Your LinkedIn profile isn't enough. If you're building something—a company, a reputation, a body of work—you need a home on the internet that you control. Not a profile on someone else's platform. Your own domain. Your own design. Your own rules.

Most founders don't have time to learn web development, and hiring a designer means weeks of back-and-forth for something that should be simple. You're left choosing between expensive custom work or settling for a generic template.

AI changed this. You can now build a genuinely distinctive personal website in 30 minutes. Here's how.

What You Need

1. Your story. Not your CV—your story. Write 3-4 paragraphs about who you are, what you've built, and what you care about. Be specific. "I'm a product builder" is generic. "I've built tech products that made the financial lives of millions of Brazilians easier" is real.

2. A domain. Buy one. lapolazzati.com, yourname.com, whatever. Use Cloudflare or any registrar. Your name is fine.

3. Content to share. Do you write? Research? Build? Figure out what you want the site to showcase. For me: newsletter, podcast, research, reading log, and experience.

The Structure That Works

Homepage: Your portrait, your intro (the story you wrote), what you're building now, and how people can follow your work. No clever metaphors. No "I'm passionate about..." Just who you are and what you do.

Sub-pages: Create separate pages for:

  • Experience / CV
  • Research / Writing
  • Reading (what you're consuming—this is underrated; people want to know what influences you)

Newsletter signup: Place it prominently. If you're not building an email list, you're wasting the traffic.

Contact: A form, not just a mailto link. Use Formsubmit.co (free, no backend needed).

The 30-Minute Process

Step 1: Design direction (5 minutes)

Don't start with "I want a website." Start with "I want it to feel like..." For mine: "European bookshop-café. Warm cream paper. Editorial typography. Like The Economist meets a Milanese design studio."

Be specific about what you DON'T want. No neon gradients. No generic "AI bro" aesthetic. No stock photos of people pointing at whiteboards.

Step 2: Build it (15 minutes)

Use Claude. The prompt matters. Don't say "build me a website." Say:

"Build a personal website for [name]. Single-page centered layout like petergyang.com, with editorial typography (Playfair Display + DM Sans) and a cream/red color palette. Sections: Hero with portrait, Newsletter, Podcast, Experience, Contact form. Portrait image at [path]."

Then specify the pages:

  • "Experience should be a separate page at /experience with full CV timeline"
  • "Create /research for published work"
  • "Create /reading for a reading log"

The more specific you are, the better the result.

Step 3: Deploy (10 minutes)

Use Cloudflare Pages. Free, fast, three commands:

wrangler login
wrangler pages project create yoursite
wrangler pages deploy ./website --project-name yoursite

Add your custom domain in the Cloudflare dashboard. SSL certificate provisions automatically. Done.

What to Avoid

Don't use a template. Templates look like templates. Everyone can tell. AI can build something distinctive if you give it direction.

Don't overthink the design. Pick 2-3 fonts. Pick 2-3 colors. Use them consistently. That's 90% of good design.

Don't write "About Me." Write "Hello, I'm [name]." The second is how humans talk.

Don't add a blog if you won't write. An abandoned blog is worse than no blog. If you write weekly, link to your newsletter or Twitter.

Don't forget mobile. 60% of visitors use phones. AI-built sites are usually responsive by default, but check.

What Happens Next

Link to it everywhere. Email signature. Twitter bio. LinkedIn. Everywhere.

Keep it updated. Add new research. Update your reading log. Don't let it go stale.

Use it as your base. When someone asks "what do you do?", send them there. When you publish something, post it there. Your website is the hub. Everything else is a spoke.

The Real Advantage

I now have a place that's mine. When I write something, when I build something, when I want to share what I'm thinking about—it goes here first. Twitter can change its algorithm. LinkedIn can bury your posts. Your domain? That's yours.

And it took 30 minutes.

If you're building something that matters, you need a home for it. Not a profile. A home.