A studio's first 90 days on client portal software

"Northgate Studio" is a nine-person branding practice running about fourteen active clients at a time. Their work already lived in tools that worked: artwork in Google Drive, day-to-day conversation in Slack and WhatsApp, invoices in Stripe. Nothing was broken — it was just scattered across four places, and only the studio knew the map.

Every project produced the same three client emails: where is the latest proof, what stage are we at, and can you resend the invoice. Answering them cost the account manager several hours a week and made a careful studio look disorganized.

The studio evaluated two all-in-one portals. Both required moving documents into a new system, which meant a migration, a second place for files to drift out of date, and a new data-protection conversation with two clients in regulated sectors. The partners shelved the idea for a year.

The unlock was architectural: a portal that stores nothing. Vellum keeps the routing metadata — which link belongs to which client — while the file itself stays in the studio's Drive under the studio's own permissions. The comparison guide covers that trade-off in detail.

• One Hub per client, branded with the studio's mark and colour.
• Documents: Drive folders for artwork, proofs and final delivery packs.
• Messages: the existing Slack channel or WhatsApp thread, linked, not replaced.
• Payments: the live Stripe invoice for the current stage.
• Status moved through kickoff, in progress, in review and delivered.

Setup for all fourteen clients took an afternoon, because nothing had to be uploaded.

The status chips did most of the work. Clients who could see "in review" stopped asking for updates, and the account manager's Monday morning went from chasing to reviewing. Sign-off got faster mainly because the newest proof and the approval thread sat one click apart instead of in two different inboxes.

Invoices moved too. Putting the Stripe link inside the same page the client already opened for the work removed the awkward standalone "payment reminder" email entirely.

"The part I didn't expect: onboarding a new client got shorter. One link, and they already know where everything is."

At nine people and fourteen active clients the studio sits on Agency at $49/month — unlimited clients, team seats, white-labeling and status automation. A solo designer with up to fifteen clients runs the same setup on Solo at $29/month. Both start with a 7-day trial.