How to use AI to Build a Website FAST

Automation saves us time and effort. It washes the dishes, finds the cheapest flights – and now AI builds websites. It’s possible to use artificial intelligence (more accurately named “machine learning”) to carry out parts of the web design process. Or even do the entire thing.

In this guide, we’re going to look at ways to instruct computer programs to make a website. Even easier than using a drag-and-drop tool, AI simply interprets your instructions and brings your ideas to life.

Web design is about to get a whole lot faster.

Best AI Website Builders

Here’s a quick rundown of the essential AI toolkit for building a website.

ChatGPT

Ask questions over instant messenger and get speedy answers in plain English. You can ask for a range of website-related help such as layout design or custom code for adding a chatbot. ChatGPT is the ideal way to use AI to write blog posts.

Midjourney

Get unique computer-generated images of anything you can imagine, including AI web design. Specify the style, mood, characters, colors, and backdrop, and Midjourney will conjure up some designs for you.

GoDaddy

Answer a couple of quiz questions and GoDaddy’s AI creates a fully designed website for you to edit as you need.

Wix

Select from multiple choice questions, and Wix‘s web design artificial intelligence will pull together a custom website. For instance, if your website is for a restaurant, Wix will recommend its menu, reservations, and food delivery functions.

Using ChatGPT to Build a Website

If you want to know exactly what ChatGPT is, you can check out the FAQ section at the end. But for now, we’re going to look at how to use it. ChatGPT can carry out a staggering range of website building tasks, including:

• Writing code to build the website framework (it knows over 10 programming languages)
• Customizing a content management system (CMS) such as WordPress
• Creating a content plan for blog posts
• Composing text (homepage, product descriptions, articles…)
• Building APIs to connect external programs to your website
• Advising on any aspect of making a website

First, you need to create an account on chat.openai.com. Then you’re ready to start typing in your first question. You continue the conversation just like instant chat messenger. Feel free to use shortcuts like, “Can you give me more examples?” or “Explain that in a more simple way.”

Sounds impressive, right? Now you won’t need to learn any coding at all, it’s just a simple matter of copy and paste! Wrong. When I asked ChatGPT which website builder tasks it could carry out, it initially produced an impressive list. But when challenged, its answers quickly scaled back its ambitious claims. (Ever had that experience with a contractor? Sigh, even the robots are capable of overselling their talents).

For example, ChatGPT boldly promised: “I can help with website security by… implementing SSL certificates.” But when I asked if it could issue me with a valid SSL certificate, it responded that of course it couldn’t, because I’d need to go through the proper verification process. So I asked if it could install my SSL certificate, and the response was no because it can’t access my server.

Playing it pretty fast and loose with the definition of “implementing”, aren’t we, ChatGPT? Instead, the bot helpfully offered a six-step process outlining how I could do it all myself. Which brings us to the main takeaway about ChatGPT: it’s a virtual assistant, and a more precise version of a search engine tool.

Example: Building a Cryptocurrency Landing Page

When I asked ChatGPT to write me code I can use in WordPress for a website landing page, it did just that… With a few caveats. Here’s what I learned about using ChatGPT to write code:

Benefits

1. It’s incredibly fast. I only had to wait about a minute as lines of code appeared before my eyes. That’s a lot faster than the week’s delivery time it could take for a web designer. That’s after you’ve spent time researching and interviewing a few different people.
2. It works how I want it to. The landing page text was divided into headings, so it was clear to read. It’s also immediately clear to search engine crawlers what the structure of the page is. That’s great for SEO (meaning a better chance of search engine users clicking through to my website).
3. Results were intuitive. The style of the text for my webpage was enticing: you can use my app to “Trade cryptocurrencies with ease” and click a link to “Sign up today!”. The AI interpreted my request as business-related, and gave me a web page which would actively encourage users to believe in my product. It listed the top three benefits of my app and it even offered a $10 free credit sign up deal.
4. It was extremely easy. I gave it sixteen words to go off, and it creatively generated my landing page for “a new cryptocurrency exchange app”.
5. Oh, and it was free. I paid $0 for this handy service.

Drawbacks

1. It’s full of lies. Like a lot of good marketing material, the advertisement for my product had nothing to do with the product itself. It sounded amazing but was based on no facts at all. So it’s very tempting to use the text exactly as it is because it sounds so compelling. However, I’m going to have to rewrite it all to reflect the product as it truly is.
2. It used an image that doesn’t exist. The example image comes up on the preview as broken because… there’s no image there. Perhaps this is a good thing – or we get into debates about copyright. But it’s another thing I’ll have to go in and manually change.
3. I need to dig into the code myself. In order to edit the bits that are wrong, I’ll need to understand exactly where and how to change the lines of code that pertain to various parts of the website. Or pay someone who does.
4. It hasn’t built me a website. Of course it hasn’t, because there’s more to getting a website live on the web than generating the code to a landing page.

Looks like we’ve still got some more work to do before our website is complete. Let’s consider some other AI tools for web design.

Using Midjourney to Build a Website

Instead of using a search engine to browse web design ideas, you can now use AI to create brand new ones from scratch. An exciting free tool called Midjourney is quick to get started with, and produces images based off phrases you type in.

Unlike ChatGPT, it won’t have a conversation with you, but as it’s based on Discord (a chatroom website), Midjourney results are instantly shared with everyone else in the same webchat. That means you can build on the designs of others, discuss troubleshooting with fellow users, or simply browse new and existing creations.

Now, the image quality isn’t the highest, so don’t expect to be able to upload these images straight to the web. Instead, your best bet is to use the layouts as design inspiration to emulate when you create the website yourself.

You’ll likely have to go through several versions of your generated design to get to one you like best. Once you’ve done this, YouTuber Levi Hagen suggests mimicking the positioning of images and words with a separate website builder tool called Elementor. That requires getting hands-on with a more technically challenging program.

So let’s look into our final option for an easier workaround.

AI Website Builders: Wix, GoDaddy

A couple of the mainstream website builders (namely, Wix and GoDaddy) can create automated designs based on your preferences. Known as “Artificial Design Intelligence (ADI),” the tools conjure up a website inspired by your answers to some multiple choice questions. It’s the online equivalent of sitting with a human web designer, having a quick conversation, and reviewing their design proofs.

Here’s a summary of the pros and cons of ADI:

Example: Making a Website for Pet Boarding Services

On the GoDaddy website, under “Websites & Hosting,” I selected “Online Store” as my choice of website type. Then I answered some simple questions including “What are your main goals?” (I answered: “Sell goods and services,” “Let customers book appointments,” and “Share info about my business.”)

After around five questions, the engine took two minutes to load. I then entered a simple dashboard, where I clicked “Edit my website” to see the results. I was impressed with the design: eye-catching images of animals (precisely related to my business niche), a snappy headline (“Your Furry Friend’s Home Away from Home”), and even a pricing section with suggested services.

What’s particularly good about GoDaddy ADI’s auto-generated text is it contains questions. For example: “What benefits can pets experience when they’re in your care? Do you offer playtime or grooming services?” This is a helpful reminder that the placeholder text needs updating to make it specific to my business. It’s then less likely I’ll accidentally leave the generic machine-written words on the live site.

We rated it 4.1/5 overall in our GoDaddy review, thanks in part to how easy it is to use.

Wix works in a similar way, with almost twice as many price plans as GoDaddy – all of them with the option of AI web design. I found the services Wix AI suggested were not highly relevant for my pet care business.

Though I typed in “Pet Sitter”, I was offered “Group Trainings”, “Online Meeting”, and “Consultation” as possible options to add to my site. For instance, there were no options to book pet boarding, day care, or pet services of any kind.

When I tried again with “Pet Care Provider”, I got some more closely related results (such as “Dog Walking”). Though I was a little surprised to see “Sea Turtle Snorkling Hour” on offer.

The lesson is AI is not yet perfect, but tools like Wix speed up the web design journey.

Pros and Cons of Using AI to Generate a Website

Around one in four Americans interact with AI several times a day. And website creation is another area where the robots are taking over helping out. We’ll go through some pros and cons of using AI to build a website, now.

✅ Save money on web designers

Everyone is looking to cut costs these days. And with inflation between 5-9% this past year, it makes perfect sense to save a few bucks where you can. The cost of a website built by a designer can easily surpass $20,000. Now imagine what else you could put that money towards. Interested in AI tools now? I bet you are.

✅ Gather wider inspiration

Unless you’re particularly gifted, it can be hard to come up with a bunch of creative ideas. When it comes to website design, it might not even be a topic you find exciting even in the slightest. It’s not like we’re asking you to design donut flavors (strawberry rainbow sprinkles, anyone?).

With AI, you can benefit from a fountain of ideas that never runs dry. All you have to do is ask.

❌ Results can be a bit… meh

AI tools are not incredible. A lot of them are great – and technology is certainly now achieving what we could once only have dreamt of. But a common criticism of AI-generated work is that it’s generic, hackneyed, and… well, robotic. We’ll look at overcoming that, further down.

❌ You’re still going to have to do some work

If you use AI to write blog posts, be warned they could contain inaccuracies (read: lies). It’s possible your website could be de-listed from Google search results if it looks like you’re using AI to publish spam content.

Work (Artificially) Smart, Not Hard

Website creation is just one more area of life that AI is taking away jobs making much easier. And best of all, many of these tools are open-source, so they’re freely available for everyone to use. The main drawback, of course, is the risk of publishing content that doesn’t truly reflect your business. So make sure you proof read twice just to be sure.

Remember, though, no matter how you build it, you still need to plan for website maintenance costs down the line. But if you ask ChatGPT nicely, I’m sure it will help you draw up a budget for that too.