The agency operating system for client work

Agencies do not lose margin only on delivery — they lose it in handoffs. A lead enters a form tool, becomes a CRM contact, work happens in a project app, files live in Drive, and billing happens in Stripe with a spreadsheet for status. Trellis is built as a client ops platform: one multi-tenant system from capture to invoice.

The flow: capture → CRM → deliver → invoice

1. Lead capture. Lead Generation campaigns, forms, and pipeline stages capture demand with space-aware tenancy.
2. CRM. Convert and enrich relationships with unified profiles — not a separate product with a different permission model.
3. Client delivery. The Client Portal gives stakeholders projects, tasks, and documents under role-based access.
4. Invoice. Invoicing creates bills and Stripe Checkout links without exporting client lists to another vendor.
5. Automate & measure. Automations orchestrate invites and follow-ups; Analytics reports across spaces, work, and billing.

Why multi-tenant matters

Client ops fails when tenancy is bolted on. Trellis organizations contain spaces; RLS scopes data by membership. White-label (subdomain, hide branding, custom domains by plan) lets agencies present a branded surface while keeping internal admin tools.

Bolted-on tenancy shows up as operational tax: a shared folder that quietly exposes another client's brief, a CRM view someone forgot to filter, a Zap that fires into the wrong workspace. When isolation is enforced in the database, the default outcome is safe and the exceptions are explicit.

Where handoffs usually leak

• Won deal to kickoff. The deal closes in one tool and the delivery team rebuilds context from a Slack thread.
• Delivery to billing. Someone reconciles hours or milestones by hand, then chases payment in a separate channel.
• Client questions to answers.Status lives in a person's head, so every update is a synchronous interruption.
• Reporting. Analytics require exports from three systems that disagree on what a client is.

Trellis targets these seams specifically. Because Lead Gen, CRM, portal, invoicing, and analytics share the same organization and space model, a client is one entity rather than four loosely-joined records.

What to consolidate first

1. Client-facing delivery. Move status and documents into the portal. This is the change clients notice.
2. Invoicing. Bill from the same system so payment status is visible next to the work.
3. User management. Consolidate who has access, internal and external.
4. Pipeline and CRM. Move the front of the funnel once delivery is stable.
5. Automations and analytics. Automate only paths you have already run manually enough times to trust.

Metrics an agency OS should improve

• Time from won deal to client having portal access
• Number of status-request emails per active engagement
• Days sales outstanding on invoices
• Number of tools a new hire must be provisioned into
• Time to produce a per-client activity report

These are the numbers to baseline before you migrate. If a consolidation does not move any of them, it is tool churn rather than an operating system.

Who this is for

• Agencies replacing a HubSpot + Notion + Stripe patchwork
• Internal growth teams that need client-facing access plus ops
• Teams that want AI specialist agents later (Enterprise) without reinventing tenancy

Compare and price

See an honest stack comparison on Trellis vs HubSpot-only vs Notion + Stripe, then check Pricing for Starter / Growth / Enterprise entitlements. Security posture (auth, RLS, Stripe card handling, subprocessors) is on Security.

For onboarding playbooks, read client onboarding workflow.