Generating a Design Using AI

Generating a design is usually the first thing you do in a new Oncord website. You answer a few questions about your business, and Oncord builds a design and a set of example pages to start from.

How the first part goes depends on whether you already have a website. If you do, Oncord can look at it and pick up your logo, colours and wording. If you don't, you describe your business instead and Oncord works from that.

Before You Begin

• You need administrator access to Dashboard > Website > Designs.
• Have your logo file ready if you want to upload your own.

Starting the Generator

• Go to Dashboard > Website > Designs.
• Click + New Website Design.

The generator will work through four steps: Business, Logo, Goal and Design. You can see where you are at any point, and move back if you want to change an answer.

The first question is Do you currently have a website? Your answer decides which of the two paths below you follow.

Choosing Your Goal

From here the steps are the same either way.

Oncord asks what the main thing is that you want visitors to do on your site. This shapes the calls to action in the pages it builds, so pick the option that matters most to your business.

Choose Something Else if none of the options fit, or if you are not sure yet.

Click Next. 

Picking a Design

Oncord now generates a set of designs from your answers, which takes a moment.

Start by picking one. The chat panel in the next step works on whichever design you have selected, so choose a design first and refine it after that.

• Click a design to open a full preview.
• Click Close Preview to go back and look at another one.

Everything stays editable afterwards, so the design only needs to be close, not perfect.

Adjusting Your Design

The chat panel beside the previews is Oncord's AI Agent, working on the design you are looking at. Rather than hunting for the right setting, you can describe what you want in plain words and watch it change.

Things you can ask for:

• Make the header darker.
• Change the tagline to "Straight answers on your tax, all year round".
• Use a warmer colour for the buttons.
• Rewrite the services section so it mentions bookkeeping.

You can also set your brand styling directly:

• Under Colours, choose the colours used for accents and buttons. If you have brand colours, paste their Hex codes.
• Under Fonts, choose a Headings font and a Body font. You can filter the list by style, such as sans serif, display, script or monospace.

The same AI Agent is available throughout Oncord once your site is built. To learn what else it can do, see Working With The AI Agent.

Generating Your Site

When you are happy with the design, click the tick icon, Use this Design.

A dialog opens to confirm how the site should be created.

If your Oncord website is empty, click Generate my site. Oncord creates the design along with a set of example pages, then takes you to them.

If Your Oncord Website Already Has Pages

If you have already built pages in Oncord, the dialog asks how to handle them first.

• Create new pages: Your existing pages stay as they are. New pages are created offline at /new-site/, or the next available numbered address such as /new-site1/, so you can work without affecting the live site.
• Delete existing pages: Your existing designs and pages are deleted and replaced.

Create new pages is the safer choice in most cases, and the one we recommend unless you are starting over deliberately.

If you choose Delete existing pages, you are asked to type CONFIRM before anything is removed. This cannot be undone.

Tips and Notes

• The design and pages are fully editable, so the generated result is a starting point rather than a final answer.
• The designs you are shown stay the same while you work through the wizard, so you will not lose one by moving back a step.
• If you would rather start from an empty design and build it yourself, click Create with code instead at the bottom left of the generator.