Your website and everything around it

Your website sits in the middle

A website rarely works alone. Search results, AI answers, ads, social profiles and email all send people to it or depend on it. Each one also asks something of your site and of the builder you chose.

This section looks at each from the website side: what your site needs, what your builder lets you control, and what to check before it becomes a problem. Pick the topic you need, or read them in the order below.

The six topics

Search engines (SEO)

No builder ranks a site by itself. Google’s own guide points to the basics: useful content, clear page titles and descriptions, readable URLs, a sitemap, speed and a site that works on phones. Websites and SEO compares what each builder lets you edit, from titles to 301 redirects, and when a builder starts to hold you back. New to the term? See our SEO entry.

AI search

ChatGPT, Gemini and Google’s AI Overviews pull answers from websites. Google says there are no extra requirements for its AI features; normal SEO applies. Websites and AI search covers the AI crawlers, what llms.txt is and isn’t, and the settings that can make your site invisible to AI tools without you noticing.

Google Ads

An ad is only as good as the page it sends people to. Google can disapprove ads whose landing pages don’t work or can’t be crawled. Websites and Google Ads explains what a landing page needs, how conversion tracking works and which builders make the Google tag easy.

Social media

Instagram lets a profile show up to 5 website links, and link-in-bio tools such as Linktree offer a page of buttons instead. Websites and social media weighs link-in-bio tools against your own site, and covers share previews, the Meta Pixel and social shops that send buyers to your site to check out.

Ownership

Your domain, your words, your photos, your designer’s work and your builder’s template can all have different owners. Who owns your website explains the copyright, domain and trademark basics, with a checklist to make sure the important parts are in your name.

Email

An address at your own domain looks more professional and stays with the business. Websites and email compares Google Workspace, Microsoft 365, free options and forwarding, and explains SPF, DKIM and DMARC and the inbox providers’ sender rules.

How the pieces connect

The domain ties everything together. Your search rankings, ad links, social profile links and email addresses all use your domain name. If someone else controls the domain, they control all of them. That is why ownership comes first.

Search and AI answers draw on the same pages. Google says a page has to be indexed and eligible to show in Search with a snippet to appear as a supporting link in its AI features. Fixing your SEO basics helps both.

Ads and social bring visitors; tracking tags measure them. The Google tag and the Meta Pixel are small pieces of code your builder has to support. How easily it does that varies by platform.

Email and your website share DNS. Both are set in your domain’s DNS records. A careless website move can stop your email, which is why our migration guide has a step just for MX records.

Leaving a builder touches all of it. Redirects, tracking tags, forms and email settings you set up on one platform may need redoing on the next. Our exit scores show what each platform lets you take.

Where to start

1. Put the domain and the builder account in your name.
2. Set up email at your domain, with SPF, DKIM and DMARC.
3. Get the SEO basics right: titles, descriptions, URLs and a sitemap.
4. Check your AI crawler settings so you aren’t blocked by accident.
5. Add ads, social links and tracking when you are ready to spend time or money on traffic.