Sell Monthly Creative Retainers

Use Newie for monthly creative, design, content, social, marketing, and agency support retainers.

Use this when you sell ongoing access to a creative team, skillset, output, or support package.

Creative retainers usually give the client a defined monthly scope: design hours, content production, creative direction, social assets, ad creative, website support, reporting, or priority access. Newie can manage recurring billing, customer records, agreed terms, receipts, and onboarding while delivery happens in your normal tools.

What the Agency Needs

A creative retainer only works if both sides understand the monthly capacity. You need predictable billing, but also need to stop scope from expanding into unlimited design, endless revisions, or urgent requests that were never priced.

Newie should hold the subscription, agreement, receipts, and onboarding details. Manage tasks, utilization, approvals, files, and scope reviews in your normal project system.

Common Setup

1. Create a Subscription for each monthly retainer tier
2. Use Terms of Service for included scope, revision limits, unused time, cancellation notice, turnaround times, approval expectations, and out-of-scope work
3. Use a Setup Fee when the client should pay an onboarding, audit, setup, or kickoff fee immediately
4. Use Billing Start Date when the client commits now but the retainer should begin on a future date
5. Use Welcome Emails for brief forms, kickoff booking links, Slack or project-management invites, shared folders, brand asset instructions, and first-month expectations
6. Use groups for service line, account manager, client type, location, or retainer tier where reporting needs separation

Retainer Sale Flow

1. Client chooses the retainer

   The client agrees to the monthly scope, deliverables, communication process, price, start date, and cancellation terms.

2. Send the subscription

   Share the standard service link, a custom price/start date link, or complete the sale with Purchase as Customer where available.

3. Client agrees and subscribes

   Terms of Service can capture scope, revision limits, payment expectations, and cancellation notice before checkout.

4. Newie sends onboarding

   The Welcome Email can include kickoff booking, brief forms, asset upload links, project-management access, and communication channels.

5. Deliver each month

   The recurring retainer remains in Newie while tasks, approvals, files, and communication stay in your normal delivery tools.

Retainer Scope to Define

• Monthly hours, deliverables, or service lines included
• Turnaround times and approval expectations
• Revision limits and what counts as a new request
• Whether unused time or deliverables roll over
• Notice period, minimum term, and cancellation rules
• How urgent work, ad hoc projects, and scope extensions are charged
• When the retainer should be reviewed or resized

Useful Service Examples

Offer	Newie Setup	Notes
Monthly design retainer	Subscription	Good for recurring creative support
Social content package	Subscription	Good for monthly content production or asset delivery
Marketing support retainer	Subscription	Use terms to define included scope and response expectations
Retainer with setup or audit	Subscription with Setup Fee	Setup Fee collects onboarding or audit work at checkout
First project plus monthly support	One-Off Service plus Subscription	Sell the project separately from the ongoing retainer

Last updated: 2026-06-01