Your Website Starting Point

The Lesson

Your website lives on a server. The quality of that server affects speed, security, and uptime — all of which affect whether customers stay or leave. A slow website fails the three-second test before the design even loads.

Track A — Building from scratch

1. Buy hosting on Hostinger. We recommend Hostinger because it consistently delivers fast load times on a LiteSpeed server stack, offers one-click WordPress installation, includes a free SSL certificate, and costs less than ₹300/month on the Business plan — which is the lowest-friction entry point for a business website that needs to be fast, secure, and scalable enough to grow with you.

Full disclosure: the link below is an affiliate link. We considered not including one, because we've spent three weeks teaching you to distrust recommendations with financial incentives behind them. We included it because the recommendation would be identical without the affiliate arrangement — Hostinger is what we use for client projects where the brief calls for managed WordPress hosting. The affiliate commission doesn't change what we'd recommend. If you already have hosting you're happy with, skip this step entirely.

[Hostinger affiliate link]

1. Register your domain (if you don't have one). If Hostinger's free domain isn't the name you want, register separately through GoDaddy (largest registrar, easy to use) or Namecheap (often cheaper, solid interface). Keep the domain short, memorable, and relevant to your business. Avoid hyphens and numbers. If the .com is taken, .in works perfectly for Indian businesses.

1. Install WordPress via Hostinger's one-click installer. Select the blank/clean install — no starter templates.

1. Basic WordPress configuration (step by step — we'll also have a video walkthrough for this):

• Site identity: Go to Settings → General. Set your Site Title to your business name. Set the Tagline to your one-line pitch from Day 10. Set your timezone to your location.
• Permalinks: Go to Settings → Permalinks. Select "Post name." This makes your URLs clean and readable (yoursite.com/services instead of yoursite.com/?p=123). Click Save. Do this before you create any pages.
• Reading settings: Go to Settings → Reading. Under "Your homepage displays," select "A static page." Set "Homepage" to a page you'll create called "Home." Set "Posts page" to a page called "Blog" (create both as blank pages first, you'll fill them in on Day 24).
• Discussion settings: Go to Settings → Discussion. Uncheck "Allow people to submit comments on new posts" unless you specifically want blog comments (most business sites don't).
• Delete defaults: Go to Posts → All Posts. Delete the "Hello World" sample post. Go to Pages → All Pages. Delete the "Sample Page."
• SSL certificate: Hostinger activates this automatically, but verify: go to your Hostinger dashboard → SSL → check that it shows "Active" for your domain. Your site URL should show https://, not http://.
• Create your page structure: Based on Day 13's sitemap, create blank pages for each page you planned (Home, About, Services/Work, Contact, Blog at minimum). Don't add content yet — you're building the skeleton.
• Set up your navigation menu: Go to Appearance → Menus (or Appearance → Editor → Navigation in newer WordPress versions). Create a Primary Menu and add your pages in the order you want them. Assign it to the "Primary" or "Header" location.

1. Essential Plugins to Install:

• Advanced Custom Fields (ACF) — for flexible content blocks. This is how you'll build custom page layouts without page builder bloat.
• WS Form or Gravity Forms — for contact forms and lead capture.
• Yoast SEO or Rank Math — for search visibility. (We'll cover how to use these in the free SEO guide.)
• WP Fastest Cache or LiteSpeed Cache (LiteSpeed if your Hostinger plan uses LiteSpeed server) — for page speed.
• A security plugin (Wordfence or Sucuri).

Don't install anything else yet. Plugin bloat kills performance. Every plugin you add is code your server has to load. Only install what serves a clear purpose.

Remember: this doesn't need to be perfect today. You're setting up the foundation. The copy (which is what actually converts) goes in on Day 24. A live site with decent copy beats an unlaunched site with perfect design every single time.

Track B — You already have a website

1. Run a full AI audit. Open your Copywriting & UX folder and use this prompt:

"You are a conversion rate optimisation expert who uses the methodologies from Making Websites Win, Don't Make Me Think, and Laws of UX. I need you to audit my current website as if you were a potential customer seeing it for the first time.

My business: [what you do] My customers: [who they are] How customers find my site: [Google search, social media link, direct URL, referral] Here is the text from my homepage and key pages: [paste the full text from each page — copy everything visible on the page]

Audit step by step:

1. Three-second test (Krug): Looking only at the first screenful of content — can you tell what the business does, who it's for, and what to do next? If not, what's missing or confusing? 2. Benefit-first check (Cashvertising, Bly): Go through every heading and subheading. For each one, mark it as benefit-first (customer gets something) or feature-first (business describes itself). Count the ratio. 3. Social proof placement (Cialdini): Where is proof of credibility — testimonials, client logos, numbers, results? Is it distributed at decision points (near CTAs, on pricing pages, above the fold) or buried at the bottom? 4. Buying path friction (Making Websites Win): Trace the path from 'I just landed here' to 'I've bought / enquired / signed up.' How many steps? Where is it breaking? Where would a customer hesitate, get confused, or leave? 5. Jakob's Law check (Laws of UX): Does the navigation follow patterns my customers expect from other sites in my category? Or does it force them to learn a new interface?

Give me a prioritised fix list: rank the problems from highest to lowest impact. For each problem, name the principle it violates, explain why it matters, and describe the specific fix. I want to start with the change that will make the biggest difference."

1. Identify your platform. Different platforms, different editing methods:

• WordPress + Elementor / Divi / WPBakery: The AI identifies the copy and structural problems. You make changes in the page builder's visual editor. Focus on content, not design tweaks.
• Wix / Squarespace / Shopify: Same AI audit. Changes happen in the platform's built-in editor.
• Custom-coded site: Take the AI's recommendations to your developer, or use Claude Code to generate updated code.

1. Start with the homepage. Whatever platform you're on, the homepage is where 80% of the impact lives. Fix that first using the audit's recommendations.

Output (Track A): A live WordPress installation on Hostinger with essential plugins installed and basic configuration done. Output (Track B): A prioritised audit of your existing site with the top 5 changes identified and your homepage fix started. Output (Track C): A diagnostic brief documenting: (1) your current website's performance against the three-second test, the four-step framework, and the buying path audit — scored with the sharper criteria you now have after three weeks; (2) a comparison with 2-3 competitors' sites using the same diagnostic tools; (3) a prioritised list of what needs to be built or fixed, ranked by conversion impact. Use the Track B audit prompt above even if you're not making the changes yourself — the diagnosis is the deliverable.