Firstly, if you haven’t already, download yourself a copy of my guide “Getting started on the Internet”. (Previously called “Understanding websites”.) I wrote it for my friend who was giving up full time employment to go self-employed, and was always texting me new dilemmas. So it’s a combination of the EXACT questions you’re asking yourself (or confusedly asking Google and ChatGPT) and what I know people often misunderstand (I’ve been making websites for over 20 years).

In my guide, I explain the difference between a website a developer codes for you, and one you pay for monthly as a “hosted solution”. Here’s the link to the big report I mention where we’ve compared all the leading website builders for you.

You can actually do this before you set up your website if you want to know you’ve gotten the ball rolling.

This has been a SEO nice-to-have for over a decade, but now it’s actually really important to help LLMs (large language models – AKA AI) understand your business. Ideally you code this into your website, but if you can’t code, then our tool AIProfiles lets you create structured data you can link to from your website in just a few minutes, by filling in a form with some details about you and your company. Use code GETSTART to get it for £24pa (which is 60% off). If you haven’t read the guide above (which you really should) you can read more about structured data here.

Yes I gave that a short title, because yes, you can just “learn” SEO. It’s not rocket science, I think a lot of it is actually quite instinctive once you’re in the swing of it. There is “technical SEO” which, as the name suggests, is quite technical, but there’s still an awful lot you can do yourself (technical SEO you won’t really be able to do much about on a hosted solution like SquareSpace).

I’ve taught SEO for almost 20 years and I finally (in 2025) got around to putting my training online so you can buy it as an e-book. It is honestly the most detailed SEO course I’ve seen available – and I often buy other people’s in order to benchmark. And I’m ALWAYS pleasantly surprised.

(Should you do SEO training before you set up your website so you can set it up with SEO in mind? Hmmm there would be benefits – but if you try to learn everything there is to learn before you take action you’ll never launch your site. And things will make more sense once you can see them in context.)

Yey! New for 2025/26 – something else to concern yourself with – what ChatGPT wants you to do in order for it to mention you. But have no fears, I’ve put together a mahoosive (well, 33 pages) free guide about that too.

Spoiler alert – this has a lot in common with SEO, as GoogleBot is just a robot too. But there are some big shifts – such as citations matter more than link backs for AI. But read it all in the guide – it’s super easy to digest, I promise.

In my 20+ years of making websites, it’s safe to say I’ve seen a few recurring issues with websites. I still have clients who let their domain names expire by accident! Plus, just making sure your website is reliably online as much as possible is SUPER important for SEO and AI – Google won’t rank a site highly if it can’t depend on it being available.

We’ve built various inhouse monitoring tools over the decades for our clients, but we’ve now brought that all together into one service that anyone can sign up to (there’s a free tier). SiteVitals lets you know the important bits of your website – such as speed, security, SEO and all round integrity – are being monitored and you’ll be alerted if there’s anything you need to know about.

I hope you’re gonna want to do this step – and it’s the easiest one of all. Just stay in touch! Make sure you’re following me on LinkedIn and/or Instagram, and stay subscribed to my newsletter (sign up here if you’ve landed on this page without downloading a guide).

Each week I email something actually, genuinely useful which you can normally implement or check on your site in a few minutes, and you’ll be the first to hear about my free talks and Masterclasses. I hope to see you at one, one day!