Software for freelance social media managers: retainers, approvals and reports

Running social for four or five local businesses is mostly chasing sign-off. November's calendar is ready on October 25, and the owner of the taco shop answers on the 3rd with a voice memo that says "make it pop." The retainer invoice goes out whenever you remember, and nobody knows how many rounds of changes the fee was supposed to cover. SoloWOS handles that side of the work. Publishing stays in the scheduler you already use.

From the audit call to a paid retainer

1. The business fills out your account audit form: which platforms they're on, whether they run Meta or TikTok ads and roughly what they spend a month, and who approves posts. If they say they have no product photos, a conditional question asks whether they want a shoot. Submitting the form takes them to book a 30-minute discovery call.
2. Send the retainer as a proposal with lines nobody can misread, for example 12 feed posts and 8 stories a month, comment replies Monday to Friday and one monthly report. Keep ad spend out of your fee: it runs on the client's own card in Meta Ads Manager, or sits on its own line if you pay it and pass it through. Add a line for extra posts with its price.
3. Once they accept, the contract goes out through E-Signatures. Typical terms: a 3-month minimum, 30 days' notice to end it, two rounds of changes per post, who owns the accounts and the ad account, and who adds the paid-partnership label when the brand pays a creator.
4. Each month, upload the calendar as a PDF, or each post as a PNG or JPG, for approval in the client's portal. They pin a comment on the exact spot ("the sale price is wrong"), ask for changes or approve the version with their name. Files can be up to 25 MB, with up to 50 versions kept.
5. Create the first invoice from the accepted proposal and set it to repeat monthly in Invoicing. The next ones go out on the 1st with a card pay link through your Stripe account, plus your ACH or Zelle details if you add them, and optional reminders 3 days before and 3 and 7 days after the due date.
6. On the 3rd, record the report with Screen Recording: open each platform's insights, walk through the three posts that worked and say what changes next month. Videos run up to 5 minutes on Solo, and you can see whether the client watched to the end.

A typical week with five accounts

• Monday: you upload December calendars for the taco shop and the hair salon. The salon approves by lunch; the taco shop pins two comments on Tuesday's promo.
• Tuesday: a gym fills out the audit form and books a call for Thursday. An automation emails them two short case studies as soon as the form comes in.
• Wednesday: the dental office's retainer invoice went past due on Friday. The reminder already went out, and they pay by card from the link.
• Thursday: after the call, the gym gets the retainer proposal with the 3-month minimum in the terms.
• Friday: Time Tracking shows the taco shop took 14 hours this month on a retainer priced for 8. That goes into your renewal conversation.

All 13 tools, one by one

How a social media manager with several client accounts uses each tool.

• Link in Bio: your own page with your services, results and audit form. Solo includes 1 Link in Bio page and Team 3, so it's for your brand, not one page per client.
• Short Links: one tagged link per campaign per client (/s/tacos-black-friday) with clicks by day, country and device for the monthly report. If the promo changes, edit the destination without touching the published post.
• Forms: the new-account audit and a quarterly two-question satisfaction check. Each response creates or updates the client's contact so the answers aren't buried in DMs.
• Scheduling: the free 30-minute discovery call and the monthly review, sent as a single-use link so each client books exactly one review a month.
• Proposals: the retainer with its deliverables and minimum term, and one-off quotes for a launch, Black Friday or a holiday campaign. Save your most-sold retainer as a template.
• E-Signatures: the services contract and, when the client hands you admin access, a short letter that says who keeps the accounts and logins when the work ends.
• Document Tracking: your quarterly strategy deck as a PDF. You see which pages the owner read before the meeting, and you can turn the link off if they don't sign.
• Screen Recording: the monthly report as a video (up to 5 minutes on Solo, 15 minutes on Team). Clients comment at the exact second they have a question.
• Notes & Boards: a board per client with each post of the month as a task with a due date. There's no calendar view and the client doesn't see the board.
• Time Tracking: a project per account at your hourly rate, so you know which retainer pays and which one eats your week. Extra rounds go onto the next invoice as billable hours.
• Invoicing: the retainer invoice that repeats on the 1st with a card pay link, and a separate invoice for extra posts or a pass-through ad spend line.
• Expenses: your scheduler subscription, stock photos, Canva and the boosted posts you pay for on a client's behalf, each with its receipt, so month-end shows real profit.
• Automations: a thank-you with case studies when the audit form arrives, a follow-up 3 days after a proposal still isn't accepted, and a review request 30 days after a contact moves to Won.

FTC rules and taxes that touch social media work

• Sponsored posts need a clear disclosure. The FTC's Disclosures 101 guide says any financial, employment, personal or family relationship with a brand counts, free products included. The disclosure goes with the post itself, not only in the bio or behind a "more" link; in a video it goes in the video. Plain words like "ad" or "sponsored" work; "sp" or "collab" don't. Put who handles it in your contract when you run creator campaigns for a client.
• Don't buy followers or reviews for a client. The FTC's 2024 rule on reviews and testimonials bans fake reviews and bans buying or selling fake indicators of social media influence, such as followers or views from bots or hijacked accounts, when the buyer knew or should have known they were fake and used them for a commercial purpose. Violations can bring civil penalties.
• Business clients that pay you $2,000 or more for services in 2026 report it on Form 1099-NEC (the threshold was $600 through 2025). Card payments through Stripe or PayPal only produce a federal Form 1099-K above $20,000 and 200 transactions in a year, though some states set lower thresholds. The income is taxable either way, form or no form.
• Sales tax on digital and marketing services depends on the state. Check your state's revenue department before you assume a retainer is exempt.

This is general information, not legal advice. Rules vary by state; check yours with a lawyer or your licensing board.

SoloWOS or Planable: which fits

Planable and Later schedule posts and handle client approval of the post itself. SoloWOS overlaps with them only on approvals: they cover what happens on the platforms, and SoloWOS covers the client who pays the retainer.

Choose Planable if:

• You want clients to approve the scheduled post in the calendar, with publishing blocked until someone signs off.
• Several people at the client need to review, since Planable prices per workspace with unlimited users.

Choose Later if:

• You mainly need scheduling and Link in Bio for one brand, and approvals can wait until you're on Growth.

Choose SoloWOS if:

• What's missing is quoting the retainer, getting the contract signed, sending the invoice every month and knowing the hours each account takes.
• You approve single pieces or a monthly calendar PDF, with the comment pinned on the image.

Most social media managers use both kinds: a scheduler for the platforms, SoloWOS for selling, signing and billing. Prices and features checked between October 17 and 23, 2026 on each company's site.

Start with these three

Proposals with your retainer saved as a template, Invoicing with that retainer set to repeat monthly, and Screen Recording for the report. Turn on post approvals in the client portal with your first calendar, and add Time Tracking at your first month-end.

Free tools that help

• Retainer calculator to price an account from the hours it really takes.
• Engagement rate calculator for the numbers in your monthly report.
• UTM builder to tag every campaign link.
• Invoice late fee calculator for the client who pays the retainer 30 days late.

What SoloWOS won't do for a social media manager

• It doesn't post or schedule to Instagram, Facebook, TikTok or LinkedIn, and it doesn't pull their analytics. Your report uses each platform's numbers.
• Approvals take images and PDFs (PNG, JPG, WebP or PDF up to 25 MB). A reel or video can't be approved in the portal.
• It doesn't charge the retainer to the client's card. The invoice goes out on its date and the client pays it from the link or by bank transfer.
• No social inbox and no automatic replies to comments or DMs.
• SoloWOS doesn't file taxes, issue 1099s or collect sales tax for you. Invoicing sends the invoice with a pay link (card through your Stripe account) and your other payment details; your accountant or tax software handles the rest.