Today we build it — a brain that remembers your story, talks like you, and knows your customers. Its first piece of work: your website, live on the internet before you leave. No code. No agency. No waiting.
Different business, same steps — by the end, one of these is yours. That's the guarantee.
"I built an AI note-taker for my wife's therapy practice in one Saturday afternoon — instead of paying $35 a month for the official add-on."
"I'm an architect, 40 years in the field, not a developer. I built my own project tracker — and my firm runs on it now."
"Made my first live website this week. It's real. It's online."
These very slides — the ones you're swiping right now — were built with Claude Code. Interactive maps, carousels, copy buttons: all of it.
Phone is for questions. Laptop is for building. Re-scan the QR on your laptop browser, or type the short link on screen.
If your machine doesn't qualify, tell us now — pair up with a neighbour for today rather than sitting out.
We break when the room needs it — this is a working session, not a lecture.
A true story: during OpenAI's own safety testing, their o1 model was put in a locked hacking challenge — and the challenge accidentally broke. Instead of giving up, the model found a hole in the test setup, restarted the system its own way, and took the answer from outside the rules of the game. Harmless in a lab. But nobody asked it to do that. AI is powerful, and it will surprise you — which is exactly why we teach the safety layer first.
AI tools may use your conversations to help improve their models. That's a real choice, not a trick — some people are happy to contribute. But you should choose it, not sleepwalk into it.
The rule isn't "always off." The rule is: you decide, knowing what it does.
This is the disclaimer, in plain words. Used with respect, this is the most valuable tool in your business. Used carelessly, it's a very fast intern with admin access.
All brilliant. But notice: after every answer, you still do the doing.
Chat AI hands you knowledge. Claude Code hands you the finished thing. That's the entire difference — and it changes what a non-technical person can create.
Today: the website. Tomorrow: the automation behind it. Same skill, growing scope.
That's the only skill requirement today. Let's set up your machine.
You'll also want a free Netlify account for the go-live part (netlify.com — sign up takes a minute). If you set one up before the event, even better.
One download. A normal app — like installing WhatsApp or Chrome.
Playing a game, you hit a save point before the boss fight. Lose? You don't start the whole game again — you go back to the save. Git does exactly that, automatically, for everything Claude builds you.
Governance isn't a lecture — it's a habit. You just made your first informed call, before your first prompt.
Hi! I'm brand new to this. In simple, non-technical language: introduce yourself and tell me three things you could build for my business.
When it replies — that's it. You're using the same tool professional developers use. It only gets more fun from here.
Claude replied to you → thumbs up. Anything else → shout, and we fix it together on your screen. Nobody moves on until the whole room is in.
Remember the second brain from the opening slide? This is where we build it — except ours has a better name. A silent partner knows the business inside out, backs every move — and stays invisible. Yours works around the clock, never takes equity, and lives as a small set of files in your folder. Claude reads them at the start of every conversation, forever.
The full version of this technique takes the top Claude communities a week of lessons. Ours is the one-day edition: just enough that everything you build today comes out sounding like your business, not a generic one.
Here are the 6 questions coming your way, with the kind of answer that works — short and honest beats long and polished:
Interview me so you can become my silent partner. Ask me 6 short questions, ONE at a time — wait for my answer before the next, and don't summarize my answers back to me: 1) my name and my business name, 2) what we sell in one sentence, 3) who buys from us, 4) for this one, don't ask me to describe anything — instead, role-play as one of my customers: send me a typical customer message (asking if we're open, what to get, how much something costs) and tell me to reply exactly the way I really would. My reply IS my voice — learn the tone and wording from it, 5) what makes us different from our competitors, 6) the one action I want every customer to take. When I've answered all 6, create three files in this folder — business.md, voice.md and audience.md — using my own words, not polished marketing language. Then update CLAUDE.md to reference all three so you remember me in every future conversation here. Finally, create partner.md — a one-page summary: first line "# " followed by my business name, second line "> " followed by the phrase I actually use, then three sections "## What we are", "## How we sound", "## Who we serve", each with 3 to 5 short bullets in my own words. Finish by showing me the full contents of partner.md so I can copy it.
Why these six matter: they literally become your website today. You're walking out of here with your own site live on the internet — that's the guarantee — and everything it says, in every word, grows from these answers. Better answers, better site.
Claude just showed you partner.md — your business, distilled into one page. Copy all of it, paste it below, and watch this slide draw your map.
Screenshot your map. Those aren't our words on the screen — they're yours, from the interview ten minutes ago. Every business in this room gets a different map, because every business in this room is different.
Without me repeating anything about my business: a customer just messaged asking what we offer and how much it costs. Write the WhatsApp reply you'd send on my behalf, in my brand tone.
Read what comes back. That's a message you could actually send to a real customer, in your voice, about your business — and we've barely started. That reply is yours to keep.
Install the Claude app on your phone and sign in with the same account. Your work hands off seamlessly between laptop and phone — check on a build from the coffee queue, approve a change from the sofa, keep things moving with the laptop closed.
Same brain, both screens. The laptop is just the workbench — the partner travels with you.
Don't say "make website". Say who you are, what you sell, who it's for, and what you want a visitor to do. The more you tell it, the better it builds — exactly like a real member of staff.
From here on, the prompts have blanks. Tap a maroon blank, type your own words, then hit copy — the button copies the whole prompt with your words inside.
Build me a one-page website for my business, . We . Our customers are . The one thing a visitor should do is . Make it clean and professional, and open a preview so I can see it.
Claude is writing real website files into your my-website folder and opening a live preview. You never need to open those files — you're the boss reviewing the work, not the one doing it. And Git is quietly saving every version behind the scenes.
Preview looks wrong or nothing appears? Normal sometimes. Tell Claude "the preview isn't showing, fix it" — or call us over.
We built a sample site for this course — and unlike a random website, this one you have our full permission to clone. Structure, sections, layout: take it all. Your content goes inside.
Recreate the structure and layout of this example site: . Keep the skeleton, but fill every section with MY business from your memory files, styled by my design.md. It should feel like mine, not like a copy.
Why this is fine here and not elsewhere: we own it and we're handing it to you. Cloning structure from something offered to you = smart. Lifting someone else's site wholesale = trouble. Know the difference, use it forever.
Study this picture — the colors, fonts, spacing, and overall mood. Create design.md in this folder capturing that style as MY brand's look, and add it to CLAUDE.md so you always design in this style for me. Important: take only the style — never their logo, photos, text or name. Then restyle my website to match design.md and show me the preview.
The line, so we never cross it: style — colors, fonts, layout feel — is inspiration and it's fair game. Their logo, their photos, their words, their name? Theirs. We take the vibe. Never the content.
Add a section that shows my three main : . Write a short, convincing line for each one. Match the style of the rest of the page.
AI-built sites have tells, and your customers can smell them: purple-blue gradients, emoji in every heading, everything centered, the same font as every other AI site. One prompt scrubs it all.
Go through my site and remove anything that looks AI-generated: no purple or blue gradients, no emoji in headings, no generic buzzwords like "elevate" or "seamless", don't center every single thing. Follow my design.md, use my real words from the memory files, and make it feel like a real business made this — because one did. Show me the before and after.
This one prompt is the difference between "nice AI demo" and "wait, who built your site?" — the reaction you actually want.
This is the slide that pays for today. A visitor who can message you in one tap is a lead.
Add a prominent WhatsApp button that opens a chat with my business number , with the pre-filled message "Hi, I found you through your website!". Put it where a visitor can't miss it.
When we're back: your site stops living on your laptop and goes onto the actual internet.
Bring us your broken thing — even "mine looks ugly" counts. We'll take them one at a time on the big screen, and you'll watch how to un-stick yourself: describe the problem to Claude the way you'd describe it to us.
The real skill today isn't building. It's knowing every problem is one honest sentence away from fixed.
Your site lives on your laptop. Netlify is a free service that puts it on a real internet address — so customers, family, and that one skeptical friend can all see it. Claude handles the whole move; you just approve.
Haven't made your free Netlify account yet? netlify.com → Sign up → use your email. One minute.
Deploy this website to Netlify. Walk me through anything you need from me in simple steps, and give me the live link when it's done.
First time, it'll ask you to sign in to Netlify — a browser window opens, you click approve, done.
Already have a live company website? Don't touch it today. Build here on the free link — then, after the course, work with whoever hosts your current site to move this onto your own domain without interrupting anything. Your domain provider has the steps; we'll point you the right way.
A real business website, on the real internet, built by you, today. Send it to one person who didn't believe you'd do this.
This room is full of business owners who now build with AI. That's not a small network. Use it.
Add a Google Maps section showing my location at , our opening hours (), and a footer with my Instagram . Then deploy the update.
Add a testimonials section with these real quotes from my clients, word for word, never shortened and never invented: "" — , and "" — . Then deploy the update.
Notice the last four words — updating a live site is just: change it, then say "deploy the update."
That's genuinely all the jargon you need. Day 2 uses both — the waiter fetches your invoice data, the plug connects Claude to Telegram.
A Telegram bot that answers real business questions — "what does this client owe?", "send them the invoice reminder" — working for you around the clock. Today you built a shopfront. Tomorrow you hire staff.
Bring the same laptop — everything's already set up on it. And remember the governance rule: next session we connect things, so think ahead about what you're comfortable connecting.
One last thing before you go — tell us, face to face: your best moment and your most confusing one. Tomorrow gets better because of it.