Your agency is growing. What worked for a five-person team doesn’t quite fit your 20-person operation.
Asana got you this far, but now that you’re scaling up, you need something different. These 11 Asana alternatives for marketing agencies might be just what you need for your expanding marketing firm.
Let’s find you something that grows with your ambition. 🎯
11 Best Asana Alternatives for Marketing Agencies
- Why Go for Asana Alternatives for Marketing Agencies?
- Top Asana Alternatives for Marketing Agencies at a Glance
- The Best Asana Alternatives for Marketing Agencies
- 1. ClickUp (Best for all-in-one agency management)
- 2. Wrike (Best for creative asset management)
- 3. Jira (Best for Agile marketing workflows)
- 4. Trello (Best for visual campaign tracking)
- 5. ProofHub (Best for creative review processes)
- 6. Teamwork (Best for client-focused project delivery)
- 7. Airtable (Best for flexible campaign planning)
- 8. ActiveCollab (Best for project profitability tracking)
- 9. Basecamp (Best for simplified team communication)
- 10. Zoho Projects (Best for integrated business workflows)
Summarize this article for me pleaseWhy Go for Asana Alternatives for Marketing Agencies?
Asana’s agency project management software works for many, but marketing agencies often need more tailored solutions. Here’s why you might look elsewhere:
- Not marketing-specific: Asana lacks marketing-focused workflows, needing heavy customization and extra tools for campaign lifecycles, causing fragmented operations
- Incomplete campaign coverage: It manages tasks well but misses key steps like order intake and asset approvals, requiring separate systems
- Struggles with scaling: As client and campaign complexity grow, Asana’s simple structure gets cluttered, reducing visibility
- No time tracking or billing: Agencies tracking billable hours must use third-party tools or manual spreadsheets, as Asana lacks these features
- Limited reporting: Basic dashboards don’t offer customizable campaign and marketing agency KPIs, hindering insights for multiple projects
- Missing client collaboration features: No client portals or granular permissions create friction with comms
- Weak task hierarchy: Inflexible subtasks and limited AI marketing automation lead to manual workarounds
🧠 Fun Fact: Volney B. Palmer started the first known ad agency in the USA. His original plan was to just sell ad space in newspapers. Strategy, slogans, and creative departments came much later.
Summarize this article for me pleaseTop Asana Alternatives for Marketing Agencies at a Glance
Here’s a brief comparison of the best Asana alternatives for marketing agencies. 👇
| Tool | Best for | Best features | Pricing* |
| ClickUp | All-in-one agency management platform for creative and operational alignment Team size: Ideal for individuals, startups, and enterprises | Custom workflows, AI assistance, Dashboards, Docs, time tracking, AI calendar, feedback tools | Free forever; Customizations available for enterprises |
| Wrike | Creative asset organization and client portal workflows Team size: Ideal for midsize to large creative teams | Request forms, proofing, side-by-side versioning, client workspaces, automated reports | Free; Paid plans start at $10/month per user |
| Jira | Agile campaign execution and iterative project updates Team size: Ideal for technical marketing teams and dev-collaborative agencies | Custom workflows, Kanban boards, campaign automation, over 30 built-in reports | Free; Paid plans start at $8/month per user |
| Trello | Visual task management and campaign mapping Team size: Ideal for editorial, social, and content teams | Content calendars, customizable templates, Google Drive sync, Power-Up integrations | Free; Paid plans start at $6/month per user |
| ProofHub | Structured creative reviews and stakeholder approvals Team size: Ideal for design, content, and branding teams | Markup feedback, approval flows, custom forms, permission controls | Free trial; Paid plans start at $50/month |
| Teamwork | Profitability tracking and client-centric delivery Team size: Ideal for agencies managing billing, retainers, and deliverables | Time/budget tracking, QuickBooks invoicing, workload planner, client view access | Free; Paid plans start at $13.99/month per user |
| Airtable | Campaign planning with customizable workflows and data views Team size: Ideal for operations and planning teams | Formula fields, campaign portals, color-coded calendars, conditional logic | Free; Paid plans start at $24/month per user |
| ActiveCollab | Project profitability monitoring and time-based invoicing Team size: Ideal for finance-aware project managers and service agencies | Timers on tasks, recurring invoices, workload overview, scope creep alerts | Free; Paid plans start at $11/month per user |
| Basecamp | Simplified communication and central project visibility Team size: Ideal for lean teams and cross-functional marketing groups | Message boards, auto check-ins, document hub, client simplicity | Free; Paid plans start at $15/month per user |
| Zoho Projects | Marketing ops tied into business-wide workflows Team size: Ideal for teams using the Zoho ecosystem | Project portals, expense tracking, workload views, Blueprint automations | Free; Paid plans start at $5/month per user |
How we review software at ClickUp
Our editorial team follows a transparent, research-backed, and vendor-neutral process, so you can trust that our recommendations are based on real product value.
Here’s a detailed rundown of how we review software at ClickUp.
Summarize this article for me pleaseThe Best Asana Alternatives for Marketing Agencies
These are our picks for the best Asana alternatives for marketing agencies. 📝
1. ClickUp (Best for all-in-one agency management)
ClickUp gives you the structure that Asana lacks, while staying flexible enough to match the way your agency works.
To begin with, ClickUp’s Project Management Software serves as your agency’s operational backbone. And when you integrate ClickUp’s Marketing Solution and the ClickUp Creative Agency Software, you gain access to specialized workflows designed specifically for marketing operations
Keep campaigns moving
Say your agency is working on a full-funnel campaign for a consumer tech brand—organic posts, paid ads, email drips, and landing pages all rolling out over six weeks.
You start by building a Folder for the campaign. Inside it, you use ClickUp Tasks to create detailed deliverables for each asset: one for the Instagram carousel, one for the launch email, and one for the video ad.
Each Task gets assigned to the right team member along with deadlines, creative briefs, and subtasks for handoffs.
Watch it (and more) in action in the video below: 👇🏼
To keep everyone aligned on progress, you define your own ClickUp Custom Task Statuses: ‘Briefing’, ‘Draft in Progress’, ‘Internal Review’, ‘Client Review’, and ‘Final Approval’. These reflect the actual stages your agency follows.
At the same time, you add ClickUp Custom Fields to every task so your team can slice and filter the work easily. Specify the deliverables’ channel, audience type, asset format, and campaign priority.
So if your strategist wants to see all top-priority assets for paid media going live next week, they can filter the view in seconds.
See everything in real time
Your operational data transforms into strategic insights through ClickUp Dashboards. These visual command centers display real-time information about team capacity, project deadlines, and campaign performance across all your clients.
You can also create private client-facing dashboards that show live progress on deliverables, deadlines, and blockers without exposing internal notes or production-level detail.
Move faster with AI
ClickUp Brain is the platform’s built-in AI engine that helps your team plan, write, and summarize without losing momentum.
Suppose your agency is planning a Black Friday campaign for an e-commerce client. The strategist opens a ClickUp Doc to outline the campaign structure. They type a short prompt like ‘Black Friday promo plan for skincare brand’.
ClickUp Brain suggests a campaign schedule broken down by channels—email, paid social, landing pages, and influencer collabs—along with key messaging angles and deliverable formats.
⭐️ Bonus: You can choose from multiple AI models like Claude, ChatGPT, and Gemini right from within your ClickUp Workspace! Pick the LLM of your choice in ClickUp so it has the full context of your work and connected apps, and get creative!
Then, during the production phase, if your creative lead wants to know what’s still pending review or where feedback is blocked, the AI marketing tool can summarize the latest comments across tasks in one click.
Automate repetitive work
ClickUp Automation handles all the tedious project status updates, assignment changes, and reminders that eat up your team’s time during campaigns.
For example, when a Task moves to ‘Client Review’, an Automation can automatically tag the account manager, set a deadline for feedback, and reassign the task if that deadline slips.
Get started with agency templates
The ClickUp Marketing Agency Template is built for agencies that manage campaign cycles across multiple clients. It includes Lists for creative requests, pre-built Custom Task Statuses for review flows, and Custom Fields for platform and format.
The template also includes views like Contract Timelines and Account Overviews, giving you instant visibility.
If you also manage retainers or client ops alongside creative delivery, the ClickUp Agency Management Template will help you get set up faster.
ClickUp best features
- Work how each team prefers: View campaigns in Board View for creatives, List for project managers, or Gantt charts for client-facing updates
- Skip repetitive setup: Create ClickUp Recurring Tasks for monthly content drops, client check-ins, or campaign reports
- Stay ahead of delays: Plan projects with the AI-powered ClickUp Calendar that flags scheduling conflicts and workload overloads
- Intake work cleanly: Build ClickUp Forms for creative briefs, campaign requests, or feedback so nothing gets lost in emails or chats
- Know where hours go: Track project time across services, clients, and roles with ClickUp Project Time Tracking
- Keep strategy and execution connected: Draft messaging plans, asset outlines, and rollout checklists inside ClickUp Docs linked to Tasks
- Make feedback actionable: Turn reviewer comments into assigned next steps using ClickUp Assign Comments in both Tasks and Docs
- Ensure focused discussions: Talk inside ClickUp Chat so campaign convos stay next to the work, not scattered across platforms
ClickUp limitations
- Without careful setup, it’s easy to miss key updates or get flooded with irrelevant pings
ClickUp pricing
free forever
Best for individual users
Free Free
Key Features:
60MB Storage
Unlimited Tasks
Unlimited Free Plan Members
unlimited
Best for small teams
$7 $10
Everything in Free +
Unlimited Storage
Unlimited Folders and Spaces
Unlimited Integrations
business
Best for mid-sized teams
$12 $19
Everything in Unlimited +
Google SSO
Unlimited Message History
Unlimited Mind Maps
enterprise
Best for many large teams
Get a custom demo and see how ClickUp aligns with your goals.
Everything in Business +
White Labeling
Conditional Logic in Forms
Subtasks in Multiple Lists
* Prices when billed annually
The world's most complete work AI, starting at $9 per month
ClickUp Brain is a no Brainer. One AI to manage your work, at a fraction of the cost.
ClickUp ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.7/5 (10,000+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4.6/5 (4,000+ reviews)
What are real-life users saying about ClickUp?
This Reddit review really says it all:
2. Wrike (Best for creative asset management)
via Wrike
You know that sinking feeling when a client asks for ‘the logo with the blue background’ and you realize there are 12 versions scattered across different folders? Wrike gets it.
This Asana alternative for marketing agencies shines when you’re handling multiple demanding clients who each have their own special way of doing things.
Your biggest headache—getting everyone on the same page about project requirements—gets solved through marketing templates. No more starting from scratch every time you onboard a new client or launch a familiar campaign type.
Wrike best features
- Create custom request forms that automatically convert client briefs into actionable tasks
- Compare different versions of creative assets side-by-side during the approval process
- Set up automated digital marketing reports that track campaign metrics and project health without manual work
- Share dedicated client workspaces where external collaborators can review progress and provide feedback
Wrike limitations
- While Wrike offers proofing tools, agencies note that repeated review cycles require tedious manual setup and can clutter the workspace
- Reporting and dashboards are often described as inadequate for high‑level client presentations
- Core time tracking in Wrike is basic, clunky, and inefficient for billable hours reporting
Wrike pricing
- Free
- Team: $10/month per user
- Business: $25/month per user
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
- Pinnacle: Custom pricing
Wrike ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.2/5 (4,400 reviews)
- Capterra: 4.4/5 (2,614 reviews)
What are real-life users saying about Wrike?
Here’s a Reddit user’s opinion on this tool:
🔍 Did You Know? David Ogilvy, often called the father of modern advertising, didn’t start out in marketing. After leaving Oxford, he trained as a chef in Paris and later sold AGA stoves door-to-door in Scotland. He was so good at it that he wrote a sales manual in 1935, which was later praised by Fortune as one of the best ever written.
3. Jira (Best for Agile marketing workflows)
via Atlassian
Here’s the thing about marketing campaigns: they change. A lot. Sometimes hourly. Jira recognizes this reality because it was designed for software development, where requirements shift faster than fashion trends.
While your competitors are still trying to force marketing into waterfall processes, you’ll be adapting on the fly. The customization depth means you can model exactly how your team works rather than conforming to someone else’s idea of ‘best practices.’
Jira best features
- Build custom workflows that match your specific marketing planning processes and approval chains
- Visualize campaign progress using Kanban boards or timeline views with dependency tracking
- Automate repetitive tasks like assigning work or moving projects through approval stages
- Access over 30 different reports to track everything from cycle time to team velocity
Jira limitations
- Technical complexity can intimidate non-technical marketing team members
- Non-technical users find making basic updates tedious and slow; environments often ‘bloat’ with extra fields, workflows, and clicks
- Collaboration with clients is cumbersome; you can’t easily involve external stakeholders
- Limited creative proofing capabilities compared to design-focused alternatives
Jira pricing
- Free
- Standard: $8/month per user
- Premium: $14/month per user
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
Jira ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.3/5 (6,425+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4.4/5 (15,155+ reviews)
What are real-life users saying about Jira?
Straight from a G2 review:
🧠 Fun Fact: The original meaning of the word ‘brand’ comes from livestock. Ranchers burned unique marks onto cattle to indicate ownership. Marketers co-opted the term to describe products that ‘stuck’ in consumer minds.
4. Trello (Best for visual campaign tracking)
via Trello
Content writing service providers thrive on visual organization that shows the big picture at a glance.
Trello’s card-based approach mirrors how editorial teams naturally think about content pipelines and campaign flows. The Asana alternative works particularly well for agencies that prioritize simplicity over feature complexity.
Butler automation handles the mundane tasks that eat up creative time, while multiple view options let different team members see projects in their preferred format.
Trello best features
- Create visual content calendars that clients can understand without explanation
- Set up card templates for recurring campaigns so new projects start the right way
- Connect directly to your client’s Google Drive folders so assets sync without downloading and reuploading
- Connect hundreds of third-party apps through Power-Ups to extend the project management platform’s functionality
Trello limitations
- Lacks advanced project management features like Gantt charts or resource planning
- No built-in time tracking or detailed reporting capabilities
- Limited file storage space on free and lower-tier plans
- No clear hierarchy, limiting oversight across campaigns
Trello pricing
- Free
- Standard: $6/month per user
- Premium: $12.50/month per user
- Enterprise: $17.50/month per user (billed annually)
Trello ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.4/5 (13,695+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4.5/5 (23,620 reviews)
What are real-life users saying about Trello?
A G2 reviewer shared this feedback:
➡️ Read More: Free Consulting Proposal Templates to Win Clients
5. ProofHub (Best for creative review processes)
via ProofHub
ProofHub recognizes that most marketing work involves visuals that need stakeholder sign-off, and email chains are where creativity goes to die. The Asana alternative for marketing agencies brings order to the chaos of creative reviews through structured approval processes that actually work.
What makes it particularly smart is how it handles client permissions—giving them exactly what they need to see without drowning them in features they’ll never use.
The custom forms help capture those rambling initial briefs that usually come as stream-of-consciousness emails.
ProofHub best features
- Upload images and PDFs for markup with comments and annotations directly on the files
- Route creative assets through approval workflows with automatic stakeholder notifications
- Capture client requests through custom forms that convert directly into project tasks
- Control what clients can see and do with granular permission settings
ProofHub limitations
- Limited integration options compared to other marketing agency software
- No advanced resource management tools or capacity planning features
- Reporting capabilities are basic and may not satisfy content marketing agencies needing detailed analytics
ProofHub pricing
- Free trial
- Ultimate control: $150/month
- Essential: $50/month
ProofHub ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.6/5 (100+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4.6/5 (100+ reviews)
What are real-life users saying about ProofHub?
From a G2 review:
Your agency’s not a mess, your process is.
Fix it with The Big Book for Agency Project Management: a no-BS playbook packed with real strategies agencies use to run smoother projects, keep clients happy, and actually make money doing it.
6. Teamwork (Best for client-focused project delivery)
via Teamwork
Running an agency means walking a tightrope between keeping clients happy and maintaining a profitable business. Teamwork doesn’t pretend that these goals always align, but it helps you manage both simultaneously.
The project management tool treats client collaboration as a first-class feature rather than an afterthought, which makes a huge difference when you’re trying to maintain professional relationships while hitting deadlines.
Teamwork best features
- Track time and budgets with real-time profitability insights to keep projects on track financially
- Manage team capacity and workload to prevent burnout and missed deadlines
- Generate invoices directly from logged time and expenses with the QuickBooks integration
- Provide clients with controlled access to view milestones and approve deliverables
Teamwork limitations
- Kanban automation is basic and not easily tailored to complex migration workflows
- Advanced features require higher-tier plans that may be expensive for smaller agencies
- Steeper earning curve than simpler Asana alternatives for marketing agencies
- Some users report occasional performance issues with large projects
Teamwork pricing
- Free
- Deliver: $13.99/month per user
- Grow: $25.99/month per user
- Scale: Custom pricing
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
Teamwork ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.4/5 (1,170+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4.5/5 (915+ reviews)
What are real-life users saying about Teamwork?
This comes straight from a Reddit thread:
💡 Pro Tip: To grow your digital marketing agency, build a ‘conversion insights vault.’ After every campaign, document what worked, what didn’t, audience behavior trends, and creative angles. Over time, this becomes a marketing roadmap with tested strategies that sharpen your edge and speed up results for future clients.
7. Airtable (Best for flexible campaign planning)
via Airtable
Airtable brings database power to project management in ways that Asana simply can’t. Marketing agencies can build custom workflows that connect campaign budgets to timelines, track creative assets through attachment fields, and set up automated approval processes that make sense for client work.
The beauty lies in how you can slice and dice this interconnected data in countless ways, revealing insights that would stay hidden in other Asana alternatives for marketing agencies.
Airtable best features
- Sync campaign budgets with actual spend tracking using formula fields and currency formatting
- Create conditional formatting that highlights overdue deliverables or budget overruns automatically
- Build client portals by sharing filtered views that show only relevant project data
- Map out content calendars with color-coded campaign phases and automatic publishing reminders
Airtable limitations
- Role-based access is coarse; any editor can modify views or structure, and others can easily unlock locked views
- Bases function as separate silos—commenting, automations, and users can’t span across them
- Airtable struggles with large datasets; bases exceeding ~50K records can slow down significantly
Airtable pricing
- Free (limited to two users)
- Team: $24/month per user
- Business: $54/month per user
- Enterprise: Custom pricing
Airtable ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.6/5 (2,985+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4.7/5 (2,185 reviews)
What are real-life users saying about Airtable?
Here’s a G2 reviewer’s take:
⚙️ Bonus: Want to scale quality output without burning out your team? Start using content writing templates tailored to each stage of the buyer journey.
📮 ClickUp Insight: 37% of our respondents use AI for content creation, including writing, editing, and emails. However, this process usually involves switching between different tools, such as a content generation tool and your workspace.
With ClickUp, you get AI-powered writing assistance across the workspace (+ the use of multiple AI models like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Claude)—all while maintaining context from your entire workspace.
8. ActiveCollab (Best for project profitability tracking)
via ActiveCollab
ActiveCollab fixes the annoying gap between doing the work and getting paid for it.
Your team logs time directly on project tasks while collaborating through visual proofing tools, and that tracked time transforms into professional invoices without the usual spreadsheet gymnastics (you know what we’re talking about!).
Watch project budgets shift from green to red in real time as hours accumulate, catching scope creep before it kills profitability.
ActiveCollab best features
- Start timers directly on tasks to capture billable hours without disrupting workflow
- Monitor project profitability in real time to catch budget overruns before they hurt
- Visualize team workload to balance assignments and prevent burnout
- Set up recurring invoices for retainer clients with automatic billing cycles
ActiveCollab limitations
- Some agencies find the layout uninspiring or unintuitive
- Reporting features are basic and may not satisfy those needing detailed analytics
- Subtasks are poorly handled; there’s a lack of clarity with dependencies, and dropped attachments frustrate users
ActiveCollab pricing
- Free trial
- Plus: $15/month (for three users)
- Pro: $11/month per user
- Pro + Get paid: $17/month per user
ActiveCollab ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.2/5 (90+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4.5/5 (405+ reviews)
What are real-life users saying about ActiveCollab?
Here’s what a G2 review says about this Asana alternative for marketing agencies:
Life of an agency owner in one photo.
If this hits close to home, we’re sharing more real agency ops talk over on our LinkedIn.
9. Basecamp (Best for simplified team communication)
via Basecamp
While most Asana alternatives for marketing agencies pile on PM features, Basecamp strips them away to focus on keeping everyone informed and accountable. The platform works well for agencies drowning in communication chaos across multiple channels.
Your clients will love it because they can participate meaningfully without needing a training manual, and your team will appreciate not having to learn yet another complicated system.
Basecamp best features
- Keep all project communication in organized message boards rather than scattered emails
- Schedule automatic check-ins that prompt team members to share progress updates
- Store all project files and documents in one searchable location with version control
Basecamp limitations
- Lacks advanced task management features like Gantt charts or resource planning
- No time tracking templates
- Limited customization options for workflows or marketing agency project structures
- It may feel too simple for agencies managing complex, multi-phase campaigns
Basecamp pricing
- Free
- Plus: $15/month per user
- Pro Unlimited: $299/month (billed annually, unlimited users)
Basecamp ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.1/5 (5,340 reviews)
- Capterra: 4.3/5 (14,520+ reviews)
What are real-life users saying about Basecamp?
According to a Reddit post:
💡 Pro Tip: Stop guessing who’s ready to buy. Using AI for lead generation lets you zero in on high-intent prospects by analyzing behavior patterns in real time. Think fewer cold leads, more laser-focused outreach, and smarter follow-ups that actually convert.
10. Zoho Projects (Best for integrated business workflows)
via Zoho
Marketing doesn’t happen in a vacuum—it connects to sales pipelines, customer service issues, and broader business operations. Zoho Projects gets this interconnected reality and plays nicely with the entire Zoho ecosystem.
The alternative to Asana shines when you need to coordinate marketing efforts with other business functions without constantly switching between different tools. Blueprint workflows help standardize those repetitive processes that every agency has but rarely documents properly.
Zoho Projects best features
- View team capacity and workload to prevent excess resource allocation and missed deadlines
- Track budget vs. actual spend using built-in expense tracking and financial reporting features
- Generate detailed timesheets that integrate with Zoho Invoice for seamless billing processes
- Create client-facing project portals where stakeholders can view progress without backend access
Zoho Projects limitations
- The client portal requires configuration and may confuse non-technical stakeholders
- Limited creative proofing capabilities compared to design-focused Asana alternatives for marketing agencies
- Reporting features are basic and not easily customizable for data management
Zoho Projects pricing
- Free
- Premium: $5/month per user
- Enterprise: $10/month per user
- Projects Plus: Custom pricing
Zoho Projects ratings and reviews
- G2: 4.3/5 (475+ reviews)
- Capterra: 4.5/5 (810+ reviews)
What are real-life users saying about Zoho Projects?
This is what a Reddit user had to say:
📽️ Behind The Scenes: Learn how ClickUp’s marketing team uses ClickUp to scale content, campaigns, and conversions.
Summarize this article for me pleaseClickUp Is the Upgrade Your Agency Needs
Asana alternatives for marketing agencies aren’t hard to find, but most of them solve only parts of the problem.
ClickUp covers the whole thing. It’s the everything app for work, which means your team doesn’t have to jump between tools just to launch one campaign.
You can spin up custom workflows that match each client’s process, track every deadline without extra coordination, and move from brief to review without losing momentum.
Sign up for ClickUp today! ✅
Everything you need to stay organized and get work done.
