What accounting software is best for a PR agency?

Key takeaways

• Choose software built for recurring revenue. The best accounting software for a PR agency excels at managing monthly retainers, tracking time against fixed budgets, and automating client invoicing.
• Integration is non-negotiable. Your software must connect seamlessly with your project management tools (like Asana or Trello), payment gateways (like Stripe or GoCardless), and your business bank account for automatic feeds.
• Clarity on client profitability is key. Look for features that let you see the gross margin (the money left after paying your team) for each client or campaign, so you know which accounts are truly profitable.
• Scalability matters from day one. Even if you're a solo practitioner, pick a system that can grow with you, handling multiple team members, project tracking, and more complex client structures without needing a costly switch later.
• Specialist support pays off. Working with accountants who understand PR agencies can help you configure your software correctly from the start, saving you time and ensuring your financial data is accurate and actionable.

What makes accounting software good for a PR agency?

Good accounting software for a PR agency makes your financial life simpler. It should handle your monthly retainer billing automatically, track how much time your team spends on each client, and show you exactly how profitable each account is. For a PR firm, this means less time on admin and more time managing client relationships and campaigns.

PR agencies have a specific financial rhythm. You bill clients a fixed fee each month, but your costs (like team time) vary. The right software connects these dots. It lets you see if you're spending more hours on a client than their retainer covers. This visibility is what turns basic bookkeeping into a powerful business tool.

In our experience working with PR agencies, the most common pain point is not knowing which clients are profitable until it's too late. The best accounting software for a PR agency solves this by giving you real-time insights. You can see your financial position any day of the month, not just when your accountant sends a report.

How do PR agencies use accounting software differently?

PR agencies use accounting software to manage client retainers, track time against budgets, and measure campaign profitability. Unlike product-based businesses, an agency's main asset is billable time. Your software needs to track this time and convert it into clear financial data, showing you the margin on every piece of work.

Think of it this way. A shop sells products and tracks stock. You sell expertise and track time. Your "inventory" is the hours your team has available each month. Good cloud accounting for agencies helps you manage this inventory. It shows you which clients are using those hours and whether you're being paid enough for them.

Another key difference is invoicing. Many PR agencies work on monthly retainers. Manually creating the same invoice every month is a waste of time. The right software automates this. You set up the retainer once, and it sends the invoice, records the payment, and even chases late payers for you. This automation is a huge time-saver for busy agency owners.

What are the top accounting software options for UK PR agencies?

The top accounting software UK options for PR agencies are Xero, QuickBooks Online, and FreeAgent. Each has strengths for agency workflows, particularly around invoicing, expense tracking, and project reporting. Your choice depends on your agency's size, complexity, and how you prefer to work.

Xero is a favourite for many growing agencies. Its strength is in connections. Xero has a huge marketplace of add-ons. You can connect it to time-tracking apps like Harvest, project tools like Asana, and payment systems like Stripe. This creates a seamless workflow. Time tracked in Harvest can automatically flow into a draft invoice in Xero.

QuickBooks Online is known for its user-friendly interface and powerful reporting. It's excellent for agencies that want deep dive reports on client profitability without needing an accounting degree to understand them. You can easily tag income and expenses by client or project to see your gross margin per account.

FreeAgent is built with service businesses and freelancers in mind. It's very intuitive for tracking time, estimating projects, and invoicing. For a small PR agency or solo consultant, FreeAgent can be a perfect, cost-effective starting point that covers all the essentials of small business bookkeeping tools.

According to a 2024 industry report by Software Advice, ease of use and integration capabilities are the top two factors for service businesses choosing accounting software. This aligns perfectly with what PR agencies need.

Which features are essential in PR agency accounting software?

Essential features for PR agency software are automated recurring invoices, project/time tracking, clear profit & loss by client, and bank feed integration. These features directly address the core financial tasks of managing retainers, controlling costs, and understanding profitability.

Automated recurring invoicing is non-negotiable. You should be able to set up a client's monthly retainer once and forget it. The software creates and sends the invoice, records the payment when it arrives, and alerts you if it's late. This single feature can save you several hours every month.

Project and time tracking is the engine of agency profitability. You need to know how many hours a £3,000 monthly retainer is buying. The software should let your team log time against specific clients or projects. Then, it should show you a simple report: "Client A: Retainer £3,000, Team Cost £2,200, Gross Profit £800." That's actionable data.

A clear profit & loss report by client is what separates basic software from the best accounting software for a PR agency. This report should include all income from that client and all related costs (team salaries, freelancer fees, expenses). It tells you instantly which clients are your most profitable partners and which might need a conversation about scope or fees.

How does cloud accounting benefit a growing PR agency?

Cloud accounting for agencies gives you real-time financial access from anywhere, automates data entry via bank feeds, and makes collaboration with your accountant seamless. For a growing PR agency, this means you can make informed decisions quickly, without waiting for month-end reports.

The real-time aspect is a game-changer. You can check your cash position, see which invoices are overdue, and view your profit margin for the month-to-date all from your phone. This is vital when you're considering hiring a new account executive or taking on a big new project. You're not guessing; you're deciding based on live data.

Automation through bank feeds saves countless hours. Every transaction from your business bank account flows automatically into your software. You just need to categorise them (e.g., "software subscription," "team lunch," "client travel"). This eliminates manual data entry and reduces errors. It also means your books are always up to date.

Collaboration is easier. You can give your accountant or bookkeeper secure access to your live data. They can help with complex tasks, prepare your tax returns, and offer advice based on your actual numbers, not a spreadsheet you emailed them last quarter. This partnership is much more powerful. For specialist support, consider working with accountants familiar with PR agency economics.

What are the common mistakes when choosing agency accounting software?

The most common mistake is choosing software designed for a different type of business, like retail or construction. PR agencies need tools built for selling time and managing retainers. Other mistakes include ignoring integration needs, underestimating future growth, and not getting the team to use the time-tracking features properly.

Choosing generic software is a false economy. A system that's great for tracking physical stock won't help you track billable hours against a client budget. You'll end up using spreadsheets to fill the gaps, which defeats the purpose of buying software in the first place. Always look for features tailored to service businesses.

Ignoring integrations creates manual work. Your project management, time-tracking, and payment systems should talk to your accounting software. If they don't, you or your team will waste time copying data from one place to another. This data transfer is boring, prone to error, and distracts from client work.

Underestimating growth locks you into a system that can't scale. You might start as a solo consultant, but if you plan to hire, your software needs to support multiple users, detailed project tracking, and more sophisticated reporting. Migrating to a new system later is a big, disruptive project. It's better to start with a scalable cloud accounting for agencies solution.

How should a PR agency set up its software for success?

To set up for success, configure your chart of accounts for agency income and costs, connect all bank and credit card feeds, integrate time-tracking and project tools, and set up client profiles for tracking profitability. A good initial setup turns your software from a record-keeping tool into a management dashboard.

Start with your chart of accounts. This is the list of categories for your income and expenses. For a PR agency, you need specific categories like "Retainer Income," "Project Income," "Freelancer Costs," and "Software Subscriptions." A generic chart of accounts won't give you the insights you need. Many accounting software UK platforms offer pre-built templates for service businesses.

Connect everything immediately. Link your business bank account and any company credit cards. Connect your time-tracking app (like Harvest or Clockify) and your payment processor (like Stripe). The goal is to have as much data flowing in automatically as possible. The less manual entry, the more accurate and useful your financial picture will be.

Create detailed client profiles. In your software, each client should have a profile where all their invoices, payments, and related expenses are recorded. This allows the software to automatically generate a profit & loss report for that client. Knowing that "Tech Startup Client" has a 45% gross margin while "Fashion Brand Client" has a 60% margin is incredibly powerful information for pricing and resource planning.

What metrics can PR agencies track with the right software?

With the right software, PR agencies can track gross profit margin per client, average revenue per employee, utilisation rate (billable hours vs. total hours), debtor days (how long clients take to pay), and cash flow runway. These metrics move you from just recording history to actively managing your business's health.

Gross profit margin per client is the most important metric. It tells you what's left from a client's fee after you pay the direct costs of delivering their work (primarily your team's time). If a £5,000 retainer costs £4,000 in team salary, your gross margin is 20%. If it costs £3,000, your margin is 40%. Good software calculates this automatically.

Utilisation rate measures your team's efficiency. It's the percentage of their paid hours that are billable to a client. A healthy agency aims for around 70-80% utilisation. The rest is for admin, business development, and training. Software that tracks time makes this metric easy to see. Low utilisation means you have spare capacity. High utilisation might mean your team is overworked and you need to hire.

Cash flow runway shows how many months you could operate if all income stopped today. It's your bank balance divided by your average monthly running costs. This is a critical safety metric. The right software helps you forecast this by showing your upcoming bills and expected client payments. You can find a useful financial planning template for agencies to build this out further.

When should a PR agency consider upgrading its accounting software?

Consider upgrading your software when you're constantly using spreadsheets to fill gaps, when you can't easily see client profitability, when manual processes are eating into billable time, or when you're planning to hire your first employees. Upgrading is an investment in efficiency and control.

Spreadsheet reliance is a major red flag. If you're exporting data from your software to Excel to figure out basic things like "how profitable was last month?" or "what's our cash forecast?", your software isn't doing its job. The best accounting software for a PR agency should provide these answers within the platform through custom reports or dashboards.

Hiring your first employees is a key trigger. Solo practitioners can often manage with simpler small business bookkeeping tools. Once you have a team, you need to track payroll, manage expenses for multiple people, and understand the cost of each person relative to the clients they work on. More robust software like Xero or QuickBooks Online is built for this complexity.

Planning for growth is another reason. If you're aiming to double your client base or income, your financial systems need to be able to handle that volume without breaking. Proactively upgrading gives you the reporting and automation you need to manage growth smoothly, rather than scrambling when you're already overwhelmed.

How can specialist accountants help PR agencies with software?

Specialist accountants help PR agencies choose the right software, set it up correctly from day one, interpret the data it produces, and use it for strategic forecasting. They save you time, ensure compliance, and help you leverage your financial data to make better business decisions.

The choice of software can be overwhelming. An accountant who works with many agencies sees what works in practice. They can recommend a platform based on your specific workflow, team size, and growth plans. They'll know which integrations are most valuable for a PR firm, saving you from costly trial and error.

The setup is where the real value is created. A generic setup gives you generic reports. A specialist will configure your chart of accounts, invoice templates, and reporting dashboards to show you exactly what you need to see: retainer performance, client profitability, and agency-wide margins. They ensure your data is clean and meaningful from the start.

Finally, they turn data into insight. Anyone can generate a profit and loss statement. A good agency accountant looks at that statement and asks, "Why is your gross margin lower this month? Which client caused that? Is it a one-off or a trend?" This analysis helps you price future work accurately, manage client scope, and improve overall profitability. For hands-on support, getting in touch with a specialist is the logical next step.