CRM with project management for a team that sells and delivers
Short answer: a CRM with project management links clients and deals to the work you deliver. It helps when the same people handle the sale, scope and project. The buying test is whether a confirmed promise survives that handoff with an owner, an agreed date and a visible approval, not merely whether a tool has both a pipeline and a board.
As of October 2026. Written by Flori. Competitor capabilities and prices below were checked against the linked official pages on October 29. This is a documentation comparison, not a hands-on ranking.
Follow one client from inquiry to handover
Our fictional example is a three-person studio refreshing five website pages for Juniper. Rowan approves; Casey supplies content and access. The agreed fee is USD 6,000, with two revision rounds and no ecommerce. This is training data, not a customer result.
| Stage | Record to keep | What someone must verify |
|---|---|---|
| Inquiry | Client, contacts, objective and source | Who can approve and what is still unknown |
| Agreement | Won deal plus the actual scope and agreement link | A won stage does not prove payment or a signed contract |
| Delivery | Linked project, six tasks, owners and dependencies | Copy and check scope; a deal import does not create the delivery plan |
| Change | Sixth-page request, cost/date impact and decision | Keep unapproved work outside accepted scope |
| Review | Exact draft version and Rowan's actual response | Sent for review is different from approved |
| Handover | Deliverables, access, open issues and support owner | Casey can use the files and systems; acceptance is recorded |
Open the complete project brief and six-task plan. It includes a missing-access branch, a scope-change decision and an assistant permissions exercise. To try the CRM records, import the account, people and deal, in that order, into an isolated test workspace. These CSVs create records, not a ready-made project. Follow the migration and reconciliation checklist.
Which products belong on the shortlist?
| Product | Documented reason to consider it | What to check for your workflow |
|---|---|---|
| Insightly | CRM with native projects and a published MCP server | Sales reports, project handoff and the plan needed for automation; test client sharing and assistant scope |
| Capsule | CRM projects connected to customer work | Project boards, task routines and the plan required for your automation |
| Bonsai | Clients and projects alongside contracts, invoicing and payments on applicable plans; publishes MCP | Whether billing and delivery in one product matter more than keeping existing tools |
| Flowlu | CRM, project management and financial tools | Required plan, team size, client access and how your delivery process fits |
| Flori | Accounts, people and deals beside project tasks, client pages and your own connected assistants | Scope and review behavior; no invoice sending, payment collection or e-signatures |
Sources: Insightly projects, Insightly MCP, Capsule projects, Bonsai plans, Bonsai MCP, Flowlu plans and Flori pricing. A feature listed here does not establish equal depth, access controls or ease of setup. Unknowns belong in the trial, not in a negative competitor claim.
A separate sales CRM and project tool can also be the right choice. An existing integration may already carry the fields and context you need. Keep it if the handoff works and the cost of switching exceeds the improvement. For contracts, scheduling and payment collection, compare HoneyBook or Dubsado before assuming a delivery tool replaces them.
Cost for one, three or five people
These examples use USD list prices and annual billing. Each cell shows monthly equivalent / annual subscription total. They exclude tax, discounts, payment-processing fees, add-ons and external assistant costs. Verify seat minimums and current checkout terms. This is not a feature-equivalent price ranking.
| Plan and reason for including it | 1 person | 3 people | 5 people |
|---|---|---|---|
| Flori Core: client pages, project templates and connected assistants | $10 / $120 | $30 / $360 | $50 / $600 |
| Insightly CRM Plus: CRM and project management | $29 / $348 | $87 / $1,044 | $145 / $1,740 |
| Bonsai Essentials: client portal, contracts, invoices and payments | $19 / $228 | $57 / $684 | $95 / $1,140 |
| Bonsai Premium: adds deals pipeline and further project controls | $29 / $348 | $87 / $1,044 | $145 / $1,740 |
Sources: Flori, Insightly, Bonsai. Flori Core monthly billing is $12, $36 or $60 for those team sizes. Clients, guests and assistants are not paid Flori seats. A separate assistant subscription or API bill can still apply to every person who uses one. Flori has no AI-credit add-on; that does not make model usage free or unlimited.
Capsule and Flowlu remain valid candidates. Use their current Capsule and Flowlu plan selectors for your region and requirements rather than treating an unverified price as a fair comparison.
Trial the difficult parts before the happy path
- Import a small sample and check account links, currency, stage and duplicate handling. Do not move the entire customer history first.
- Start a project from a won deal and inspect which promises and contacts need manual attention.
- Withhold one required input. Can the team see the blocked work, responsible person and next action?
- Reject a draft, then approve a named revision. Check that the two decisions remain distinguishable.
- If you use an assistant, test read-only access and a known out-of-scope project. Update access can permit immediate writes; a review queue is not a universal restriction.
- Have the receiving person open the handover files and confirm access. Record the real result.
Use the blank comparison worksheet to record plan, setup effort, manual steps, retained fields and failures. We have not run this comparative trial, so we make no speed or success-rate claim.
Choose by the work you would otherwise lose
For a consultant, the key record may be the sponsor's decision and next engagement. For an agency, it may be the approved scope and next client review. For a freelancer, it may be a dated follow-up and an unpaid-invoice reminder. Start with that concrete problem. Team size alone does not establish that one system is better than two.
FAQ
Does a CRM with project management automatically preserve the agreed scope? Not necessarily. It can link the sale and project, but someone must check the actual brief, contacts, deliverables and dates. Importing a deal into Flori does not create its delivery tasks or copy a signed agreement.
Is Flori the only CRM with projects or MCP? No. Insightly documents both; other products also offer CRM projects or assistant connections. Compare your actual workflow, plans and permissions.
Does Flori replace invoicing and accounting? No. Flori does not send invoices, collect payment or provide e-signatures. Premium can record invoices and payments received; keep the tool that performs billing.
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