More and more clients are coming to me with a website they built with AI.
They typed a few sentences into an AI website builder, and a few minutes later they had a homepage. A nice one. Good colours, clean layout, a big photo, a button that says “Get started.”
Then they ask me: “Can you do this?”
Yes. For sure I can. And I’m glad they brought it.
Why I like it when you bring me an AI design
An AI mock-up is one of the most useful things a client can hand me.
It shows me the style you like. It shows me the colours, the layout, the feel you’re after. That used to take a few meetings and a stack of “I like this site” links. Now you can just show me.
So this isn’t an article about how AI is bad. It isn’t. Building a site this way is often called “vibe coding,” and it’s genuinely good at some things:
- Trying out a look before you commit to one
- A quick mock-up to show your team or your board
- A one-page site for a short event or a two-week promotion
- Rough first drafts of copy and page structure
If you need a single page that will never change and never collect anything from anyone, a vibe-coded page might be all you need.
The trouble starts when people see that homepage and think the website is finished.
What you see is the small part
A website is a bit like a house. The AI built you a beautiful front room. It didn’t build the foundation, the wiring, the plumbing, or the locks on the doors.
From the street, you can’t tell. Both houses look done.
The folks at WebDevStudios made this point well on a site called It Looks Done. They put a vibe-coded site and a properly built site side by side and walked through a single launch day. Same design, same content. One of them spends the day breaking.
It’s worth a few minutes of your time. Here’s my own take on what sits under the surface, and what it means for a small business.
Can people find you?
A good-looking site doesn’t help if nobody can find it.
Search engines like Google need a map of your site, page titles, descriptions, and a way to understand what each page is about. When you change a page address, the old one needs to send people to the new one. Otherwise every link you’ve earned over the years leads to an error.
And it’s not just Google anymore. More people are asking AI tools like ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude for recommendations: “Who builds websites near me?” Those tools read your site too. They need clear content and a clean structure to understand who you are and what you do. If they can’t make sense of your site, they’ll recommend someone else.
When you share your site on Facebook or LinkedIn, it should show a proper preview with a picture and a title. Not a grey box.
None of that shows up in an AI screenshot. All of it matters on day one.
Can you update it yourself?
A website launches once. It gets edited for years.
You’ll want to fix a typo, add a staff member, post an event, or change your hours. On a site we build, you log in, make the change, and save it. You don’t need to call anyone.
On an AI-built site, your text often lives inside the code. A one-word fix can mean going back to the AI, or paying a developer to figure out code nobody actually wrote.
And if more than one person updates the site, you need different levels of access. Your summer student shouldn’t be able to delete the homepage.
Do your forms actually work?
Your contact form is how leads reach you. It has to do more than look nice.
It needs to check what people type, block spam, send the message to the right inbox, and keep a copy in case an email goes missing. Without that, you get two things: lost leads, and an inbox full of bots.
Is it safe?
This is the part that costs the most when it goes wrong.
Every website is built on software, and that software needs security updates. Someone has to watch for them and apply them. On a vibe-coded site, there’s usually no one watching. You may not even know what software is in there.
Then there’s privacy. In Canada, PIPEDA sets rules for how businesses handle personal information. If your site uses tracking tools like Google Analytics or ad pixels, you need a clear privacy policy and, in many cases, consent from visitors.
Accessibility matters too. People using screen readers or keyboards need to be able to use your site. It’s the right thing to do. And in Ontario, the Accessibility for Ontarians with Disabilities Act (AODA) requires many businesses to meet web accessibility standards.
And backups. If something breaks, can you roll it back? Or do you start over?
Who looks after it next year?
This is the real question.
Websites need care. Plugins get updated. Browsers change. Your business changes. Someone has to keep the site running, fast, and secure for years, not just on launch day.
An AI tool won’t call you when something breaks. It won’t notice your site is down at 4:30 on a Friday. And when you need to add online booking, a newsletter signup, or a store, it will start from scratch every time.
What a web developer actually does
This is what I want clients to understand. Design is the part you see. It’s important, and I care about it a lot. But it’s maybe a fifth of the job.
The rest is everything above. Making sure Google and AI search tools can find you. Making sure you can update your own site. Making sure your forms work and your leads land in your inbox. Keeping the site secure, private, accessible, and backed up. Being there when something goes wrong.
That’s the work. It just doesn’t show up in a screenshot.
So bring me your AI design
Seriously. Bring it.
Use AI to explore ideas and figure out what you like. Then let’s build it properly, on a platform made for business websites, with all the parts underneath that keep it working.
I’ll use your design as the starting point. You’ll get the look you wanted and a site that’s actually done.
Let me know what you’ve been working on.