusted by over 225,000 customers worldwide.
A big selling point of Monday.com is its customizability. You can flexibly adjust this platform to meet your precise needs, such as creating personalized shareable forms and creative requests. It also includes expense tracking, recruitment tools, competitor analysis, and many other features to help your agency get ahead of the game.
When to Choose Monday.com
For mid-size and larger agencies, Monday.com is a terrific choice. It has a great visual design, free of clutter, making it relatively easy to work with, along with a broad set of flexible features for every kind of agency. Consider it if you want a solution that’s especially good at promoting cross-team collaboration, but does understand that it requires a lot of customization for it to work right for you.
Clockify
Last but not least, we have Clockify. As you may be able to infer from the name, this project management platform is primarily focused on time. More specifically, it’s a proven solution for managing and tracking time across your projects and workforce. This can help with meeting deadlines and maximizing efficiency agency-wide.
But there’s more to Clockify than simple timesheets logging hours and minutes spent on tasks and projects. It also offers numerous other management features, like report generation, scheduling, invoicing, and expense tracking. This makes it a surprisingly comprehensive piece of agency project management software, and it’s free to use.
When to Choose Clockify
While it may lack the all-in-one appeal of a tool like FunctionFox, Clockify still brings plenty to the table. It’s a good fit for medium or larger agencies struggling to keep track of their many projects, employees, and expenses. It’s especially useful as a payroll solution if remote workers or teams are spread out in different locations.
How to Choose the Right Marketing Agency Project Management Tool
You’ve seen some of the top-rated creative and ad agency project management software out there. Next, let’s look at how to choose which one of these tools is best for your business. For that, you need to ask some key questions, look at your agency’s setup, consider your budget, and think about the future and how you imagine your agency evolving.
Here are the main factors to focus on:
- Collaboration: One of the main reasons to invest in project management apps is to keep everyone on the same page and support collaboration. Consider how well each tool works in terms of facilitating communication and teamwork across your workforce, especially if you have multiple teams and departments.
- Complexity: Think, too, about the complexity of the projects you’re working on. You don’t necessarily need the most complicated project management apps for simple projects. But, if your work is more multi-layered, with lots of elements to manage and monitor, you’ll need a solution that can keep up.
- Budget: Of course, price always matters when investing in elements of your agency’s tech stack. This is especially true for small agencies that are still finding their feet and don’t necessarily have huge amounts of capital to throw around. Look into pricing plans and fees and find a solution that meets your needs without breaking your budget.
- Ease-of-use: Whenever you get a new piece of business software – like a marketing agency project management tool – you have to train workers how to use it effectively. That takes time and resources, and it’s much easier if you can find tools and solutions that are intuitive and straightforward, saving everyone a lot of hassle.
- Specific Needs: Every agency is different and has its own quirks and specific ways of working. It’s therefore strongly recommended that each agency avoid simply following trends or buying the most popular software but instead consider their unique situation and needs in order to find the most suitable match.
Choose the Best Creative Agency Project Management Software
Overall, the importance of agency project management software cannot be understated, especially for small businesses. The right software could be that difference-making factor that drives your agency on to bigger and better things, helping you perform more efficiently, make better use of your resources, and forge stronger connections with your clients.
So, don’t settle for anything less than the best. Keep the tips and factors above in mind, and consider testing out free trials or demos of some of the software listed above to learn more. Then, armed with all the knowledge you need, you can choose the most appropriate and useful solution to set your agency on track for success.