Birdcage Business Hub · Our own build
We replaced $3,500 a month of software with one app we own.
The Birdcage Business Hub is the operating system we run the agency on. Clients, projects, CRM, content, approvals and an owner view, over one database. We built it because the stack we rented never talked to itself.
The brief
Six sources of truth. None of them talked.
A strategy-first agency means a stack: projects, CRM, proposals, time, approvals, content calendar, docs. Each tool solved a slice.
Every one was a monthly invoice and a per-seat tax. The total crept past $3,500 a month, and we still spent half our time copying information between systems that should have known about each other. So we built our own.
What we did
The work
One operating system for the whole agency
- One hierarchy: My Day, then clients, then projects, then the work. CRM and an owner view sit over the same database.
- Every client, project, plan, content piece, task, comment, time entry, deal and proposal lives in one place and threads back to its source. No re-keying.
- Built for how a small team works. One job per view, no badge spam, calm enough for every day.
What it does
Every slice, in one place.
Plans you can see move.
Every client's strategy is cards travelling across three phases: Strategy, Build, Optimise. The client watches the work happen. No status email.
Content drafted in the client's own voice.
Each client's brand strategy, voice, pillars and audience live in the system. The AI drafts in the right voice and shows its working: which framework, which rules, every time.
Tasks with everything attached.
Subtasks, threaded comments, time against an estimate, multiple owners, and an AI estimate from similar past work. On desktop or in your pocket.
A business view, not a to-do list.
What shipped this week, what carried over, hours per client, and a quiet AI flag when the same thing slips three weeks running.
Client approvals without the chase.
Clients see exactly how a post will look, then approve or ask for changes in two taps. No logins to lose, no email threads to untangle.
What happened
A fraction of the cost, and it does not climb when we hire.
- $3,500a month replaced
- ~$42ka year, climbing with every seat
- 6+ to 1tools collapsed into one app
- 100%self-hosted. Our code, our data
The work, up close
Not a concept deck. It runs the agency every day.
We own it, we do not rent it
The software fits the business.
Self-hosted. Our code, our database, our data. No per-seat pricing, no vendor killing the feature we depend on. When we need something new, we build it, usually the same week. This is what we build for clients too.
Past and present clients
Want one built for you?
A free half hour. You leave knowing what to fix first, whether or not you hire us.