A Hands-On Workshop Guide
From Idea to Live Website
A hands-on path from "I have an idea" to "it's live on the internet" — using AI to actually build it.
The Big Picture
Five pieces, each doing one job. Once you see how they connect, the whole thing stops feeling like magic.
| Piece | What it actually does |
|---|
| Squarespace (Domains) | Where you buy your web address — yourbusiness.com |
| Claude | The AI that actually writes your website's code, based on what you tell it you want |
| GitHub | Where your website's code lives and gets saved — think of it as the filing cabinet |
| Supabase | The database — where things like sign-ups, forms, or saved info actually get stored |
| Netlify | Takes the code sitting in GitHub and makes it a real, live website people can visit |
The flow: You describe what you want to Claude → Claude writes the code → the code goes to GitHub → Netlify turns it into a live site → your Squarespace domain points people to it.
Step-by-Step Workflow
Step 1 — Buy your domain (Squarespace)
- Go to domains.squarespace.com
- Search your desired name (start with .com if it's available)
- Register it — expect around $14 for the first year, then $20/year on renewal
- WHOIS privacy and a free SSL certificate come included automatically — nothing extra to buy there
You don't need anything else built yet to do this step. Grab the name before someone else does, then move on.
Step 2 — Sign up for Claude
- Go to claude.ai and create a free account
- Free is fine to start and explore. If you're going to actually build something real — multiple sessions, real back-and-forth — the Pro plan (~$20/month) removes the frustration of hitting usage limits mid-project
- This is the tool you'll talk to like a very capable assistant: describe what you want built, in plain English
You don't need to know how to code. You need to know how to describe what you want clearly.
Step 3 — Set up GitHub
- Go to github.com, create a free account
- Free covers everything you need at this stage — unlimited public and private repositories, no cost
- Create a new repository (think: a new folder for this one project)
- This is where Claude's finished code gets uploaded and saved
You're not writing code here — you're just giving Claude's output a home.
Step 4 — Set up Supabase (only if your project needs to save data)
- Go to supabase.com, create a free account
- Create a new project
- Free tier covers most beginner and small-business projects: 500MB of database space, 50,000 monthly active users, 1GB of file storage
- One quirk worth knowing: free projects pause after 7 days with no activity — just log in and click around occasionally to keep it awake, or upgrade to Pro ($25/month) once your project is real and live
Skip this step entirely if your site is just informational — a page that doesn't need forms, logins, or saved data doesn't need a database at all.
Step 5 — Set up Netlify
- Go to netlify.com, create a free account
- Connect it to your GitHub account
- Pick the repository from Step 3 — Netlify will automatically publish it as a live website
- Free tier covers most beginner sites: 100GB of bandwidth and 300 build minutes a month
- Netlify gives you a random web address to start (something like random-name-123.netlify.app) — that's normal
Step 6 — Connect your domain to your site
- In Netlify, go to your site's Domain Settings and add your custom domain from Step 1
- Netlify will show you specific DNS records to add
- Go back into Squarespace's domain settings and add those exact records
- Give it 10–30 minutes to take effect, then your real domain shows your real site
Step 7 — Keep building
Go back to Claude anytime you want to add something, fix something, or change something. Describe what you want, get the updated code, push it to GitHub the same way, and Netlify updates your live site automatically within a minute or two.
This is the actual loop. Idea → Claude → GitHub → Netlify → live. Every time.
What This Actually Costs
| Item | Cost |
|---|
| Domain (Squarespace) | ~$14 first year, $20/year on renewal |
| Claude | Free to start; $20/month (Pro) for real project work |
| GitHub | Free at this scale |
| Supabase | Free at this scale (upgrade to $25/month only once you're live with real users) |
| Netlify | Free at this scale (upgrade to $19–20/month only if you outgrow the free limits) |
Realistic starting cost: about $20–40 total to get your domain and your first month of Claude Pro. Everything else can run entirely free until your project is genuinely growing — at which point paying to upgrade is a good problem to have.
Why This Matters
You don't need to become a programmer. You need to learn how to direct AI clearly enough that it builds the right thing — and how these five pieces fit together so you're not dependent on anyone else to make changes, fix something, or grow your idea into a real business.