🔥 Firetail Hosting Ghost Website Onboarding Guide
This detailed onboarding guide will ensure you're prepared and confident for meetings about setting up your Ghost websites. It clearly explains every aspect the client must provide or consider, along with cost implications.
1. 🌐 Domain Management
Clients have two choices for domain management:
- Managed Domain (Recommended)
- Managed through Cloudflare (DDoS protection, CDN, SSL, security)
- Con: Client must contact support for DNS changes.
- Client-Managed Domain
- Client controls DNS fully, we provide necessary records.
No extra charge for managed domains; best suited for clients wanting minimal involvement.
2. 🎨 Branding & Company Info
Required Assets (Extra Cost if Missing)
- Logos: Vector (.svg), High-res (.png), Low-res (.jpg)
- Brand Identity: Colors (HEX/RGB), Fonts
Required Legal & Brand Content (Extra Cost if Missing)
- Terms & Conditions, Privacy Policy
- About Us section, Mission Statement
Brand assets are crucial. Missing files incur extra design costs.
3. 🗂️ Pages & Specific Content
Common Pages (Extra Cost if more than 3 Selected)
- About: Company background, team photos, company mission.
- Services/Features: Detailed descriptions, images/icons.
- Contact: Physical address, phone, email, form specifics.
- FAQ: Common questions with provided answers.
- Testimonials: Client-provided testimonials.
- Pricing: Clear pricing structure provided by client.
- Team/Staff: Bios, headshots, contact details.
- Custom: Need a page that is unique to your business? You can make custom requests for just about anything. (Extra costs apply)
Tags
- Provide initial tag list and short SEO-friendly descriptions.
Content must be provided clearly; missing content may incur additional sourcing costs.
4. 📞 Business Info & Contact Details
- Legal Business Name
- Physical Address (or PO Box)
- Public Email & Phone Number
- Social Media Links (optional)
5. 🎭 Theme Selection
- Free Themes: Casper, Alto, Edition, Dawn, Liebling.
- Premium Themes: Client selects from Ghost Marketplace or ThemeForest. Premium themes incur additional build costs.
6. 📸 Media & Graphic Assets
- Client-provided images: hero images, banners, videos.
- Acceptable formats: jpg, png, webp, mp4.
Limited media provided incurs additional graphic design costs.
7. 📩 Managed Email Sending Tiers (via Mailgun)
- Basic (included): 5,000 emails/month
- Growth: 10,000 emails/month (+$20/month)
- Professional: 25,000 emails/month (+$45/month)
- Business: 50,000 emails/month (+$75/month)
- Enterprise: Over 50,000 emails/month (client-managed recommended)
Higher email volume increases monthly hosting costs.
8. 💾 Managed Hosting & Storage Tiers (AWS EBS)
- Standard (included): 32 GB Storage
- Plus: 64 GB Storage (+$25/month)
- Pro: 128 GB Storage (+$50/month)
- Enterprise: 256 GB+ Custom Pricing
Larger media libraries or storage-heavy sites increase hosting costs.
9. 💾 Ghost Specific Options
- Who can subscribe to your site?
- Anyone can sign up (Recommended)
- Paid members only
- Invite only
- Nobody
- Who can view your posts?
- Anyone
- Members only
- Paid members only
- Paid members on a specific tier only
- Who can comment on posts?
- Everyone (Not recommended)
- Members Only (Recommended)
- Paid Members Only (Recommended)
10. 💾 Security Settings
- Would you like Two Factor Authentication Enforced?
11. 🛠️ Optional Features & Integrations (Extra Build Costs)
- Analytics (Google, Plausible, Fathom)
- E-commerce embeds (Shopify, Gumroad)
- Social embeds (Instagram, Twitter)
- Calendar integrations (Calendly, TidyCal)
- Custom forms, surveys
- Comments system (Disqus, Cove)
🧾 Summary: Cost Breakdown
- Website build costs: Missing branding/media assets, additional pages, premium themes, integrations.
- Monthly hosting costs: Additional email sending, expanded storage needs.
🚀 Why Clients Love Our Approach
- Transparent pricing
- Clear expectations
- Flexible scaling
- No hidden fees
Review this guide before meetings to ensure clarity and confidence in discussing project scope and costs with clients.