The renewal portfolio, agent-prepared briefs, and working a cycle from tracked date to recorded outcome.
Outlit’s Renewals responsibility tracks every renewal cycle it can see — from CRM opportunities or manual entries — prepares an evidence-backed brief before each date, and refreshes that brief as new customer activity arrives. Your work is reviewing briefs, steering the approach, and recording outcomes.If Renewals is missing from your sidebar, see Responsibilities for workspace availability. Customer profiles can still show renewal dates.
CRM connected (Salesforce, HubSpot, or Attio) with pipeline mapping finished
Renewal opportunities become cycles automatically — deduplicated against the CRM record; the mapping covers renewal stages, won/lost outcomes, and the field carrying the renewal date
Billing connected (Stripe)
Billing status on the account; billing-confirmed outcomes
Responsibilities → Renewals lists upcoming and overdue cycles — the planning view for the whole renewal book: dates, values, readiness (On track, Needs attention, At risk, Unknown), and brief state. Renewals that need a person — a brief awaiting review, a milestone reached, an unresolved risk — also appear in Attention, which is where day-to-day review happens.
Fictional example — Northwind Retail (northwindretail.example), $36k ARR, renewing in 40 days:
1
The cycle appears
A renewal opportunity in your CRM becomes a cycle in the portfolio — or you create it manually. A cycle carries a renewal date (CRM-sourced dates stay distinguishable from manual overrides), an optional notice deadline — the last day to cancel without auto-renewing — and an outcome once it resolves.
2
The brief is prepared
Before the date, Outlit investigates the account and prepares a renewal brief — checked by Outlit before it’s published as the cycle’s current approved brief. When a new brief is approved, it supersedes the previous one; earlier versions stay under Previous assessments so you can see how the read has moved.
3
An attention item arrives
When the renewal needs a person — a milestone reached or new risk — it lands in Attention as a Renewal item with the date front and center.
A renewal card puts the due date and priority up front. Fictional demo data.
4
Read the brief
Open the renewal — from Attention or the portfolio — for the full workspace. The approved brief covers:
Executive synthesis — the renewal in a paragraph
Value and adoption — usage and value evidence
Stakeholders and sentiment — who’s involved and how they lean
Commercial and procurement — contract, terms, and buying-process context
Risks, Opportunities, Unknowns — keyed findings with evidence
Key evidence — the source records the brief rests on, with provenance
For Northwind, the brief might flag that the champion changed roles in September and procurement started a security review — findings carry their supporting evidence. A linked churn case appears alongside when the account has one open, and a prior-deal comparison shows how this renewal compares to the customer’s previous deal where history exists.
5
Choose the approach
Below the brief, check what Outlit proposes — for example, reconfirm the new budget owner before the notice deadline — with steps marked as recommendations or actions, where a proposal exists. Pick it, pick an alternative, or switch later if the next call changes the picture.The page also shows freshness — when a brief is scheduled, being prepared, may be stale, or delayed — and you can force a refresh with Request brief now.
6
Review outbound work
Any email in the plan is drafted for your review — edit and approve before it sends via Gmail. See Actions and approvals.
7
Record the outcome
When the deal resolves: link the closing CRM opportunity, or set Renewed / Not renewed manually. Outcome sources — CRM, manual, or billing-confirmed — are kept distinct so the record shows how you know.
Workspace members with customer-management permission can:
Request brief now — refresh the brief on demand (the freshness label shows when the last one was prepared)
Set the notice deadline — the auto-renew cutoff, separately from the renewal date
Override the renewal date — correct a CRM date in Outlit without touching the CRM; the source date stays visible and your override wins for planning and milestones
Create or edit a manual cycle — for renewals that never lived in the CRM
Void a cycle — for a renewal that isn’t real (duplicate, cancelled contract); voided cycles are excluded, not deleted
Resolve attention — close the item with a note when no further work is needed
New customer calls trigger a fresh look at the approach automatically — one recheck after each new call, no request needed. After a call syncs (Granola, Gong, Fireflies, or a logged meeting), review the updated approach before you approve any outbound step.
Confirm a CRM is connected and its pipeline mapping is finished — renewal stages, won/lost outcomes, and the renewal-date field. If mapping is done and the list is still empty, check that the deals actually carry valid dates in the mapped field. Or create a manual cycle on any customer to prove the loop end to end.
A specific renewal isn't tracked
For CRM renewals, the opportunity must exist in the synced CRM, map to a renewal stage, and carry a valid value in the mapped renewal-date field — check the CRM connection’s pipeline mapping. For anything outside the CRM, create a manual cycle on the customer.
The date is wrong
Use the renewal date override on the cycle — the CRM source date stays visible, and your override wins for planning and milestones.
The brief looks stale or thin
Check the freshness label at the top of the detail page, then Request brief now. Thin briefs usually mean thin sources — the customer’s Coverage tab shows which systems this account actually has data from.
A renewal closed but still shows open
Check whether the CRM opportunity’s closed stage maps correctly, then link the outcome opportunity or set the outcome manually.
