How a business rents your site — the self-serve close

What you're doing and why

You've got a ranked site and a shortlist of local businesses that want its leads (that was module 5). Now you need the business to actually say yes and start paying — without you writing a contract, chasing a signature, or manually setting up billing. This is the self-serve close: you send one link, and the business signs and adds a card themselves. When both are done, the site is theirs and their portal invite goes out automatically. You do nothing but send the link.

The exact steps (what the business sees)

1. You share the public sales page: app.rankrentai.com/for-rent/<their-site-domain>. It shows a real screenshot of the site, honest proof (Google rank only if it's page one, leads it's already captured, estimated value), the price, and a big Claim this site button. One business only.
2. They tap Claim this site → a short form (business, name, email, phone). No account needed.
3. They land on the two-step complete page:
   • Sign the rental agreement — we email them a contract (Shiply e-sign). They open it and sign.
   • Add your card — a card form (Stripe). Nothing is charged yet; it's saved for when they go live. The page ticks each step green on its own as they finish — they can do the two in either order.
4. The moment both land — signed and card on file — the deal flips to active, the site flips to rented (so no one else can claim it), and the business gets an email inviting them into their renter portal. You get a "new renter" notification.

Why it's built the way it is

• Screenshot, not a live embed. The microsites block being shown inside another page (X-Frame-Options), so the sales page uses a captured screenshot instead — it also loads instantly and always looks clean.
• Both-gates activation. A site never flips to "rented" on a signature alone or a card alone — it needs both. That check runs from two places at once (the contract-signature cron and the card webhook), and is race-safe so a business can never be double-set-up or double-charged.
• Honest proof only. If the site isn't ranking on page one yet, the page does NOT show the rank number — it says "live on Google" instead. Never oversell; the screenshot + exclusivity carry it.

Gotchas

• Before you share claim links: two setup steps — (1) add your Stripe publishable key so the card form renders, and (2) turn on rate-limiting so the public link can't be abused. Until the publishable key is set, the page shows a friendly "card setup enabled shortly" message instead of the card form (it never breaks).
• The card is saved, not charged. The self-serve close captures a card on file and gets the contract signed — the actual monthly charge is a separate step (billing). Don't promise a business they've been charged; they've committed.
• One business per site, forever. Once a site is rented it shows a "this site is taken" state and the claim button is gone. Re-visits and duplicate/double-clicks can't create a second renter.
• Assisted close. You don't have to make them self-serve — you can agree on the phone and just send them the same link to sign + add their card. Same flow, same result.