10 Best Project Management Software for Professional Service Companies in 2025

Peter Novosel
Co-Founder & Head of Product
December 30, 2024
12 minutes
This is some text inside of a div block.
Back to top

Choosing the right project management software can make or break success for professional service firms.

With tighter deadlines, complex projects, and demanding clients, having the right tools isn't just helpful—it's essential. 

With many options, the best software goes beyond task management to offer advanced reporting, resource planning, and seamless collaboration.

In this blog post, we will share a list of the 10 best project management tools tailored for professional service companies to help them stay organized, boost efficiency, and deliver exceptional results.

Factors to Consider When Evaluating Project Management Tools for Professional Services

The right project management software will help you boost productivity and maintain strong relationships with clients. 

For this, look for the following feature while evaluating project management tools for your service company:

Customizable workflows

Think about the project methodology you use and look for the software that supports your methodology. 

Having a project management that aligns with your workflows will save time and boost overall productivity.

Ensure that the tool helps you:

  • Develop project-specific dashboards.
  • Create templates to share internally and reduce work overload.
  • Build automated workflows to eliminate routine tasks like approvals, status updates, etc.

Collaboration and communication tools

To reduce delays in project approvals and boost transparency across departments, ensure the tool helps you communicate in real-time. 

Look for features such as:

  • Task and project-level comments and @mentions.
  • In-app messaging for 1:1 or group chats with stakeholders and teammates.
  • Integrations with communication channels like Slack, Teams, or email
  • Option to build project-specific chat channels to keep conversations organized.

Integrations with existing tools

Consider which connections you will need to set up consistent transfer of information across tools.

Ideally, the tool should support built-in integrations as it will reduce the additional cost and work required to set up third-party integrations.

Time and expense tracking

The project management tool should help you track and manage time for accurate billing.

Assess the granularity of time tracking features, including the ability to track billable vs. non-billable hours and associate time entries with specific projects, tasks, and clients. 

Also, look for expense-tracking capabilities that support multiple currencies, receipt uploads, and approval workflows.

Apart from the key features, it ensures that the tool is easy to use, offers prebuilt templates, and fits your budget.

Top 10 Project Management Software for Professional Service Companies

Here are our top project management solutions for professional organizations curated after extensive research and sifting through hundreds of user reviews.

  1. SmartSuite: Marketing project management platform that combines automation with a personalized workspace to help you plan, manage, and track projects of all sizes.
  2. Teamwork: Managing clients end to end–from client onboarding to sending invoices.
  3. Zoho Projects: Cloud-based collaboration for remote teams.
  4. Asana: Building flexible workflows through dependencies and automation.
  5. Smartsheet: Automating complex projects using a spreadsheet-like interface.
  6. Basecamp: Centralized client management and communication.
  7. Monday.com: Managing complex projects with a visual approach.
  8. Scoro: Centralizing project management and analyzing project profitability in real-time.
  9. Wrike: Centralizing team communication, project budgeting, and automated workflows.
  10. Workzone: Managing high volume repeatable projects.

#1: SmartSuite

SmartSuite is a versatile project management software that helps professional firms complete work orders, deliver engagement, and manage projects faster and smarter. 

Whether you want to streamline client's requests or measure KPIs for specific projects, you can do it using SmartSuite.

Here are SmartSuite’s key features that make it one of the best project management solutions for scaling your professional service projects.

Track delivery metrics and KPIs

SmartSuite’s reporting capabilities help you win clients' trust by sharing timely reports. 

You can dissect each report by highlighting key metrics and KPIs and presenting a neat and detailed overview of the project’s progress.

You can build a customized dashboard using visual elements like charts, bar graphs, tables, and pie charts to leave a lasting impression. 

SmartSuite also offers custom reports to suit your firm’s specific projects and clientele. 

And, it’s easy to share reports with your clients in whichever format you or they prefer. 

  • You can invite clients as external users by giving them permission to view or comment on the report.
  • You can share reports as attachments via email to direct clients to the report.
  • You can export as PDF, Excel, Google Sheets, or CSV export or print the report.

Powerful task management

SmartSuite’s task management gives you complete control over each project and its tasks and subtasks. From the moment you receive a client request to the delivery, you get a 360-degree view of your project’s life cycle.

One reason why users love SmartSuite is because you can convert any record type into a task. 

For example, you can create a checklist and treat one of the checklist items as a separate task. You can add notes, assign them to your team members, and track their progress.

But there’s more. SmartSuite offers other features to simplify task management for you and your team.

  • Automate recurring tasks: Build linear to multi-sequence workflows to update status, track progress, and assign tasks without manual effort. Set up automation once and use it forever.
  • 200+ templates: Access pre-built templates for use cases like account management, service orders, quote to cash and client engagement. Each template is packed with multiple pre-built views, letting you visualize the project per your preference.
  • Milestones: Break down project goals into task-based milestones to monitor progress. Configure tracking by workstream, team, and owner, flag roadblocks, and create resolution plans.
  • Time tracking: The built-in time tracking feature lets you record time for each task. You can use this data to generate invoices based on billable vs non-billable hours.

Communicate and collaborate with clients

SmartSuite’s built-in communication and collaboration features help you build transparency with clients by giving them timely updates about the project’s progress.

Its Share View feature lets you share status, progress reports, design scope, and more with external stakeholders without purchasing additional user seats in SmartSuite. Not only it’s cost-effective but ensures no key information gets lost due to multiple lines of communication

Here are some other SmartSuite features that make collaboration with customers a breeze:

  • Built-in communication centers such as group chats and 1:1 conversations to share quick updates, manage change requests, and get progress status with internal teams.
  • The member’s directory lets you see all the details about your co-workers, including their availability status and job profile, making it efficient to contact the right people.
  • SmartSuite docs help you brainstorm with your teams, map out the projects’ resources, and conduct SWOT analysis.

Source: G2 review.

SmartSuite Pricing

SmartSuite offers a forever-free plan with access to 250+ automation actions, team collaboration, multi-dashboard views, and more.

There are four paid plans with a 14-day free trial:

  • Team: Starts at $10/user/month, including SmartSuite AI, Gantt charts, timeline views, 5000 automation runs, and time tracking.
  • Professional: Starts at $25/user/per month, including two-factor authentication, Gmail & Outlook integrations, resource management, and advanced permission control.
  • Enterprise: Starts at $35/user/month, including 500,000 automation actions, audit logs, data loss prevention, and 50,000 monthly API calls.
  • Signature: Customized plan tailored to your organization’s needs and team size.

SmartSuite Pros and Cons

✅ Generous free plan with access to advanced features.

✅ 200+ project templates for various use cases.

✅ Integrated document and file management.

✅ Comprehensive workflow automation.

✅ Dynamic dashboards and reporting.

❌ Less native integrations when compared to alternatives.

#2: Teamwork

Best for: Managing clients end to end–from client onboarding to sending invoices.

Teamwork is specifically designed for client-facing businesses such as professional service firms. 

Each feature is catered to help you manage clients and generate profit without the chaos of managing too many features at once.

Teamwork offers a complete suite, from fetching clients’ requests to sending invoices. Thus, the reliance on any other tool reduces drastically with Teamwork.

Who Is It For?

Service companies, whether small or large, looking for specialized project management solution.

Teamwork’s Top Features

  • Team communication and collaboration: Share updates with clients, get approvals, and communicate internally with a built-in messaging app, comments, and @mentions.
  • Resource planning: Assess your project’s health, understand the team's workload, and re-allocate resources to maintain peak efficiency.
  • Time and invoice tracking: Use the time tracking field to estimate billable hours and manage invoices within your workspace.

Teamwork Pricing

Teamwork.com offers a forever free plan for up to 5 users and four paid plans with a 30-day free trial.

  • Deliver: $13.99/user/month for a minimum of 3 users, billable time tracking, client company management, and Gantt charts.
  • Grow: $25.99/user/month for a minimum of 5 users, resource scheduling, utilization report, and a custom domain with SSL.
  • Scale: $69.99/user/month for a minimum of 5 users, unlimited retainer management, projects, and advanced automation with conditional logic.
  • Enterprise: Dedicated Customer Success Manager, premium support, and advanced security. Contact sales for a quote.

Teamwork Pros and Cons

✅ Customizable workflows and templates.

✅ Built-in resource management tools—time tracking, invoicing, and budgeting features.

✅ Ease of collaboration with external users like vendors or contractors.

❌ Group pricing leads to expensive plans for solo teams.

❌ Limited native integration, relying on Zapier.

#3: Zoho Projects

Best for: Cloud-based collaboration for remote teams.

Zoho Projects is a solid and budget-friendly enterprise project management solution that offers built-in tools to run projects across clients for a service-based firm. 

You can track time to assess billable hours, generate and manage invoices, and communicate effectively with your customers.

Who Is It For?

Professional service firms who want a pocket-friendly project management tool.

Zoho’s Top Features

  • Blueprint: Build linear to multi-step automated workflows to update task statuses, send messages to the right people, and trigger email alerts upon status changes.
  • Cross-department collaboration: Provide updates to stakeholders and loop them in at critical stages of project reviews through built-in chat, forum, and comments options.
  • Process management: Build scalable sales process including lead scoring, approvals, lead assignment rules, and reviews.

Zoho Projects’ Pricing

Zoho Project offers a free plan for up to 5 users where you can create 3 projects with subtasks and get access to Whiteboards and 5GB storage.

Zoho Projects has two paid plans with a 10-day free trial for each:

  • Premium: Starts at $5/user/month with access to unlimited projects, 100GB storage, project-specific workload reports, and GitHub, BitBucket, and GitLab integration.
  • Enterprise: Starts at $10/user/month with access to custom fields, Zoho’s AI assistant, advanced task and issue reports, and 30 project templates.

Zoho Projects Pros and Cons

✅ Cost-effective pricing plans.

✅ Preset reports and custom reporting capabilities.

❌ AI assistance is only available on Enterprise tiers.

#4: Asana

Best for: Building flexible workflows through dependencies and automation.

Asana is a project management platform that helps professional firms manage client work through automated workflows, dependencies, and portfolios.

Ease of configuration makes Asana a go-to project management tool for firms across different industries—merger and acquisition, accounting, compliance, etc.

Who Is It For?

Creative and marketing agencies, small and medium-sized businesses.

Asana’s Top Features

  • Request forms: Create standardized templates and send them to prospective clients to immediately collect all details. This helps you gather the information needed to start any project.
  • Capacity planning: Optimize resources (time, people, and cost) by understanding your team’s workload, task prioritization, and project goals.
  • Portfolios: Organize different clients’ projects in dedicated portfolios, getting a detailed overview of deadlines, the team involved, and overall progress.

Asana Pricing

Asana offers a free plan for up to 10 users, unlimited file storage (100MB per file), and three task views—board, list, and calendar.

There are four paid plans with a 30-day free trial.

  • Starters: Starts at $10.99/user/month, with up to 500 teammates collaboration, Asana AI, private projects, and teams.
  • Advanced: Starts at $24.99/user/month, with 25,000 automation/month, 100 portfolios, universal reporting, and goal tracking.
  • Enterprise: Advanced integrations, unlimited seats, portfolio, and automation bundles. Contact sales for a quote.
  • Enterprise+: Audit log API, HIPAA compliance, and data loss prevention integrations. Contact sales for a quote.

Asana Pros and Cons

✅ Centralized work management with portfolios.

✅ Powerful workflow automation.

✅ 270+ native integrations.

❌ Lack of native collaboration and communication tools.

❌ Group-based pricing causes a price increase for small or one-person businesses.

#5: Smartsheet

Best for: Automating complex projects using a spreadsheet-like interface.

Smartsheet is an advanced enterprise-level work and project management software that helps you manage and track projects consistently and at scale.

Its control center feature acts as the source of truth where you store your client’s database, build a portfolio, and automate workflows to ensure the smooth execution of each project.

Who Is It For?

Enterprise-level teams who manage large numbers of complex projects.

Smartsheet’s Top Features

  • Dynamic view: Create custom dashboards or views to add only the relevant projects to share with specific stakeholders. These views offer flexibility and control over your projects' privacy.
  • Automation workflow: Build no-code automation with triggers and actions to dump mundane tasks. Send upcoming deadline reminders, request signatures through integration with DocuSign, or perform calculations.
  • Digital asset management: Manage your assets in a single place, contracts, templates, project SOPs, and more.

Smartsheet Pricing

There’s no free plan or free trial available to explore Smartsheet’s features.

You can get started by choosing one of its four pricing tiers.

  • Pro: Starts at $12/member/month for up to 10 members, including private sheets creation and unlimited form access.
  • Business: Starts at $24/member/month, includes unlimited automated workflows, and requires at least 3 users.
  • Enterprise: Unlimited storage and enterprise plan manager. Contact sales for a quote.
  • Advanced work management: Offers premium features such as Calendar App. DataTable, Pivot App, and portfolio management. Contact sales for a quote.

Smartsheet Pros and Cons

✅ High level of customization.

✅ Huge library of project templates.

✅ Powerful analytics and reporting tools.

❌ Steep learning curve for spreadsheet novices.

❌ Data doesn’t get updated in real time.

❌ No task assignment features for members.

#6: Basecamp

Best for: Centralized client management and communication.

Basecamp’s project management offering is best suited for agencies who run multiple ad campaigns across various clients and desire dedicated space for each client. 

The platform offers a project based division, helping you centralize client communication, file management, and project tracking without feeling overwhelmed. 

Every campaign has a folder containing all the details—files and docs, task lists, conversations, automated triggers, and reports.

Who Is It For?

Small to medium service companies who manage a handful of projects and want a dedicated space to manage client communication.

Basecamp’s Top Features

  • To-do lists: List all the tasks that need to be done in a to-do list format and assign them to team members.
  • Hill charts: A hill-like chart gives an overview of multiple to-do lists. Team members can update task progress, giving you a clear picture of task movement across the timeline.
  • Team communication: 1:1 chats, group conversations, comments, @mentions, and message boards all help reduce time spent on meetings or finding feedback through long email threads.

Basecamp Pricing

Basecamp offers one free and two paid plans, which come with complete access to all features. The key difference is that one plan has per-user pricing, while the other has a fixed fee for unlimited users.

  • Free: Forever free plan that lets you manage one project at a time with 1GB storage.
  • Basecamp Plus: Starts at $15/user/month, including collaboration tools–messaging, comments, and emails, visual reporting graphs, and 500 GB storage for files & documents.
  • Basecamp Pro Unlimited: $299/month fixed price for unlimited seats, including 1:1 onboarding tour, 10x file & document storage (5 TB), 24/7/365 priority support, Timesheet and Admin Pro Pack add-on.

The Basecamp Plus plan comes with a 30-day free trial while Basecamp Pro Unlimited has a 7-day trial period.

Basecamp Pros and Cons

✅ Built-in team communication.

✅ Impressive visual reports like Hill Charts.

✅ Free unlimited guest invites in the Pro Unlimited tier.

❌ Limited integrations and automation when compared to alternatives.

❌ No built-in Gantt chart view.

#7. Monday.com

Best for: Managing complex projects with a visual approach.

Monday.com is a robust project management tool known for its highly customizable and visual approach to project management. 

Due to this, it’s best for service companies that offer a variety of services across clients.

You can build monthly content calendars, plan and launch holiday promotional campaigns, and map out quarterly strategies.

Who Is It For?

Medium and large-scale companies who want an adaptable project management tool.

Monday.com’s Top Features

  • Gantt charts: Visualize task dependencies, see the project’s timelines at a glance, and identify any blockers across the projects.
  • Asset management: Store, view, and manage your project-related assets—social media assets, strategy documents, and website graphics—in one place.
  • Automation: Workflow automation to create project boards, set approvals and reminders, and standardize processes across organizations.

Monday.com Pricing

Monday.com offers a 14-day free trial and a free plan for up to 2 users.

Their paid plans are based on a minimum team size of 3 and come in four categories:

  • Basic: Starts at $17/user/month with only Kanban boards view.
  • Standard: Starts at $20/user/month with 250 automated actions/month and 3+ dashboard views.
  • Pro: Starts at $32/user/month with all five dashboard views and 2-factor authentication.
  • Enterprise: For enterprise-level reporting and administration control. Contact sales for a quote.

Monday.com Pros and Cons

✅ Multiple customization options.

✅ No-code automation builder.

❌ Steep learning curve.

❌ Slow loading time and constant screen lag.

#8: Scoro

Best for: Centralizing project management and analysing project’s profitability in real-time.

Scoro is an all-in-one project management solution designed for professional services firms. 

It centralized all your work through integrated features resource planning, CRM, invoicing retainer management, etc.

Who Is It For?

Professional firms who want cost-effective software to integrate their projects in a central place.

Scoro’s Top Features

  • Retainer management: You can centralize retainer communication within a single dashboard. You can create quotes, send proposals, and track the deal throughout the lifecycle within Scoro.
  • Time tracking: You can track your team’s time and identify the time spent between billable and non-billable work. The timesheets help you clearly plan what needs to be done and how much time.
  • Collaboration: Scoro helps you track the team’s progress in real-time to assess workload capacity, assign tasks to multiple people, boost visibility, and give you permission to collaborate with external clients.

Scoro Pricing

Scoro doesn’t offer any free plan but all of its four paid plans come with a 14-day free trial.

Here’s a rundown of each plan’s pricing and feature structure:

  • Essential: $28/user/month, including Google, Apple Calendar, and Stripe integration, summary reports, file management, and quote and invoice creation.
  • Standard: $42/user/month, including Gantt chart & dependencies, time tracker, automation, and detailed financial reports.
  • Pro: $71/user/month, including integrations with Salesforce, Quickbooks, and Xero, supplier management, advanced reports, and timesheet view.
  • Ultimate: Customized enterprise pricing with access to specific features and dedicated support.

Scoro Pros and Cons

✅ Offer 50+ reports giving visibility into profitability, revenue, and team utilization.

✅ Easy to assign a single task to multiple people.

❌ Can be clunky due to too many customization options.

❌ No Kanban Boards view for project management.

#9: Wrike

Best for: Centralizing team communication, project budgeting, and automated workflows.

Wrike is an enterprise-grade project management tool known for its all-in-one approach to project management. 

The tool helps you generate real-time insights from 50+ digital ad channels, track time, manage budgets, and keep clients in the loop throughout the project.

Who Is It For?

Large to enterprise-level companies delivering professional services.

Wrike’s Top Features

  • Blueprints: Build customizable templates based on intellectual property and package offerings to scale your marketing efforts.
  • Reporting dashboards: Build a real-time snapshot of your service delivery across clientele and projects. Each report can be drilled down through customizable tables and fields.
  • Resource management: Allocate resources based on your team’s capacity, request additional resources, and optimize the team’s workload.

Wrike Pricing

Wrike offers a generous, free-forever plan with email integration and enterprise-grade security. There are five paid plans with a 14-day free trial:

  • Team: Start at $10/user/month for up to 25 users, including custom fields, workflows, unlimited request forms, and dynamic Gantt charts.
  • Business: Starts at $24.80/user/month for up to 200 users, including portfolio management, AI Risk Prediction, nested projects, and real-time reports.
  • Enterprise: Unlimited users with advanced admin, reporting, security, and integrations. Contact sales for a quote.
  • Pinnacle: Native Power BI integration, locked spaces, and budgeting features. Contact sales for a quote.

Wrike Pros and Cons

✅ 400+ integrations, including marketing and advertising tools.

✅ Generous free plan with unlimited users.

✅ Offers advertising-specific project templates.

❌ Steep learning curve because of overwhelming features.

❌ The budgeting feature is limited to Pinnacle plan users.

#10: Workzone

Best for: Managing high volume repeatable projects.

Workzone is an easy to use solution to meet project deadlines and stay on budget. 

It's known for its simplicity and robust features, including built-in collaboration, customizable reporting dashboards, and workload management.

Who is it For?

Companies looking to start or scale their professional service offering within budget.

Workzone’s Top Features

  • Time tracking: Assess how much time is spent on a project and individual tasks. You can nitpick areas for improvements to meet the project’s goals.
  • Project dashboard: Provides a holistic view of all your marketing projects— campaign statuses, project organization by department, campaign, or client.
  • File management: Supports secure file sharing, image markups, and file versioning, facilitating seamless collaboration on marketing assets and documents.

Workzone Pricing

Workzone doesn’t offer any free plan, and the free trial is available only after a one-on-one demo with their team.

The platform has three pricing tiers:

  • Team: Starts at $24/user/month with a minimum of 5 seats. The plan includes 100GB storage, resource management, expense tracking, and Gantt charts.
  • Professional: Starts at $34/user/month, including Custom project intake forms, advanced capacity planning, and 150 GB storage.
  • Enterprise: Cross-project dependencies, custom workflows, advanced time tracking reports, and workspace groups. Contact sales for a quote.

Workzone Pros and Cons

✅ Clean and easy-to-use interface.

✅ Time tracking and resource management are included in all plans.

❌ Cross-project dependencies are available only on the enterprise plan.

❌ No native communication. Collaboration is possible through comments only.

Manage Professional Service Projects Like a Pro With SmartSuite

While each software we've covered has its strengths—whether it's Teamwork's client management, Asana's workflow flexibility, or Monday.com's visual approach—finding the perfect fit comes down to your specific needs.

Think about what matters most to your team:

Do you need robust resource management? Detailed time tracking? Client collaboration tools? Maybe you're looking for a cost-effective tool that scales with your business.

After reviewing all these options, SmartSuite stands out as the clear winner for most professional service firms.

Here's why: it strikes the sweet spot between advanced features and user-friendly design that so many tools miss. 

You get everything you need—customizable workflows, detailed reporting, time tracking, and client collaboration—without the overwhelming complexity or steep learning curve.

And, its pricing flexibility is what really sets it apart. The generous free plan offers access to advanced features such as automated workflows. 

Plus, with 200+ pre-built templates, you can hit the ground running instead of spending weeks setting up your workflows.

Ready to take your project management to the next level? Give SmartSuite a try with their 14-day free trial or sign up for a free plan. You might just find it's the solution you've been looking for.

Table of Contents
Start using SmartSuite Today
  • Manage Your Workflows on a Single Platform

  • Empower Team Collaboration

  • Trusted by 5,000+ Businesses Worldwide

Start Free Trial

Related Articles

best project management software for advertising agencies

10 Best Project Management Software for Advertising Agencies in 2025

Peter Novosel
Peter Novosel
12 minutes

Asana vs. ClickUp vs. SmartSuite: Which one is better? [2025]

Trello vs. Asana vs. SmartSuite: Which one is better? [2025]

Monday.com vs. Pipedrive vs. SmartSuite: Which Project Management Tool Wins?

Arrow Left
Arrow Right