Sharing a company’s internal chat with an outside agency or a contractor is always a compromise between convenience and exposure. Zoho Cliq addresses it with Networks, a paid add-on that creates a separate collaboration space alongside the main organisation. Members of a network can be a mix of employees and external people, the network has its own channels, branding and policies, and external members never gain visibility into the parent organisation’s directory or channels. This guide sets one up for a typical case: a hosting company working with a design agency and two freelance developers.
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Short answer: As an organisation admin, open the Cliq Admin Panel, go to Networks and create a new network with a name, logo and optional custom domain, then set its feature and policy toggles, define roles, teams and departments, and add members either by generating an invite link with an expiry and join mode or by bulk-importing a list. Delegate one or more network admins, create the working channels, and add any marketplace apps the network needs. External members must be on the same Zoho data centre as the organisation.
Check prerequisites
Networks is an add-on to the paid Cliq plans and must be enabled on the organisation’s subscription before the menu appears. Only organisation admins can create a network; network admins delegated later can manage it but not create new ones. Every member of a network, internal or external, must have their Zoho account in the same data centre as your organisation, so confirm where the partner’s accounts live before promising them access. Decide in advance which internal staff will join the network, because they will hold two identities in Cliq, their organisation membership and their network membership, and switch between them.
Create and brand the network
In the Admin Panel, choose Networks and create one. Give it a name that identifies the purpose rather than the partner, since a network may outlive one engagement; something like “Agency Projects” ages better than the agency’s own name. Upload a logo and set the accent colours so members can tell at a glance which space they are in, and configure a custom domain if you want invitations and links to carry your own branding. The network description is shown to invitees, so make it explain what the space is for and what is expected of members.
Configure features and policies
The network has its own set of toggles, separate from the organisation’s. Walk through them deliberately: whether members may create channels, whether file sharing and external links are allowed, whether audio and video calls are enabled, message retention, and whether members can see one another’s profiles. For partner networks the sensible defaults are to restrict channel creation to admins, allow file sharing with size limits, and keep retention aligned with your contracts.
Roles, teams and departments come next; create a role for external members with fewer permissions than the internal one, and teams that mirror the projects, so that channel membership can be granted per team rather than per person. Custom user field layouts let you record the partner company and contract end date on each external profile, which is invaluable at offboarding time.
Invite members
There are two routes. Invite links are generated with an expiry date and a join mode, either open joining or admin approval; use approval mode for anything involving customer data and send the link to the partner’s coordinator. Bulk addition takes a list of email addresses and assigns them roles and teams in one operation, which suits onboarding a whole agency at once. Internal staff are added from the organisation directory. After members join, delegate administration to one internal person and, if appropriate, one trusted contact at the partner so day-to-day channel and membership changes do not queue up for the organisation admin.
Channels and apps
Create the working channels inside the network rather than inviting externals into organisation channels. A typical structure is one announcements channel that only admins can post to, a general channel, and one channel per project or ticket queue. Add marketplace apps that the network needs, such as a task or ticketing integration, and keep them scoped to the network; an app authorised at the organisation level is not automatically available inside it. Bots and webhooks configured for the network post only there, which is the point.
Verify and offboard cleanly
Log in as a test external account and confirm it can see the network channels and members, cannot search the parent organisation’s directory, and cannot open organisation channels by link. Check that a file shared in a network channel is not visible from the organisation side. Review the members list monthly and remove externals whose engagement has ended; the contract end date field makes this a simple filter.
The common pitfall is adding an external person to the organisation itself because the network invitation link had expired, which grants far more visibility than intended; regenerate the link instead. For the wider leaver process see Offboarding an employee: checklist for Active Directory, Microsoft 365, Google Workspace and Zoho.
Zoho Cliq Networks at a glance
Official documentation: Zoho Cliq help.
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Frequently asked questions
Does Zoho Cliq Networks work with partners on a different Zoho data centre?
No. All members of a network must have accounts on the same data centre as the organisation that created it, so a partner registered elsewhere would need an account created in your region.
How long does it take to set up a Cliq Network?
Creating the network, setting policies and roles, and generating invitations takes about an hour. Member onboarding depends on how quickly the partner’s people accept, since each must have or create a Zoho account.
Can I undo a network or remove a partner after the project ends?
Yes. Remove individual external members from the network’s member list, which revokes their access immediately, or delete the whole network from the Admin Panel once its channels and files have been exported or archived.