Build a site from scratch

This is the path for starting with nothing. You signed up, you have a Steeren workspace, and right now it's empty - no content, no brand details filled in yet. What you want at the end is a real marketing website: a homepage, a blog that's wired to Steeren so new posts appear automatically, and your legal pages.

This guide walks you through that whole journey, from an empty workspace to a site you can put live. You don't write any code. Your job is a handful of decisions and some honest feedback along the way.

[!NOTE] This guide is for a brand-new, empty workspace. If your workspace already has your brand details, your audience, and some published posts in it, you don't need the from-scratch path - Steeren can build straight from what's already there.

What you bring, and what Steeren does

You bring the bare minimum and make a couple of decisions. Steeren does the research, writing, and assembly.

You're never asked to touch code. Your real work is the corrections, one or two small decisions, and your reaction to the preview.

Step 1: Point Steeren at your business

You need one of these:

• A website URL - for example https://acme.com. This is the best thing to give, because it lets Steeren read your real wording, colors, font, and customer stories.
• A company name on its own - also fine, but Steeren has to find you first, so the result is a little thinner and you'll have more to correct in the next step.

A URL gives Steeren the strongest signal, so reach for that if you have one.

Step 2: Steeren researches, then checks with you

Steeren reads your website and looks around the public web - your pages, who your competitors are, who your customers seem to be, and what makes you different. It's told to flag anything it couldn't find rather than make something up, so you won't get a fake testimonial or an invented customer name.

Then it stops and asks you something like:

"Here's what I've gathered. Before we go further, is there anything you'd correct - your industry, who you're for, what makes you different, your tone, anything you saw and didn't like?"

This is the one moment you really shouldn't skip. Everything that comes next is built on this picture of your business, so if the industry guess is off or the audience is wrong, fix it here before it spreads through the rest of the site.

[!WARNING] This is real research, not magic. If your existing website is sparse, the read on your tone and audience will be thin too. Your corrections are where that gets put right - so read what Steeren found carefully, especially anything it has flagged as unsure.

Step 3: Your brand details get saved into the workspace

This is what makes the from-scratch path more than a one-off site build. Everything Steeren learned - your brand, your tone, who you're for, what makes you different, your competitors - gets written into your workspace, not just used once and forgotten.

That matters because this saved brand context is what makes generated content actually sound like you rather than generic filler. It's the same context the rest of Steeren draws on later when it writes posts, plans campaigns, or rebuilds the site. Fill it in well once, and everything downstream benefits.

[!TIP] Want to understand exactly what these brand details are and how they shape what the AI writes? See The context wiki: brand, ICP & voice. That's the knowledge base this step is filling in, and it's worth a read - the richer it is, the better your content sounds.

If Steeren couldn't work out your brand colors from your existing site, it'll ask you for one or two before moving on.

Step 4: Decide whether to start your blog with a few posts

A site with a completely empty blog can look half-finished. So Steeren offers to write you a few starter posts based on the research:

"Should I write a few starter blog posts so the site doesn't ship empty? You can edit, publish, or delete them freely once the site is up."

A few things worth knowing:

• You choose how many - the default is 3, up to a maximum of 5. More than a handful is just more to review, not a bigger head start.
• The posts arrive as drafts. Nothing is published without you - your first move in the dashboard will be to read them and decide what goes live.
• The topics are evergreen and general - no "2026 trends", no "we just launched X" (you haven't launched anything yet through Steeren), nothing that piggybacks on a named competitor.

Because these posts are written from the brand details you just filled in, they land in your voice rather than reading like generic AI copy. That's the payoff of doing Step 3 properly.

If you'd rather start clean, just say no. Your blog will show its empty state ("No posts published yet. Check back soon.") until you write your first post.

[!NOTE] If your workspace context is still empty when posts are generated, the writing comes out generic. That's exactly why the brand details (Step 3) come first - they're what gives the posts your voice.

Step 5: Steeren builds the site

This part runs without needing you. Steeren plans the pages and sections, picks a look that fits your industry, and asks you to choose a visual style - for example a hero animation or scroll effect - from a small set of options.

Then it writes all the copy and designs the site, assembles your homepage, layout, and legal pages, and styles the blog. Your blog comes pre-wired to Steeren: your blog index lists your published posts automatically, and each post page renders the full post - including any interactive pieces like call-to-action buttons or inline lead forms, which keep working and tracking clicks rather than turning into flat text. You don't have to set any of that up; it's part of the site you're handed.

Step 6: Preview it locally and ask for changes

Steeren starts the site on your own machine and gives you a local address (usually http://localhost:3000) to open in your browser.

[!TIP] Treat this as a real back-and-forth, not a quick glance. Even when it "looks fine", ask for the two or three things you'd improve - that second pass is usually where a site goes from "fine" to actually good.

The site ships with a small feedback widget - a bubble in the bottom-right corner - so you can leave comments and point at specific sections as you review. It tucks your notes away in your own browser and gives you a "Copy all" button; you paste those notes back into the chat when you want Steeren to make the changes. The widget is hidden while you preview locally and shown on the live site, so you can keep collecting feedback after go-live too.

For a review you're doing live, just talk through the changes as you go. For one you want to do on your own time, Steeren can put the site online first and share the link, and you leave widget comments whenever it suits you.

Step 7 (optional): Add more pages

Once you're happy with the homepage, blog, and legal pages, Steeren asks if you'd like anything else - a contact form, a products or services page, a comparison page versus a competitor, a simple lead-magnet tool, an events page, or extra sections like a changelog or case studies. Pick what you want, or skip straight to going live.

Step 8: Go live

When you give the word that the preview is good, Steeren finishes the site and publishes it. It cleans up the copy (stripping the little formatting glitches AI-written text sometimes carries) and gets the site ready to put online.

[!NOTE] Putting the site online is the one part that isn't fully guaranteed yet. Steeren prepares and publishes the finished site, and the working preview is always a real, reliable result - but an automatic live web address isn't something to count on landing the instant you give the go-ahead. If you don't see a live URL right away, that's expected, not a fault.

Honest expectations

A few things to keep in mind so nothing surprises you:

• A good site needs your brand details filled in first. An empty workspace can't produce content that sounds like you. The research-and-correction steps and Step 3 are what make the difference - don't rush them.
• The research is only as good as what's public. A sparse existing site means a thinner read on your tone and audience. Your correction pass is doing real work, so give it real attention.
• Going live is not yet fully automatic. The finished site and the working preview are the dependable results today; an instant live web address is the one open question.
• After this first run, the dashboard is your source of truth. If you edit your brand details, audience, or positioning later, do it in the dashboard - a future rebuild reads whatever's there now.

FAQ

Do I have to let Steeren write blog posts? No. It's entirely optional. Skip it and your blog shows its empty state until you write your own.

Can I rebuild the site later without redoing the research? Yes - that's the whole point of saving your brand details into the workspace. A later build reads your brand, audience, and positioning straight from Steeren instead of researching from scratch again.

Will my site's content sound like generic AI? Only if you skip the brand details. The content is written from what you fill in about your brand, tone, and audience - the richer that is, the more it sounds like you. See The context wiki for what goes in there.

Why does Steeren want a website URL instead of just asking me questions? A URL is the single strongest signal - it gives Steeren your real wording, colors, font, customer stories, and existing pages to build from. With just a name it has more guessing to do, so expect a bit more correcting. You can still give a name alone; it just means more cleanup in Step 2.

I gave the go-ahead but nothing's live yet. Is that a bug? Not necessarily. Going live is the one step that isn't fully guaranteed yet. The finished site and your working preview are the reliable results today; an automatic live web address isn't promised the moment you give the go-ahead.