Disclosure: I build ShipPress, the Mac app I use for the example in this article. The six questions work with any AI coding tool, with or without it.
"Build me a website for my udon shop" gets you a generic site with a hero image, three feature boxes and a made-up menu with made-up prices. The AI isn't bad at WordPress. It just has nothing to work with, so it fills the gaps with averages.
When I designed the onboarding for ShipPress, I tried to cut the brief down to the smallest set of questions that still changes what the AI builds. I ended up with six. Here they are, with what each one changes in the output and a short example answer for a small udon shop in Kyoto.
1. Who are you, and what do you do?
A family-run udon shop in Kyoto. We make the noodles by hand every morning.
This sets the voice and the page structure. A family shop gets an "Our story" page and a warmer tone. A consultancy gets service pages and case studies. Without it, the AI guesses, usually a startup landing page.
2. Who do you most want to visit your site?
Tourists planning a trip to Kyoto, plus regulars checking if we're open.
One audience is enough. Tourists need the address, a map and an English menu near the top. Regulars need today's hours. Naming the audience decides what goes above the fold.
3. What do you sell or offer?
Six kinds of udon, a seasonal special, and take-out on weekdays.
Real items give the AI real content to lay out. "Food" gets you placeholder cards. "Kitsune udon, curry udon and a seasonal special" gets you a menu page that's close to done.
4. Once the site is online, what would make you happy?
More table reservations on weekend evenings.
This one surprises people, but it changes the most. The goal becomes the main call to action. With "more reservations", the AI put a "Reserve a table" button at the top of the home page and added a reservation section. With no goal, you get a contact form at the bottom that nobody scrolls to.
5. What must be on the site?
Opening hours, a map, the menu with prices, and that we're closed on Tuesdays.
This is your checklist. It's also where I ask the AI to be honest: if it doesn't know the prices or hours, it should ask instead of inventing them. A site that shows a wrong closing day is worse than a site with a gap.
6. What style do you like?
Warm and calm, with wood tones.
Three or four words is plenty. Adjectives plus one material or color ("wood tones", "navy and cream") steer the design better than "modern" or "clean", which every site claims to be.
Tips that made the biggest difference
- Put the name in your first sentence. "A small handmade udon shop in Kyoto called Hinoki Udon" tells the AI the site name. In ShipPress, the word after "called" becomes the site's name.
- One concrete detail per answer. A real dish, a real visitor, a real goal. Short is fine. Vague is the problem.
- Leave blanks rather than guess. You can skip any question and tell the AI more in the chat later.
- Give real facts when the AI asks. Prices, hours, address. Don't let placeholders ship.
What this looks like in ShipPress
In ShipPress you type the one-sentence description on the Home screen, and it walks you through these six questions as a short interview. Your sentence stays at the top, so you only add what's missing. Then you click Build my site, and your AI tool (Claude Code, Codex, Cursor CLI and others, on your own account) builds a real WordPress site on your Mac. Nothing is public until you choose to go live.
Here's the full flow for the udon shop, from the first sentence to a site with its own design:
The written version, with screenshots of each step, is here: https://shippress.codotx.com/docs-describe-your-site?ref=devto-en
If you already work with an AI CLI directly, you can paste the six answers into your first prompt as a brief. They work the same way there.
Your turn
Which of the six do you usually skip when you brief an AI or a designer? For me it was question 4, until I saw how much it changed the home page.
- ShipPress (free, Mac): https://shippress.codotx.com/?ref=devto-en
- Issues and feedback: https://github.com/oberonlai/shippress-releases/issues
Oberon Lai
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