# Agency CRM > We built a small advertising agency a CRM shaped exactly to how it works, lean, audited and live in days, for less than the subscription it replaced. Source: https://www.hiaitus.ai/projects/agency-crm **Sector:** Advertising **The CRM an agency actually needed, built in days** Exactly-fit software, not another subscription. **Days** not months, to build - AI ran the build, tests and migrations; the human owned every sign-off. - Twice audited, hundreds of automated tests, before it touched real data. - Costs less than the subscription it replaced. ## The CRM an agency actually needed, built in days ## THE BUSINESS A small, growing advertising agency in Australia. A client roster and a prospect list both expanding faster than the tools tracking them. Sales, outreach and follow-up were spread across an enterprise CRM the team used a fraction of, and a spreadsheet doing the rest. The work was getting done. The system was not helping. ## THE PROBLEM Generic CRMs are built for everyone, so they fit no one. The agency was paying an enterprise price for a platform it used at a tenth of its capacity, and still not getting the three things it actually needed: its own pipeline, its own outreach cadence, and reporting it could trust. Every new hire meant more configuration. Every import meant more dirty data. Procurement, setup and admin overhead the team did not have the hours for. The tool meant to speed them up had become a tax. ## THE PROVOCATION They did not need a bigger CRM. They needed a smaller one that was exactly theirs. Feature-rich is not the same as fit. A platform that does a hundred things adequately for everyone loses to one that does the agency's ten things perfectly. Built lean, that CRM costs less than the subscription it replaces and does precisely what the agency does, and nothing it does not. Exactly-fit beats feature-rich. Owned beats rented. _HOW WE OPERATE_ ## One human plus AI. Strategy. Data model. Build. Testing. Audit. Migration. All executed by a single lead working with the Hiaitus AI agentic platform. The judgement is human. The execution is engineered. Nothing shipped without a person signing it off. ### 01 · Built around their pipeline, not a template. The data model started from how the agency actually sells, not from a generic CRM's idea of a contact. ### 02 · AI does the build, the tests and the migrations. The human owns the strategy, the data decisions and every sign-off. The tireless work is engineered. ### 03 · Twice audited, hundreds of tests, before it touched their data. Two full code-and-data audits and a passing test suite ran before a single real record was migrated. ### 04 · Costs less than the CRM it replaced. Exactly-fit is not just better. Owned and lean, it is cheaper than the subscription it retired. ### Days, not months. From brief to a working, audited CRM the team could run. ## WHAT WE BUILT Not a feature list for its own sake. Every part maps to something the agency actually does. - Contacts and companies, organised the way the agency thinks about its market. - A visual sales pipeline with weighted forecasting, so the team can see what is likely to close and when. - Activity reporting that shows what got done, by whom, across any day, week or month. - Notes and a full history on every contact, so nothing important lives in one person's inbox. - Role-based access for the team, viewers, admins and an owner, enforced on the server, not just hidden in the interface. - A clean import that de-duplicates, screens out do-not-contact records, and never silently overwrites a manual edit. - A complete, immutable audit trail of every change. Twice audited, hundreds of automated tests, and the agency's real data migrated across before go-live. ## Exactly-fit software, built for how you work, not adapted to it. The best CRM is not the one with the most features. It is the one shaped to you. - [Start a conversation](https://www.hiaitus.ai/contact) _FAQ_ ## Questions before you build. ### Is a custom built CRM cheaper than an off the shelf subscription? A custom CRM can cost less to run than the subscription it replaces, and the agency CRM Hiaitus built does exactly that. Off the shelf platforms charge enterprise prices even when a small team uses a tenth of the capacity. Built lean and owned rather than rented, the cost sits below what was being paid before. ### How is existing CRM data moved across to a new custom system? Data is migrated only after the new system has been tested and audited. On the agency CRM, two full code and data audits and a passing test suite ran before a single real record moved. The import de-duplicates, screens out do-not-contact records, and never silently overwrites a manual edit. ### Who checks the work if AI is writing the software? A person does, and nothing ships without their sign-off. On this build, one lead worked with the Hiaitus AI agentic platform: the AI ran the build, the tests and the migrations, while the human owned the strategy, the data decisions and every approval. Judgement stays human. Execution is engineered. ### What goes into a small agency CRM built from scratch? A custom CRM includes only the parts the business actually uses. For this agency that meant contacts and companies organised the way the team thinks about its market, a visual sales pipeline with weighted forecasting, activity reporting across any day, week or month, and notes and full history on every contact so nothing important lives in one person's inbox. ### Can custom built software handle team permissions and change history? Yes. The agency CRM Hiaitus built has role-based access for team members, viewers, admins and an owner, enforced on the server rather than hidden in the interface, so the rules hold no matter how the data is reached. Every change is recorded in a complete, immutable audit trail, so history cannot be quietly rewritten.