How to Write Website Copy With AI (5 Steps + Prompts)

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You know what your business does. You can explain it to a client over coffee in two minutes. But the moment you open a blank homepage, the words go flat: “We deliver tailored solutions.” You stare at it, delete it, and the website waits another month.

Here is how to write website copy with AI: do not ask ChatGPT or Claude to “write my homepage”. Give it the raw material first: who your customer is, the problem they have, what you offer, the proof you can actually show, and three sentences you wrote yourself so it can copy your voice. Then plan the page section by section, let the AI draft one section at a time, and edit every line for two things: can a busy visitor scan it in ten seconds, and is every claim true. Done this way, a first homepage draft fits in one focused afternoon, and the result sounds like you, not like every other site.

Below: the five steps, prompts you can copy for the homepage, about page, services page and landing page, a worked example, and the mistakes that make AI website copy sound like AI.

For Claude-heavy desk days beyond website copy, keep the best Claude prompts for work kit handy — email, meeting notes, and research drafts in the same paste-and-tweak format.

No password needed – your reset opens instantly.

No password. Just your email, and you’re in.

Why most AI website copy sounds the same

Ask any chat assistant for a homepage with no context and you get the average of the internet: “Welcome to [Company], where innovation meets excellence.” It is not the tool being lazy. It simply knows nothing about you, so it fills the gaps with the safest, most common phrases it has seen.

The fix is not a magic prompt. It is input. OpenAI and Anthropic both say the same thing in their own prompting guides: give the model clear instructions, the context it needs, and examples of what good looks like (OpenAI, prompt engineering guide, Anthropic, prompt engineering overview). For website copy, the context is your customer and your offer. The examples are your own sentences.

There is a second reason it matters. Website visitors mostly do not read. In Nielsen Norman Group’s research, 79 percent of test users scanned any new page they came across, and only 16 percent read word by word (Nielsen Norman Group, How Users Read on the Web). Their later analysis found the first 10 seconds of a visit are when people decide to stay or leave (Nielsen Norman Group, How Long Do Users Stay on Web Pages?). Generic copy loses that ten seconds. Specific copy wins it.

What you need

A chat assistant: ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini. The free plans are fine for a single page. New to them? Our ChatGPT tutorial for beginners and Claude tutorial for beginners get you set up in half an hour.
Your raw facts: what you sell, the price or price range if you show it, who it is for, how it works, and any real proof (client names you may use, real reviews, years in business, certifications).
Three to five sentences in your own voice: an email to a client, a LinkedIn post, a voice memo you transcribed. This is what stops the draft from sounding like a brochure.
Your customers’ own words, if you have them: review text, survey answers, the questions people ask on sales calls. These are the best headlines you will ever get, because they are how buyers actually describe the problem.

Step 1: Build a one-page copy brief (15 minutes)

Everything else depends on this step. Instead of filling in a form, let the AI interview you. It asks better follow-up questions than a blank document does, and you answer in plain speech.

I want to write the copy for my website. Before you write anything, interview me.

Ask me one question at a time, and wait for my answer before the next one.

Cover: who my ideal customer is, the problem they have before they find me,

what they have already tried, what I offer and how it works, what it costs or

how pricing works, the proof I can show (only real things), the most common

objections I hear, and what I want a visitor to do next.

When you have enough, write a one-page copy brief with those headings.

Do not invent anything I did not tell you. Mark gaps with [ASK ME].

Answer like you would answer a friend. Short and honest beats polished. When the brief comes back, read it once and fix anything that is not quite right. This page is now the single source for every page you write next.

If you have review text or survey answers, paste them in and add: “List the exact phrases customers use to describe their problem and the result they got. Quote them, do not paraphrase.” Those quotes will feed your headlines. Our guide to using AI for market research shows how to collect more of them from competitors and forums.

Step 2: Plan the page before the words (10 minutes)

Most weak pages fail on order, not wording. Decide what each section has to do before anyone writes a sentence. A homepage for a small service business usually needs these blocks, top to bottom:

Headline: what you do and for whom, in plain words.
Subheadline: the result the customer gets, or how it works in one line.
Main button: the one action you want (book a call, get a quote, start a trial).
The problem: two or three lines that show you understand their situation.
How it works: three steps, so the next move feels small.
Proof: real reviews, real client logos you are allowed to use, real numbers.
Offer details: what is included, and the price if you show it.
FAQ: the objections from your brief, answered honestly.
Final button: the same action as the top.

Using the copy brief above, plan my [homepage / about page / services page].

Give me the sections in order. For each section write one line:

what it must make the visitor think or feel, and which facts from the brief it uses.

Do not write the copy yet.

Read the plan as your customer would. If a section has no fact from the brief behind it, cut it or go find the fact.

Step 3: Draft one section at a time (30 to 60 minutes)

Asking for the whole page in one go gives you a long block of average text. Asking per section gives you choices. Start with the headline, because it shapes everything under it.

Write 10 headline options for my homepage, using the brief.

Rules: under 10 words each, plain language a 12-year-old understands,

say what I do and who it is for, no buzzwords (innovative, cutting-edge,

seamless, solutions, unlock, elevate). At least three should use the

customers’ own phrases from the brief.

Match the tone of these sentences I wrote: [paste 3 to 5 of your sentences]

Pick one or two, then move down the plan: “Now write the subheadline and the button text for headline 4. Give three options each.” Then the problem block, then the three steps, and so on. Keep the same chat open so the brief stays in context.

Two follow-ups that improve almost every draft:

“Which sentence in this section would a busy visitor skip? Rewrite it or cut it.”
“Rewrite this so every sentence starts with the most important word.”

That second one comes from how people scan: they read the first words of lines and headings and decide from there (Nielsen Norman Group, First 2 Words).

Step 4: Edit for scanning and for truth (20 minutes)

This is the step that makes it yours. Print the draft or read it out loud, and check three things.

Is it concise, scannable and objective?

In a classic Nielsen Norman Group study, rewriting a site to be concise, scannable and objective (less promotional language) together measured 124 percent better usability than the original promotional version (Nielsen Norman Group, Concise, SCANNABLE, and Objective). In practice: short paragraphs, headings that say something, bullet lists for features, and fewer adjectives.

Is every claim true?

AI will happily write “trusted by hundreds of businesses” or a glowing quote from “Sarah, Marketing Director”. If that did not happen, delete it. This is not only about trust. In the United States, the FTC’s rule on consumer reviews and testimonials bans fake ones, including AI-generated reviews from people who do not exist or never used the product (Federal Register, Trade Regulation Rule on the Use of Consumer Reviews and Testimonials, 2024). Use real reviews, with permission, or leave the proof block out until you have them. Our guide to responding to Google reviews with AI is a good way to start collecting them.

Go through this page copy line by line. List every claim, number,

promise or testimonial, and next to each one say which fact in the

copy brief supports it. Mark anything without support as UNSUPPORTED.

Does it sound like you?

Read it out loud. Any sentence you would never say to a client gets rewritten in your words. Two or three of your own phrases per section is usually enough to make the whole page feel human.

Step 5: Add the SEO title and meta description, then publish (10 minutes)

Each page needs a title tag and a meta description. Google’s own guidance: write titles that are descriptive and concise, and avoid vague ones like “Home” (Google Search Central, title links). For descriptions, Google mostly builds the snippet from your page content, but it may use your meta description when it describes the page better, and it shortens long ones to fit the screen (Google Search Central, snippets).

Write 5 SEO title options (50 to 60 characters) and 5 meta description

options (140 to 155 characters) for this page. Put the main search phrase

near the start: [e.g. bookkeeper for cafes in Leeds]. Describe what the

visitor gets, in plain words. No clickbait, no claims that are not on the page.

Publish, then open the page on your phone. Can you tell what the business does and what to do next within ten seconds? If not, the headline or the top button needs another pass. If you are writing blog articles for the same site next, our guide on using AI to write a blog post that sounds like you uses the same voice-first approach.

Copy-paste prompts for each page

All of these assume the copy brief from Step 1 is already in the chat.

Homepage

Write my homepage copy following the plan we made, section by section,

with a heading for each block. Keep the whole page under 500 words.

Every section must use at least one fact from the brief. One main

action only: [book a call]. Mark any missing fact with [ASK ME].

About page

Write my About page. It is about the customer first and me second:

open with the problem I help with, then why I started doing this work

(use my story: [2 to 3 sentences]), then how I work, then what to do next.

First person, warm, no corporate words. Under 350 words.

Services page

Write a services page for these services: [list with one line each].

For each one: who it is for, the result, what is included, how long it

takes, and the price or “from” price if I gave one. Use a short heading

and a bullet list per service, so visitors can compare by scanning.

Landing page for one offer

Write a landing page for this single offer: [offer]. Visitors arrive from

[an ad / an email / a search for X]. Structure: headline that matches what

they searched, the problem, how it works in 3 steps, what they get, real

proof only, 4 FAQ answers from my objections, one button repeated twice.

FAQ section

Turn the objections in my brief into 6 FAQ questions, phrased the way a

customer would ask them. Answer each in 2 to 3 honest sentences.

If an honest answer is “this is not for you if…”, say that.

A worked example (made up, to show the method)

Say you are a bookkeeper who mostly works with independent cafés. The business and every detail below are invented for this example.

Before (first AI draft with no brief): “Welcome to Ledger Bright, your trusted partner for innovative financial solutions. We help businesses of all sizes unlock their full potential.”

The brief added: customers are café owners with one to three locations. Their problem: receipts in a shoebox and a VAT deadline every quarter. They have tried doing it themselves on a Sunday night. The offer: monthly bookkeeping at a fixed monthly fee, receipts photographed on the phone, a five-line summary every month. Proof: two real client reviews the owner has permission to use.

After (headline and subheadline picked from the options):

Bookkeeping for independent cafés

Snap your receipts, we do the rest. Fixed monthly fee, VAT filed on time,

and a five-line summary of your month that you can read over a coffee.

[Book a 15-minute call]

Same tool, same afternoon. The difference is the brief. The “after” version names the customer, the pain and the next step, and nothing in it needs to be taken on faith.

ChatGPT, Claude or Gemini for website copy?

All three can do this workflow well, and the brief matters far more than the model. In our own use, Claude’s first drafts often come out a little less salesy and ChatGPT is quick at giving lots of short variations, but that is a matter of taste, so try your headline prompt in two of them and keep the one you like. For a closer look at the differences in writing work, see our comparison of ChatGPT vs Claude for writing.

Dedicated “AI website copy generator” tools exist too. Most of them are a form that feeds your answers into a similar prompt. They can save a few minutes, but you still need the brief and the edit, so start with the chat assistant you already have.

Does Google penalise AI-written website copy?

Not for being AI-written. Google’s Search team says it rewards high-quality content however it is produced, and that appropriate use of AI is not against its guidelines. What breaks the rules is using automation mainly to manipulate rankings (Google Search Central Blog, Google Search’s guidance about AI-generated content). Its guide on helpful, people-first content is a good checklist for any page: is it written for your visitors, does it show real expertise, and would they leave satisfied?

Website copy built from your own brief, your own facts and your own voice passes that test easily. Fifty near-identical location pages pumped out by a prompt do not.

Common mistakes, and the quick fix

Buzzword soup (“seamless”, “cutting-edge”, “solutions”). Fix: put a banned-words list in every prompt, and ask “replace every abstract word with a concrete one”.
Too long. AI pads. Fix: give a word limit per section and ask “cut 30 percent without losing any fact”.
Invented proof. Fake numbers, fake quotes. Fix: the UNSUPPORTED check in Step 4, every time.
Five different buttons. Fix: one main action per page, repeated at the top and the bottom.
Same copy on every page. Fix: each page gets its own job in the plan (Step 2), and your headline should match what people searched to land there.
Your product pages read like a catalogue. That is a slightly different job. Our guide to writing product descriptions with AI covers shop pages.

FAQ

Can AI write my whole website?

It can draft all of it. It cannot know your customers, your prices or your proof unless you tell it, and it cannot check whether its claims are true. Plan on the AI doing most of the typing and you doing the thinking and the final edit.

How long should homepage copy be?

Long enough to answer what a first-time visitor needs to decide on the next step, and no longer. For a small service business that is often 300 to 600 words, but there is no fixed rule. If a section does not help someone decide, cut it.

Is it safe to paste client details into ChatGPT or Claude?

Leave out names and anything private, and check what your company allows. Reviews you already publish are fine. Contracts, client emails and personal data are not something to paste into a free chat account without approval.

Should I write the copy first or design the website first?

Copy first, or at least the copy plan from Step 2. Design is much easier when you know which blocks the page needs and roughly how long each one is.

Can I use the same prompts for a website in another language?

Yes. Write the brief in your strongest language, then ask for the copy in the target language with “write as a native speaker in [country], not a translation”. Have a native speaker read it before you publish.

Writing for ears instead of a homepage? The same brief-first habit works for talks. Here is how to write a speech with AI that still sounds like you, with copy-paste prompts.

Your next step

Open a new chat today, paste the interview prompt from Step 1, and answer the questions. By the end of the hour you will have a copy brief, and the homepage headline is twenty minutes after that. Once that works, the next time saver is automating the rest of the small-business admin: see AI automation for small business: what to automate first.

Still choosing a writing tool for the draft? Compare ChatGPT vs Claude vs Gemini for which one fits website and marketing copy.

Want more short, practical lessons like this one? Join Launchpad, our free starting point.