PSI Manado
Built and managed the official website for Partai Solidaritas Indonesia (PSI) Manado branch, from server setup to custom CMS theming.
- Role
- Webmaster & Developer
- Timeline
- Jan — Mar 2023
- Type
- Client Work
- Team
- Independent (Solo)
This website is no longer active. The domain psimanado.com has been taken over by an unrelated third party and is no longer managed by PSI Manado or the original developer. The archived version linked above reflects the site as it existed during the project period. Any current content on that domain is not associated with this project.
Partai Solidaritas Indonesia (PSI) Manado, a regional branch of the Indonesian political party, had no official website. Without an online presence, the party had no digital channel to communicate their programs, introduce their candidates to voters, or publish news and updates. In the lead-up to the 2024 general elections, this gap was becoming a real liability for voter outreach and organizational credibility.
The stakeholder needed a full website solution: not just a design, but the entire technical infrastructure, from domain and hosting to a content management system that non-technical staff could update independently.
I handled the full server-side setup from scratch: provisioning the hosting environment, installing and configuring Ghost CMS, connecting the psimanado.com domain via Cloudflare, and setting up DNS records for both the website and custom email addresses (@psimanado.com). Media assets were stored on S3-compatible object storage to offload storage from the VPS and ensure fast delivery. Caching rules were configured through Cloudflare to ensure fast page loads and stable uptime.
Starting from a premium Ghost theme as the base, I customized the template extensively using Handlebars, HTML, and CSS to match PSI's brand identity. The red and white color scheme was aligned with the party's official branding. Custom features included a hero carousel for campaign announcements, a sidebar section displaying party members (kader) with their district assignments, and a registration button for voter engagement.
The navigation was structured by electoral district (Bunaken, Bunaken Kepulauan, Malalayang, Mapanget, Paal Dua, Sario, Singkil, Tikala, Tuminting, Wanea, Wenang), allowing visitors to find their local representatives and news quickly. The content management was set up so that party staff could publish articles, news updates, and event announcements independently through Ghost's editor without any technical knowledge.
I implemented basic on-page SEO: proper meta titles and descriptions, semantic heading hierarchy, image alt attributes, and clean URL structures per district. Technical SEO measures included sitemap generation, robots.txt configuration, and Cloudflare performance optimization. The goal was to ensure PSI Manado appeared in local search results when voters searched for party information in the Manado region.
- Districts Covered
- 11
- Systems Managed
- 6
- Time to Launch
- 3 Mo
The website established PSI Manado's first official online presence ahead of the 2024 elections. Party staff published content independently through Ghost's editor without developer intervention.
This project taught me the value of choosing the right CMS for the audience. Ghost's clean editor empowered non-technical party staff to maintain the site without developer intervention, which was critical for a political organization that needed to publish time-sensitive content during campaign season.
If I were to revisit this project, I would formalize a handoff checklist that includes domain renewal reminders and a maintenance guide for the client's team. While the server infrastructure was fully under my control, the domain was managed under the client's own account. Its eventual expiration reinforced the importance of educating non-technical stakeholders on ongoing infrastructure obligations, particularly domain renewals, that fall outside the developer's scope but directly impact the project's longevity.