Brands
A brand is a trading name with an address, a logo and a look. Clients of that brand sign in at its address and see its name everywhere — on the portal, on invoices, in email. An agency with three trading names runs three brands inside one organisation rather than three organisations, which keeps one bill, one team and one set of books.
Brands
| Brand | Client address | Clients | State |
|---|---|---|---|
| Northwind Trading | account.northwind.example | 28 | Live |
| Northwind Studio | account.nwstudio.example | 11 | Live |
| Harbour Partners | account.harbourp.example | 2 | Live |
| Unassigned | — | 4 | Needs a brand |
The wrong-brand sign-in
Brand assignment is what routes a client to the right address. Where a client has no brand — common after a bulk import, and easy to miss because everything else about the record looks complete — a redirect can resolve to a default and sign them into the wrong brand's portal. They see the wrong company's name and, briefly, believe they are somewhere they should not be. It is a configuration gap rather than a data leak, and it is alarming to a client either way.
The clients list filters on it. After any import, this is the first thing to look at.
Even the dormant ones. A dormant client can still click an old link.
From a private window, at the brand's own address.
A new brand changes which default anything unassigned resolves to.
Clients
A company record holds the client, their people, their work orders, their invoices and their forms. People at a client company are portal users rather than members of your organisation — they have their own sign-in, they see only their company, and they are not counted as seats.
When somebody signs up or activates on a brand address, they can be routed into the CRM workspace for that brand as a lead. The routing depends on the source identifier being right — get it wrong and the lead lands in the fallback workspace rather than nowhere.
What this does not do
A client that buys from two of your brands needs two client records.
You add their people; they cannot invite colleagues themselves.
There are no parent and subsidiary company relationships.
Your team sees every brand.
Questions
How many brands can we have?
Several. Each needs its own address configured.
Can a brand have its own invoice branding?
Yes — that is most of the point.
What happens if we retire a brand?
Reassign its clients before removing the address.
Related
Putting your logo and colour on the erp.io surfaces your customers see — invoices, signing envelopes and the client portal — and what white label does and does not cover.
BillingInvoices, subscriptions, coupons and payment collection in the erp.io Client Portal — including its role as the payment rail for the platform itself.