Frequently Asked Questions

Our analytics dashboard provides comprehensive insights into your visitors' search behavior:

• Search volume: Track total searches over time with detailed charts showing daily, weekly, and monthly trends
• Popular search terms: See exactly what your visitors are searching for, ranked by frequency
• Click tracking: Monitor which search results get clicked, helping you understand content relevance
• Search patterns: Identify peak search times and seasonal trends
• Content gaps: Discover what visitors search for but don't find, revealing content opportunities

All analytics are updated in real-time and available instantly in your dashboard.

Search analytics provide actionable insights for content creators:

• Content prioritization: Focus on topics your audience actively searches for
• SEO opportunities: Identify high-intent search terms to target in new content
• Content gaps: Find searches with no or poor results, revealing content opportunities
• Audience interests: Understand evolving reader interests and trending topics
• Content performance: See which existing content gets found and clicked in search

This data-driven approach helps you create content that your audience actually wants to find.

Usage limits are calculated on a rolling 30-day basis, not by calendar month. This means the system continually monitors your usage over the most recent 30 days.

If at any point your search volume or indexed document count exceeds your plan's quota during this rolling window, you'll receive a notification to upgrade. You'll have a 7-day grace period to select a higher tier.

This approach ensures your search functionality remains reliable as your site grows, without unexpected interruptions at month boundaries.

If you exceed either your search request quota or indexed document limit:

1. You'll receive an email notification about the overage
2. You'll have a 7-day grace period to upgrade to a higher tier
3. During this grace period, your service continues without interruption
4. Usage during the grace period is billed at the next tier's rate

We don't immediately throttle or cut off service when you hit limits, giving you time to choose the right upgrade path for your needs.

We offer two billing cycle options:

• Monthly: Billed every month on your signup date
• Yearly: Billed annually at a discounted rate (saving you up to 20% compared to monthly billing)

If you choose yearly billing, you'll be charged once per year, with service continuing uninterrupted until the next annual renewal date.

When upgrading or downgrading:

• Upgrades take effect immediately with prorated charges
• Downgrades take effect at the end of your current billing period

We offer a 30-day free trial for new customers:

• Full access to all features during the trial period
• Ability to switch plans during the trial without restarting the trial period
• You'll receive a reminder email before your trial ends
• If you don't cancel before the trial ends, you'll be automatically charged for the selected plan
• If you choose to cancel before the trial ends, your search functionality will be disabled at the end of the trial

The free trial is available once per person, business, or organization. After the trial ends, you can choose any plan that fits your needs.

We take data security and privacy seriously:

• Content from your Ghost site is stored in secure cloud infrastructure in the United States
• All data is transmitted using TLS 1.2+ encryption
• Server-side AES-256 encryption is used for backups
• Content is indexed for search purposes only and is not used for any other purposes
• When you delete your search instance, indexed content is immediately removed; any remaining analytics data and backups are purged within 30 days

For international customers, data transfers comply with applicable regulations through EU-US Data Privacy Framework certification and Standard Contractual Clauses.

For complete details, please see our Privacy Policy.

Instant Search is designed to work with all standard Ghost themes. We've specifically tested and confirmed compatibility with:

Our search integration works as a drop-in replacement for Ghost's native search with minimal configuration. If you're using a custom theme or have heavily modified your theme, our support team can help with integration.

Our system automatically indexes your Ghost content:

• Initial setup: When you first create your search instance, we automatically index all your existing content
• Ongoing updates: New or modified content is detected and indexed automatically, typically within minutes
• Deleted content: When you delete posts or pages, they're automatically removed from the search index

We index the following content types:

• Posts (including featured posts)
• Pages
• Titles, tags, authors, and full content
• Custom metadata and excerpts

All of this happens automatically without any manual intervention needed from you.

Our search solution offers several advanced features not available in Ghost's native search:

• Complete search analytics: Track search volume, popular terms, click-through rates, and user behavior patterns—something Ghost's native search can't provide
• Full-text search: Searches entire post content, not just titles and excerpts
• Unlimited content: No limitation on the number of posts that can be indexed (Ghost's native search has a fixed limit)
• Typo tolerance: Automatically corrects for misspellings and typos
• Advanced search capabilities: Server-side search reduces browser load and supports more complex queries
• Content prioritization: Ability to boost featured posts in search results
• Real-time indexing: Content updates are reflected immediately in search results

The analytics capabilities alone provide insights that are impossible to get with Ghost's native search, helping you understand your audience and improve your content strategy.

Yes, you can cancel your subscription at any time through your dashboard:

• When you cancel, your subscription remains active until the end of your current billing period
• You won't be charged again after cancellation
• Your search functionality will continue to work until the end of your paid period
• After your subscription ends, the search functionality will be disabled on your site

There are no cancellation fees or penalties. If you decide to resubscribe later, you can pick up where you left off at any time.

Setting up Instant Search for your Ghost site takes less than 5 minutes:

1. Create an account and select your plan
2. Connect your Ghost site — we'll show you exactly how to get this
3. Copy our generated search code snippet
4. Paste the snippet into your Ghost admin (we provide step-by-step instructions)

That's it! The system will automatically index your content and the search functionality will be live on your site. No coding skills are required for the standard integration.

If you need assistance, our support team is available to help with the setup process.

None! Once set up, the system is completely maintenance-free:

• Content indexing happens automatically
• Updates and improvements to the search engine are deployed transparently
• No server management or configuration needed
• No plugins to update

You can continue focusing on creating great content while we ensure your search functionality works flawlessly.