Asking for changes to your website

Just ask in chat. Your co-founder builds and hosts your website, so a change — new copy, a section, a different photo, a new page, a restyle — goes through the conversation you're already having.

What to expect

When you ask for a change, your co-founder confirms it's lined up and works on it in the background. You don't need to touch code, choose a website builder, or find a developer — that's the point of having a co-founder build it for you.

Most requests go straight through. Occasionally you'll get a quick question first — usually when the request needs information that isn't on file, like:

• An "About me" or team page. Your co-founder doesn't know your story, credentials, or years of experience unless you tell it — so it asks before writing a page about you rather than inventing details.
• Testimonials or a case study. Real quotes and real results only — your co-founder won't make these up.

If you'd rather skip the questions and just have it build something reasonable, say so — it'll go ahead with what you've given it.

If a request can't go through

Two things can hold a request back: one that reads like raw code rather than a plain description gets declined for safety, and several builds back-to-back get slowed down for a bit to protect your site from a runaway back-and-forth. Either way you'll hear about it in chat, never a silent failure — describe what you want in plain language and it goes through normally.

Changes, rebuilds, and the one thing that stays fixed

Words, photos, colors, buttons, new sections and pages — change any of that whenever you like, and you'll get the smallest edit that does the job. If the homepage as a whole isn't right, ask for more than an edit: say "rebuild my homepage" and the entire page is redone from the ground up. See "Rebuilding your website".

What stays fixed either way is the overall shape of your home page, what it leads with — picked on your first build to fit your business. Swapping it for a different shape isn't something your co-founder can do today, and it'll say so rather than quietly not do it; a rebuild works within that shape. See "How your website's look is chosen".

Renaming or removing a page

Ask the same way — "rename the About page to Our Story", "take the pricing page down". Two things happen automatically, so you don't have to think about them:

• Search engines get the update in the same release. The crawl list is rebuilt to match your site exactly, so a removed page stops being advertised and a new one starts being found.
• The old web address normally keeps working after a rename. A forwarder sends visitors to the renamed page instead of an error, and the new address is the one that builds your search ranking.

A page you remove outright is gone, so that address stops working. If you'd rather point it somewhere, say which page it should go to.

When you rename your business

Renaming your business doesn't rewrite your website, so your published site shows the old name until it's rebuilt. Your co-founder offers to do that as soon as the rename lands. Two things worth knowing:

• You approve it once. The offer is remembered even if you don't answer right away — approving it on your approvals list starts the rebuild, and there's only one per rename.
• It still works if your site is mid-build. The offer to bring it up to date is kept even if your first build is already underway with the old name.

Renaming never changes your free web address or your built-in customer email — see "Your website address".

Your changes go before background work

Anything you've asked for or approved goes before the work your co-founder does on its own: blog posts, tuning pages, keeping search engines current. Only one change happens at a time and yours goes first, so background work holds off while one of yours is waiting. It isn't lost; it picks up after.

Keeping your business profile filled in

The more your co-founder knows — what you offer, who buys it, how you're priced — the better the build, with fewer follow-up questions.

Which version it builds on

Your co-founder starts from whatever version is live right now — including after you've rolled one back, so a change never quietly brings back something you'd already undone. To start somewhere else, name it: "add a contact form, but start from v0.0.4" (version names are in Settings → Site). If that version isn't on file, it'll say so rather than quietly build on a different one.

After the change goes live

Every version is tracked, so nothing is edited behind your back — you can always see what changed. If a change doesn't show up right away it may be waiting on an automatic safety check; see "Publishing your website".