How to hand off a Squarespace website to a client.

Decide Who Owns the Site

Settle this before you start building, not on launch day. There are two common setups. In the first, you build the site under your own Squarespace account and transfer ownership to the client at the end. In the second, the client starts the site and invites you as an administrator, so it's theirs from the start.

Building under your account is more common, because you control the trial and the timing, and Squarespace Circle partners need to start the trial themselves to get referral credit. Squarespace's own guidance for building sites for clients is to agree early who will take over the site and then transfer ownership to that person.

Whichever you choose, the owner should be someone at the client's business who will still be there in three years. A personal email that belongs to an employee who might leave is a common reason a business loses control of its own website.

Transfer Ownership, Step by Step

Only the current owner can transfer a Squarespace site. Before you do, the new owner has to be a contributor on the site and has to have accepted the invitation. If they haven't, start with giving the client access, then come back here.

1. Open the Permissions & Ownership panel.
2. Click your name under Owner.
3. Click Transfer Ownership.
4. Verify your account by logging in when prompted.
5. Choose the new owner from the dropdown.
6. Click Continue, then Confirm.

The transfer moves more than the site. It also moves the site's subscriptions, any Squarespace domains connected to it, and any Acuity Scheduling subscription attached to it.

What the New Owner Has to Do Next

The transfer doesn't finish the job. Squarespace lists several things the new owner should do afterward, and it's worth doing them together on a call rather than leaving them in an email:

• Update the billing information, so the previous owner isn't charged when the site renews. If you paid for the plan during the build, this is the step that stops your card being used for the client's site.
• Change the contact email on any Squarespace domain connected to the site.
• Update Squarespace Payments account details, if the site uses them.
• Remove the previous owner as a contributor, or reduce their permissions if they still need to work on the site.

If you're staying on to maintain the site, the last step is where you ask for the access you'll need. Administrator lets you keep making design changes; Website editor doesn't. Write down what you agreed so nobody is surprised later.

A website subscription can't be moved from one site to another in Squarespace. Make sure the plan you're paying for is on the site you're actually handing over, not a draft or duplicate.

A Handoff Checklist

Run through this before you send the "it's yours" email:

• Final sign-off received in writing on the design and content. See how to get client approval.
• Every placeholder replaced: lorem ipsum, stock photos you meant to swap, demo products, test blog posts.
• Forms tested and going to the client's email, not yours.
• Site title, browser icon, social sharing image and SEO titles and descriptions set.
• Domain connected and the site is set to public.
• Third-party accounts (email marketing, booking, analytics) moved to the client's logins, not yours.
• Your own access set to what you agreed: administrator, Website editor, or removed.
• A short handover document: where things live, how to edit the common pages, and who to contact for what.

Train the Client, Briefly

Most clients want to do three or four things themselves: change opening hours, swap a photo, add a blog post, update a price. A 20-minute screen share covering exactly those tasks is worth more than a long manual. Record it so they can watch it again.

End the call by saying clearly what happens next. Is there a bug-fix window, and how long is it? Are further changes paid, and at what rate? Is there a website care plan they can sign up to? Clients who know the answer to "what if I need something changed?" don't send it as a 10pm text.

Common Handoff Mistakes

Most handoff problems show up months later, when something renews or breaks and nobody knows who's responsible. The usual causes:

• Transferring ownership to a personal email that belongs to one employee, instead of an address the business controls.
• Leaving your card on the subscription, so you pay for the client's renewal or the site lapses when your card expires.
• Forms, email marketing and analytics still tied to your accounts, so leads and data quietly go to you.
• Keeping administrator access with no agreement about what you'll do with it, which leaves the client unsure whether you're still responsible for the site.
• No written note of what was handed over, so a later dispute comes down to memory.

Each of these takes a minute to prevent on handoff day and an afternoon to untangle later. Put them on your checklist, and tick them off with the client watching.

Where Bridge Fits

Bridge has nothing to do with the ownership transfer itself. That happens entirely in Squarespace. Where it helps is after the handoff, when the client starts asking for changes. If the Bridge Code is in the site's Header Code Injection, the widget stays in the client's Squarespace editor after the transfer, so they can pin a request to the spot on the page and you get a task with a screenshot and their browser and screen size.

For paid changes after launch, each task can be marked No cost, Fixed cost or Hourly, and the client pays from the widget or the client portal through your own Stripe account. See client payments. One thing to check at handoff: the client's plan has to include Code Injection for the widget to keep working.

Common Questions

Related Reading

• How to give a client access to Squarespace
• How to run a Squarespace website care plan
• How to get paid for website change requests
• What is a website care plan?