Proposals with timelines, milestone tracking, vendor costs, and invoicing — so the business side of every event is as organized as the event itself.
Here's what a typical workflow looks like for event planners.
A potential client submits through your inquiry form and lands in your inquiry pipeline. Reply, qualify, and convert to a client and project — then build the proposal.
Start timers for client meetings, vendor coordination, site visits, and admin. Every hour of planning is captured.
Record vendor invoices as expenses and pass them through to your client with markup. Flowers, catering, AV — all tracked with your margin.
Collect a deposit on signing, progress payment at the halfway mark, and final balance after the event. Payment schedules keep cash flow aligned with expenses.
After the event wraps, see your real margin. Revenue minus planning hours minus vendor costs minus expenses equals what you kept.
Proposals, contracts, time tracking, invoicing, expenses, and tax prep — all in one place.
Build proposals with deliverables and timeline milestones. Venue booking, vendor deadlines, rehearsal, event day — all scheduled.
First-class event dates on proposals and projects. Milestones auto-calculate relative to the big day.
Inquiry form submissions flow into a kanban board. Reply via email, qualify leads, and convert to clients and projects — all without leaving Clearmargin.
Drag-and-drop kanban for your event pipeline. Inquiry, proposal sent, booked, planning, day-of, wrapped.
Track planning, coordination, and event-day hours. See exactly how much time each event consumes.
Record vendor invoices and pass them through to your client. Apply markup percentages for transparent or bundled pricing.
Deposit on signing, progress payments, and final balance. Milestone-based payment schedules for every event.
Log drives to venue tours, vendor meetings, and event sites. IRS standard rate applied automatically.
Sync event milestones and deadlines with Google Calendar. See your full schedule across all active events.
Schedule C categories, quarterly estimates, and export packages for your accountant. QuickBooks and CSV formats.
Explore a demo account pre-loaded with realistic event plannersdata — proposals, invoices, expenses, and profitability reports.
Explore the demoEvent profitability requires tracking three categories: your planning hours (valued at your internal cost rate), vendor pass-through costs (with your markup), and overhead expenses (office, software, travel). Most planners track revenue but not true cost. Clearmargin captures all three and shows real margin per event, so you know which types of events are actually worth your time.
Event planners need proposals with milestones, vendor cost tracking with markup, milestone-based payment schedules, time tracking, and calendar integration. Most tools cover CRM or invoicing but not the operational side. Clearmargin connects proposals to projects with milestones, tracks vendor costs and planning hours, and syncs deadlines to your Google or Outlook calendar.
The standard model is a planning fee plus vendor pass-through with markup, collected in stages: deposit on signing (25-50%), progress payment at the halfway point, and final balance after the event. Payment schedules tied to milestones keep your cash flow aligned with vendor payments. Clearmargin supports milestone-based payment schedules with automated reminders.
Record each vendor invoice as an expense tied to the event, then pass the cost through to your client with your markup applied. Track spending by vendor to see trends and negotiate better rates over time. Clearmargin lets you record vendor costs, apply markup percentages, and see total vendor spending per event and per vendor across your portfolio.