Skip to content

Giving a client a portal

Creating a read-only portal link for a client, choosing which of the four sections they can see, and why approving is not one of the things they can do there.

Updated

A client portal is a standing, read-only window onto one client's own work. They open a link, optionally enter a passphrase, and see only the sections you granted.

There are exactly four sections: content, approvals, calendar and reports. A section you did not grant is absent from the page entirely rather than shown empty, so a client never wonders whether there is nothing there or nothing shared.

The portal is read only by design. It shows where approvals stand; it does not carry a decision. Deciding happens through a review link for a specific item, which records exactly which version the client saw.

BEFORE YOU START

  • The "administer" permission on the organisation, which is what creating and revoking a portal grant needs.
  • A client to prepare it for, and a decision about which sections they should see.
  • Your white-label branding set up, if you want the portal to carry your brand rather than the product's.

STEPS

  1. Open White label, or go to /app/white-label, and find the client portal grants panel.
  2. Create a grant: name the client, choose the sections, set an expiry, and add a passphrase if you want one.
  3. Copy the link. It is shown once.
  4. Send it to your client yourself.
  5. Revoke a grant from the same panel when the engagement ends. Revocation takes effect immediately.

WHAT YOU SHOULD SEE

Your client sees a page headed with their own name, prepared for them, saying how long the link works. Where you have set white-label branding, they see your brand name, logo, colour and support email rather than the product's.

WHAT THIS WILL NOT DO

  • It will not let a client approve. The approvals section says so: to approve or request changes, use the review link sent for that item, because that records exactly which version they saw.
  • It will not show content bodies. The content section lists items and their state, not their text.
  • It will not show your whole calendar. The window is fixed at thirty days back and sixty days forward.
  • It will not list more than fifty rows in any section, and it says how many of the total it is showing.
  • It will not carry your brand into email. There is no mail layer in this product, so nothing is sent under anyone's brand.

WORTH KNOWING

The report section offers a download. It is the only place in the product where a report can be exported to a file, and the file carries your branding and no product attribution. It states plainly that platforms which are not connected, or which have not reported, are not included.

IF IT DOES NOT WORK

  • "The link has expired. Ask your agency contact to send a new one." and "Access through this link was withdrawn. Ask your agency contact if you still need it." are the two dead-link states.
  • "We could not find that link. Check you copied all of it." usually means a truncated paste.
  • "That passphrase is not correct." is checked on the server.
  • "Something went wrong at our end, so nothing can be shown right now. Your link is fine - please try again in a moment." means the failure was ours, not the link's.
  • "Results have been measured for your account, but none of the totals came through in a form this page can read." means the report exists but did not arrive intact. Do not read it as no results.
  • "That report could not be downloaded. Refresh the page and try again."

COMMON QUESTIONS

Can I give a client a portal and an approval link at once?

Yes. They serve different purposes: the portal is standing and read only, and an approval link is for one item and one decision.

Is a portal view recorded?

Yes. Every view and every report export is written to the audit trail.

Does the client need an account?

No. The link and the passphrase are the whole of it.

  • Sending work out for review

    Creating a no-login review link for someone outside Social Studio, what the three scopes allow, and what a guest reviewer sees when the content has moved on.

  • Putting your brand in front of clients

    Setting your brand name, logo, colour and support email for the surfaces clients see, and an exact account of which surfaces carry your branding and which do not.

  • Reading your reporting

    What the workspace report totals, why a figure can say "Not reported" instead of zero, and the two ways a figure reaches it.