For accounting and advisory firms
You're not worried about our price. You're worried about telling a client their fee is going up.
That's the actual blocker, and it deserves arithmetic instead of a pitch. Below is what Clockwork costs per client file at every firm tier, what that works out to as a share of a typical advisory fee, the three ways firms absorb it, and what has to be true for it to pay for itself. Every number here is either published pricing or division you can redo yourself.
Start with the per-client number, not the invoice
Firm plans are billed per client company, not per seat, so unlimited users are included and the only figure that matters to a pass-through conversation is cost per client file. Take the plan price, divide by the client files it includes. That's the whole calculation. Prices below are annual billing; monthly billing runs higher.
Firms in Clockwork's partner base typically bill advisory clients $2,500 to $5,000 a month. On a $5,000 retainer, halve the shares above: 1.4% at Start down to 0.7% at Growth. Measured against the largest client in one partner firm's actual book, $3,000 a month, Scale's $49.97 is 1.7% of the fee.
The honest caveat: utilization is the variable that moves this number most, not the tier. Scale at 30 files is $49.97 each. Fill only 15 of those files and it doubles to $99.93. The per-client math only holds if you actually onboard the base.
The same three numbers, on one line
Three ways firms actually absorb it
Nobody has ever won this argument with a feature list. These are the three routes partner firms take, and the language that goes with each. Lift a sentence and use it.
Build it into new-client pricing
The easy one, and the one every firm gets right. For anyone signing after today the cost sits inside the fee from the first invoice, so no client ever sees a line item or an increase. Firms that go this route stop describing forecasting as an add-on and start describing it as what an advisory engagement is.
Say this“Our advisory engagement includes a rolling 12-month forecast and a weekly cash flow view. That’s part of the package, not an upgrade.”
Fold it into an existing retainer at renewal
No fee change and no negotiation. At $49.97 against a $2,500 retainer you absorb 2% of the fee and take your return in hours rather than margin. This is the right route for clients you don't want to reopen pricing with, and for the ones where the relationship is worth more than fifty dollars a month.
Say this“We’re upgrading the reporting you already get. Same fee. Starting next month you’ll see a rolling 12-month forecast and a weekly cash view.”
Raise the fee, but attach a new deliverable
Never raise the price of the same thing. Raise it with something in hand. A $250 increase on a $2,500 retainer is 10%, it covers the $49.97 roughly five times over, and the client is buying a rolling forecast, scenario modeling, and a weekly cash number they did not have last month.
Say this“Starting next quarter we’re adding a rolling 12-month forecast, weekly cash flow, and scenario modeling to your monthly package. The fee moves from $2,500 to $2,750.”
What has to be true for it to pay for itself
Clockwork’s own claim is that most firm partners see the platform pay for itself within 60 to 90 days. Treat that as a claim to be checked, not a finding. Ninety days on Scale is $4,497, so clearing it inside the window means recovering $1,499 a month in margin or in time. There are three ways to get there, and you can test each against your own book before you sign anything.
Or measure it against churn instead of hours. Scale is $17,988 a year. One client at $2,500 a month is $30,000 a year. Keeping a single engagement you would otherwise have lost pays for the platform for the full year and leaves $12,012 behind. We are not going to quote you a retention number, because we do not have one worth quoting — this is arithmetic you should run on your own book.
The other tiers work the same way. Start needs about $70 a month per client across 10 files, or three and a half hours at $200. Growth needs about $35 per client across 100 files, or seventeen and a half hours.
The honest comparison is your whole stack, not one line item
The second half of this objection is usually “we already pay for something similar.” Fair. So price the stack rather than the invoice, and compare deliverables rather than logos.
Run the first two together at 30 clients, which is what a firm needs if it wants Fathom’s reporting alongside Jirav’s modeling: $450 plus $1,500 is $1,950 a month, or $65.00 per client. Clockwork Scale is $1,499, or $49.97 per client. That is $451 a month less, $5,412 a year, and you pick up the weekly cash flow and consolidation that neither tool provides at any price.
Where this comparison fails, and you should hear it from us: if your stack is Fathom alone, you are paying about $15 per client at 30 clients and Clockwork is more expensive per line item. It should be. Fathom has no payroll integration and no weekly cash flow at any tier, so it is not the same deliverable. If weekly cash flow is not something your firm plans to sell, nobody should talk you into paying for it.
Questions your partners will ask
What if we roll it out and nobody uses it?
The fair version of this concern is that a firm bought a tool, it sat there, and the invoice kept arriving. Two things are structurally different here. Clockwork is billed per client company with unlimited users included, so nobody has to ration logins to justify seats. And each client's forecast, cash flow view, and dashboard generate themselves from their QuickBooks or Xero rather than waiting for a staff accountant to build them, so the deliverable exists whether or not anyone opened the app that week. Adoption still matters, but it shows up as utilization, not as effort.
What if we don't fill the tier?
Then your per-client number goes up and you should plan for that honestly. Scale is $49.97 per file at 30 files, $83.28 at 18, and $99.93 at 15. Choose the tier that matches the client files you will actually onboard in the first quarter, not the ones you hope to onboard by year end. You can move up later, and a smaller tier is a real answer rather than a concession.
What about our smallest clients?
This is where the percentage stops being comfortable, so here is the number. Against the low end of one partner firm's actual book, a client billing $450 a month, Scale's $49.97 is 11.1% of the fee. That is not a rounding error and nobody should present it as one. For clients at that level the answer is usually that they are not on the platform yet, or that the forecast is precisely the reason the engagement moves up a tier. Not every client in your book belongs on this on day one.
Bring your own numbers
Take the tier you would actually buy, divide by the client files you would actually onboard this quarter, and hold the result against your median advisory fee. If the percentage works, the only remaining decision is which of the three routes you use. If it does not work, say so on the call and we will tell you straight whether the tier below is the better fit.
