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# How Zendo works

Zendo is a client portal: you sell your services, take in client work and deliver it, and your clients follow all of it in one place, under your brand. Everything in Zendo is built on four concepts: requests, orders, services and clients.

![The sidebar takes you to the main parts of Zendo: Requests (1), Clients (2), Orders (3), the Front Desk (4), where clients see your services, and Settings (5).](https://getzendo.io/wp-content/uploads/2026/11/kb-s1-app-overview.webp =698x508)

## Requests

Requests are the unit of client work in Zendo. A request is one piece of work for one client or one client team: a design revision, a bug to fix, a monthly report. It has a status, an assignee and a deadline, files, a checklist and its own communication feed. Requests are the only things in Zendo that move through a workflow, so anything that needs progress tracking should be a request.

Every request has a request type. The type gives the request its name, so **you call the work whatever you like: tickets, projects, jobs**. "Request" is only Zendo's default word for it. The type also defines which form the client fills in when they submit, which statuses the request can have, who is allowed to submit it and what happens automatically as it moves along. When a client submits a request, they pick its type from that list. See [Create a request type](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/create-a-request-type-pucu6t/) and [Work a request from arrival to done](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/work-a-request-from-arrival-to-done-jfl1fw/).

## Orders

Every sale in Zendo is recorded as an order. An order shows what the client bought, the price, how they chose to pay and whether the payment has arrived. Quotes and invoices belong to the order, and the requests that deliver the work are linked to it, so the order's Fulfillment follows those requests. You do the work in the requests; the order tells you where the money is. See [Follow orders: fulfillment and payment](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/follow-orders-fulfillment-and-payment-1oq1mqu/).

## Services

Services are what you sell. A service has a name, a price, an optional Order Form the client fills in at checkout, and its own link a client can buy it from. A **one-off** service is a fixed scope for a fixed price. A **subscription** bills every cycle and limits how much work the client can have open at once. A **custom** service has no price: the client sends a brief and you reply with a quote. Your services are collected on the Front Desk, a public page where clients and visitors choose a service and pay. See [Choose a service type](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/choose-a-service-type-18ktzy9/) and [Set up your Front Desk](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/set-up-your-front-desk-mdpq9e/).

## Clients

Clients are the people you work for. Each client has a profile in Zendo that collects their requests, orders, documents and files. You decide whether and when a client signs in: you can invite them straight away, or set everything up first and invite them when it is ready. Clients from the same company can form a client team and see each other's work. See [Add clients](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/add-clients-1mfm23b/) and [Put clients into a team](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/put-clients-into-a-team-74h5nv/).

## What your clients see

Clients sign in at `https://<workspace>.getzendo.io`, or at your own domain, and see Zendo under your name, logo and colours. There they find their dashboard, their requests, orders, quotes and invoices, your Front Desk, direct messages with you, files and forms.

You control what each client sees and how Zendo looks for them. The sidebar decides which parts of the client portal a client can open, the dashboard decides what greets them, a client theme gives a client their own look, and onboarding cards tell a new client what to do first. Each of these can be shared by all clients or unique to one client or team. See [View the portal as a client](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/view-the-portal-as-a-client-8xh4sc/).

## Settings

What you find in each of the five Settings groups:

| Group | What you set there |
|---|---|
| **Workspace** | Your workspace's name and address, your team and their roles, your plan, integrations, and the default notifications for your team and your clients. |
| **Requests** | Request types and the statuses they use. |
| **Sales** | Services, the Front Desk, payment methods, and how quotes and invoices are numbered and formatted. |
| **Brand** | Your logo, the look of Zendo, client themes, the sign-up and login pages, your own domain and the emails Zendo sends for you. |
| **Portal** | Sidebars, dashboards and onboarding cards for your clients and for your own team. |

See [Set your workspace name, address and formats](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/set-your-workspace-name-address-and-formats-fzxsyf/), [Create a request type](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/create-a-request-type-pucu6t/), [Choose a service type](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/choose-a-service-type-18ktzy9/), [Set your workspace appearance](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/set-your-workspace-appearance-wobsc5/) and [Change what is in the client sidebar](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/change-what-is-in-the-client-sidebar-19vnb7p/).

## Where to go next

- Set up your workspace step by step: [Set up the basics](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/set-up-the-basics-v1502f/).
- Set up the kinds of work you take in: [Create a request type](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/create-a-request-type-pucu6t/).
- Put something up for sale: [Sell a fixed-price service](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/sell-a-fixed-price-service-1anzfy2/).
- Bring in your first client: [Add clients](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/add-clients-1mfm23b/).
- Make it look like yours: [Put your logo, favicon and app icon in place](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/put-your-logo-favicon-and-app-icon-in-place-1sy8a1l/) and [Set your workspace appearance](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/set-your-workspace-appearance-wobsc5/).

## Related

- [View the portal as a client](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/view-the-portal-as-a-client-8xh4sc/)
- [Zendo glossary](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/zendo-glossary-5mulbg/)
- [Invite your team and choose roles](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/invite-your-team-and-choose-roles-10g97kc/)
- [Understand statuses and the three states](https://help.getzendo.io/en/article/understand-statuses-and-the-three-states-10e4jci/)