SaffireTix Onboarding

We're excited to be partnering with you & your team! We'll be working closely with you to ensure you learn all the features and benefits of the Saffire ticketing platform. 

There's a lot to know, but with help from your Ticketing Account Manager (TAM) and the rest of the Saffire team, we're positive you'll be confident when using the tools & functionality available within our software. 

This article covers several things you need to know right away...

Timeline

Getting started with a new ticketing site is both exciting and intimidating. But there's no need to stress - the Saffire team follows a time-tested process to guide you from dream to reality. Here's what to expect...

1. We kick things off by creating a 'starter' site which includes all the tools you'll need for building ticket products. Your TAM will back up the courses in the self-paced training you just started with regular calls and personalized instruction.
2. Our creative team will refer to your core site to create a custom theme for your starter site. We'll have that applied within a couple of weeks.  
3. Your Client Experience Manager (CXM) will work with you to get the payment gateway and site URL established.
4. Once the new theme is applied, payment gateway is installed & tested, Google Analytics is integrated, and the URL is established, your ticketing site will be ready for action... almost. You'll still need to add products to the tickets page. Your TAM and CXM will help with that.
5. Roughly two weeks in, we'll present a design mockup and work with you through a couple of revisions (if needed) to refine the design and get your approval. 
6. Once approved, the design moves to our theme production queue. Development will take roughly four weeks
7. While the site design is in production, you'll be migrating content to the 'starter' site with the goal of completing everything by the time your theme is applied.
8. That takes us to the final audit of your new site. Your team and ours will check the theme and content to ensure everything is in place. Then, with your approval, it can go live!

DNS

This is a key piece in launching your new site, so we bring it to your attention right from the get-go. To help you understand how important this is, here's some basic info:

The Domain Name System (DNS) is a network of directories on the internet that translate URLs - such as Wikipedia.com - into IP addresses. The IP (internet protocol) address is what web browsers use to locate every site. So, before your Saffire site can go live we need to update the DNS Name Servers for your domain. 

There are two options for how we can handle this...

1. You can provide us with direct access to your name servers. The necessary credentials we'll need include the URL of your name server account, username & password.
2. OR, you can put us in touch with the person who manages your domain and they can make the changes we need. This is often an IT person who may be on your staff, or it could be with the company currently hosting your site.

One more thing: the name servers are often handled by the registrar of your domain... but not always. Because sites tend to change hosts from time to time, the name servers may have been separated from the registrar (for a variety of reasons). We can check where your domain is registered and which name servers are in use by searching for your domain on this site: https://www.whois.com/whois.

Google Analytics

Saffire includes Google Analytics (GA) code on your site to keep an eye on incoming traffic. It's far more than just a 'watchdog' - GA can be an incredibly valuable tool for analyzing who your customers are, where they're located, and how they use your site. 

If you have an existing GA account we'll use the same code - you'll just need to add Saffire as an admin to ensure the proper setup. Here's what we need:

If we're building an all-new site for you or if you haven't been using GA on your existing site, we'll create a new account for you and set you up as an admin. If you're unfamiliar with GA, here are a couple of articles which might interest you (these are not affiliated with or endorsed by Saffire):

Beginner's guide to Google Analytics

Using Google Analytics 4

Payment Gateway

If you're planning to sell anything directly from your new website, a Saffire compatible online payment gateway is essential. It's required for processing any type of ecommerce transactions, whether for paid registrations or selling anything from t-shirts to tickets. 

Please review our list of Compatible Gateways to see if you're already using one supported by our platform, or to compare and decide which gateway works best for your organization. Then work with your Client Experience Manager to initiate the setup.