Full Transcript for AI Tools Make Web Developers Better, Not Redundant!

does X, Y, and Z, whereas Google's sending David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: you a specific kind of string and saying, look, you let's position your page here. Whereas the AI tools are kind of taking a a broader sense of I'll take a piece of these articles. I know that this company talks about this quite frequently. These David Bancroft: Hmm. James Coates: are the services they do, these are the recommendations. I think these would be a good fit for you. And we've actually found ourselves coming up a lot more. inquiries now where people are saying, I found you in Jet GPT or you know, it was an AI search, so it's it's interesting. David Bancroft: Is that referred to as GEO rather than SEO via the language models? Is that right? Yeah. James Coates: No, it's I think if you get SEO right, content on the site, doing all the basics right, all of the other stuff is David Bancroft: Mm. Mm. James Coates: is all you know, it's it doesn't make a difference. It's not the same. It's all the same. David Bancroft: It's all digital, isn't it? I mean, it's all digital. actually I've received, I speak in someone only today about this. I've received two inquiries who are now clients of mine via chat GPT recommendations. So I specialize as a recruiter in the MSP, so managed service provider space specifically in the, in the Southeast, London, the Southeast. And twice people have gone to GPT and said, Who should I be speaking with? You know, I'm looking to add a IT engineer or a service desk professional. Which recruiter should I be speaking with? And I've come up trumps twice there and converted those into clients. And again, I haven't actively invested in that, but I'm doing something right. And I like to think it's possibly to do with LinkedIn and the digital cookie crumb I'm leaving there for GPT that's being fed as well by Google, but it's a powerful channel, isn't it? James Coates: Yeah, well I we ask like you I suppose it's how deep you want to go with your questions, but what did you type in? What was your journey? If you can get that information from and most David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: people, especially in AI at the moment, you're everyone's like kind of new and they're quite excited. So they'll tell you, I typed in this and I found that and I did it and you're like, okay, and you're writing all this down. David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: Giving it to your AI note taker to write it down for you. David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: but i it's it's interesting. But I like the way you said I typed into well, they come from GPT and not Chat GPT. I think that's the worst name for, you know. David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: When you say I Googled it, you you know I'm David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: gonna say I I just it's a mouthful, chat GPT, you know? Claw. I like Claw 'cause it's short and sharp. GPT, you've you've abbreviated it. David Bancroft: It is, yeah. Yeah. I have abbreviated it. My co-host who I do the, just the two of us episodes with James, he's called his GPT Quill. So he's just named it in the way that people might have named cars in the past or something like that. He's just called it Quill. but, yeah, GPT for me. and actually talking of AI and it was something that I probably wanted to bring up with you to be honest, but, you, sort of introduced it there. How do you see AI as a threat to yourself, impact media, obviously the web dev industry as a whole, because I know, and this isn't exactly a, a newsflash you can jump onto lovable or. Base 44 or any of the other ads that I see on YouTube videos. And yeah, I can create an app. I can create a website inside of an hour, a day, a week, depends on how many tokens I want to spend. And it's fully functional. But I guess how functional is it? And what's the nuance? What's the difference between what you guys would do and what I'll just get out of the box, if you like, from Lovable or Base 44. James Coates: Yeah, it's in some cases on the front end, nothing. Because you're seeing ga you know you're you're seeing something that that works. It's the David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: the gubbins behind the scenes that are the the the sometimes the problems that you'll find. Now there's a good example David Bancroft: Okay. James Coates: we had a client we onboarded and had this this custom plugin. we don't investigate the plugins but if it's if it's got updates now because it was custom it's not going to achieve sort of automatic updates or anything but it was linked to one of their CRM systems. Now All of a sudden the CRM system stops talking to the plugin because they've changed something in the CRM. Now, when we began looking at it, it was like, hang on a minute. This is this plugin is actually been built by Lovable. Now, it's again not a problem, it's it's generated the code, but David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah. James Coates: the the the someone in their team had created it, asked it to create it, put it in a plugin, it ticked the box and it worked until it did, and then someone's got to maintain that. So some of these things David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: are Great if you can build and understand the platform and and everything else, but if you don't know what you're asking for, that's that's the problem and and I think from David Bancroft: course. James Coates: the f the fear, I mean there is it there has to be a a fear here of like, is the is this the end of web design and development, or are we gonna need you anymore? And and I Did that person say that to someone that's sitting there with his screwdriver and he's putting in the screws when he comes or the now, the hammer in the now, and he's got a nail gun, he's going, Duck, duck, and he's going, my god, my job's over. No, you buy yourself a nail gun. And I think if David Bancroft: Yep. Yep. Yep. James Coates: you give AI tools to developers and to designers and people that use them, we are just in this area of we're gonna use I mean, there's gonna be some low level

stuff that's gonna disappear here. but The people that are going to use it, it's just going to get stuff more efficient and faster. I do think David Bancroft: Okay, yeah. James Coates: businesses will be using design systems and AI tools to generate things that they didn't want to pay for anyway. Forms and bits and pieces, and you think I just need it to be branded, I need to look professional. It's not worth paying David Bancroft: Mm-mm. Mm-mm. James Coates: for anyway. Get that system. But when you want the complex things, you give it to someone that knows what they're doing and you plan it out, you will now get that done much faster than for you getting better value for money out of it. So you can do it yourself, David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah. James Coates: you can get a now go. And you can nail up that thing yourself. But I guarantee the person, the DIY person, I know this from a pure fact. I've built my own bean shed in the garden, and I had a nail gun, it took me about three weeks. But you pay a craftsman to come round with it, you know, and he's done that probably in a day. So because David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah. James Coates: he knows what he's doing, he understands this, and he's knows to look out for that and this and all the things that you go, now David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: I've just put this through a crack bit of wood, or you learn along the way, and there's still things that David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: AI You won't know until you've you've made that mistake. David Bancroft: And again, I think we're talking about often with websites, we're talking about quite superficial things. So what we see and how it might present itself, how it might work. But again, I'm not a web developer. I've never trained to code. And as such, I think I know what I want from a website likely chances are. I really don't know the first thing about what I actually need from a website. And I think it's quite dangerous actually giving the tools to people that have these good ideas about how it might look, what it might do, but without any real thought what's it even trying to achieve? Because it's not just meant to look good, is it? A website's meant to achieve something, whether it be attracting attention, whether it be click through to leads or capturing data or whatever it might be. I think a lot of these apps won't necessarily do that natively. And unless you can command it as you have with GPT or any of the other models, if you can't command it like a pro, you're only ever going to get so much, aren't you, James Coates: all of the this is where I think there's different avenues. So you've website templates, already built sites that existed for many, many years. Now David Bancroft: Of I have, yep. James Coates: your Someone going in as a business owner using AI, yeah, it's David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: it's a no-brainer because you can build that yourself, but maybe your first website because you don't really know what you want anyway. So

anything's better than nothing, but you're you're practically David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah, okay. James Coates: going in at I'm getting a template, but it's building it for you. But the end result has been customized around what you need because you've instructed it. Okay, now David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: what it tends to generate is a kind of a HTML file, so it's front-end, it's you can't go in and edit it like you would say a WordPress website. So if you Want to make future changes, you've got to do that bit again, or you've you've got to be the person in control because you were the one that set it up, and that seems to be what we're finding is when you have someone that has built something, you know, and David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: a friend of mine who was like, got a site, and he's built himself his own little CRM and he's he's cracking away and everything. I was like, Look, my advice to you on this is crack on, but you're doing this because you want to save a few hundred quid in License fees, you know, because I pay the you know X amount of people paying this. But when you build this, it's gonna go somewhere. You need to put it on a server, you know, it's it's gonna need maintenance, gonna support. If you want to put an update in, you're gonna pay someone, or are you gonna do it, which your time is valuable? Are you gonna pay a team of people to update you or a person? Because if so, you've got to put value on that. That's gonna be more than 200 quid. The server might be 100 quid on itself. You know, you're gonna pay David Bancroft: Mm. Yeah, yeah, of course it is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. James Coates: an agency to to look after it, maybe a few hundred quid a month, and then you've got the fact David Bancroft: Mmm. James Coates: that I'm gonna pay you for more time. You know, David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: it it's I think it's a lot of people will get burnt before they learn. I really do. David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: But the the I think the long term of this is you just have another it's a just another platform. It's like learning Adobe Photoshop, you know, this time round David Bancroft: Mm-hmm. James Coates: to when fortunately my time come after scanning and repo and doing it all and actually being out of draw because I would never have survived. But I I landed at Photoshop five. David Bancroft: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. James Coates: And you could do all this by that by that time and David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: this is the next level. You you might not need some of those tools as much of us in some of the I platforms. David Bancroft: And again, we see Canva and that doesn't immediately spell the end of the creative industry, does it? You know, it challenges certain things, but I don't know about you, I'm sick of all of the AI posters that I see on LinkedIn and social. At first, that's James Coates: I thought that's good at first. I really did. David Bancroft: the point. How long did that at first period last? mean,

outside of a month, was, this all the same, isn't it? You know? James Coates: It it's it every local show pub is doing something and they've got the same style and everything and and that's David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: that's probably where the human element comes in. If David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: you can ask like now you have a designer, a developer, whatever you want, you've now got them at your disposal. David Bancroft: Hmm. Yeah. James Coates: But you still need to guide them. You can't just say, can you just rip me off the Coca-Cola advert for my company and stuff? Because it will look like the Coca-Cola advert, but David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: it won't have any originality to it because it's not thinking David Bancroft: Mm-hmm. James Coates: differently. Whereas a human might say, I love that concept. Can we try this? This is my style. I want to try this, David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: this, this, and it. If you guide that, you're getting the results there quicker. But again, it is coming back to that now gun. If you've got that, David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: you know what you're doing and how to how to tackle that process, you're going to get a better result than someone that just said, is build me a website or design me a brochure or a leaflet and I want to feature this, this and this. The other dangerous David Bancroft: Hmm. Yeah. James Coates: thing about all these posters is, well now I can have whatever I want on it. So now I've got this abundance of well actually this is a my local school. It's like, we're doing a cowboy event, we're doing this, we're doing that, we're doing that. So there's all of these pictures on this poster. It's like, what do I focus on? But AI is not giving David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah, jumbled. James Coates: me pushback to say, by the way, you really should focus on one thing here. David Bancroft: Yeah, well it's a people pleaser isn't it? I mean it's there to indulge you and to make you feel good about yourself so it's... James Coates: Yeah, what's your idea? I love it. brilliant, it's a really good idea. You ask someone else, it goes, or you give it to a different AI toy and a terrible idea. Whose idea was that? It was actually yours, but in a different chat. Yeah. David Bancroft: Yeah, exactly. So no, yeah, yeah, no, that's it. So I think it, yeah, that constant repetitive duplicate rinse repeat. Yeah. It's, grown on pretty quickly, hasn't it? And as quickly as these trends again, which are driven by AI tours come and go, I think we had the eighties one, didn't we last month where everyone looked like they'd been, or, know, in Miami vice or whatever. It's so James Coates: They're so good. They are really good. Yeah. David Bancroft: cool, but it. It can only last so long. think this was it last year or earlier this year, there was the, like the toy box wasn't there. So it's like an old, James Coates: l yeah, yeah, yeah. David Bancroft: so you have, would have, for example, yourself with a, an Apple Mac and a headset and, whatever else is. Yeah. It was, it was good while it lasts, but only lasts so James Coates: But that David Bancroft: long. James Coates: to create that, you know, that you go into the the process of doing that without AI and it's a time intensive process. Obviously what you're not seeing David Bancroft: Mm. yeah. James Coates: is most of these things are done freely and doing under a free account. It's using resources to do that. So it's costing someone money or using a lot of energy to create that bit of fun that someone's gonna like David Bancroft: Yeah. Mega. Yeah. Yeah. James Coates: for thirty seconds and then not worry about again. But that David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: is that is taking people away from that craft of you know, David Bancroft: Mmm. Mmm. James Coates: you wouldn't necessarily pay someone maybe to do that now because it's like I can get that done in in 30 seconds, you know, and and and paying nothing for it. And that's the main difference where people are seeing that superficial, it's an image, it's not doing anything more. And that's David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: that's the danger I think from AI stepping into the creative David Bancroft: But yeah, James Coates: side of things. David Bancroft: but that's the crossover, isn't it? Between a short impact, look, there's a toy that looks like me and actually I'm gonna trust this model with building me a whole website and expect it to channel inbound inquiries. They're two very different things, aren't they? James Coates: People do it though. People do it. I know someone is who's like, you spent and you'll spend some time. It's not it's not a quick thing because you're you're still questioning, asking questions, change this, change that, and you're then becoming that architect for that. Which I David Bancroft: Yeah, of course. Yeah, yeah, yeah. James Coates: see becoming a lot more say someone that's very entrepreneurial, you'll be able build products really quick. and I think David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: see a lot more products and ideas coming to fruition that you would not have had the possibility of doing before. And I think that's a good thing. but David Bancroft: Mm. Mm. James Coates: yes, certainly people building their own websites. But again, unless you've got that, and this is where the designer comes in, the designer's got a creative flair, otherwise, they wouldn't be in design. You can spot an AI-generated David Bancroft: Yep. James Coates: website a mile away. And in the same David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: process, when the the guy shared it with me, I was like, mate, content-wise, it's great, it's got loads of stuff on there, it has everything on there. Like the navigation was like drowning in in links, but David Bancroft: Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. James Coates: You you also like what happens when you want to change the content? you just you just tell it to update and I was like, Well that's that's fine,

but again, you're putting yourself in the business being now David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah. Of course you are. James Coates: you're you're now the maintenance guy for the tech team, whereas you know, ideally you want to be doing something more growing David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: the business rather than you know focusing on the website. David Bancroft: So hypothetically, if someone built something in one of these environments, so say, Lovable, because I see more of that platform than any of the others. So someone built something in Lovable, but then they decided, actually, I don't have the time to do these updates. I'm not really going to be the sort of CMS dude. We want to use an agency. Would you be able to replatform something that had been built in Lovable to WordPress and manage it from there, or would you have to build it from the ground up? James Coates: I've not I've come across that lovable app that I said was put into a plugin. but David Bancroft: Mmm. James Coates: anything else, we've been fortunate that no one's presented us with with lovable code. David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: but I'd imagine that because it's got to go into WordPress, you'll have to do a replatform, you have to get it in there. And and David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: whilst you're doing that, you'll question the fact that why Why does it do that? How does it how does it work? Why you ask those questions before you know it, you're rebuilding David Bancroft: Hmm. James Coates: it anyway in a different way. someone would have asked, we've David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah, that's interesting. James Coates: got all this in one go, and it works. It only works David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: because maybe the first or second iteration that come across will ship it. But when you actually David Bancroft: Mm-mm. James Coates: start to sit down and say, How do we want this to work? actually that's gonna talk to that system, that's gonna not talk, you'll then you'll build it in a different way anyway. So but they can be done. David Bancroft: Yeah, okay. James Coates: They can be done. It's is whether you'd want to bring that across. I mean some people will, but it is yeah, I say it's whether you'd want David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: to kind of just refactor that and put that straight into the David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: website. And we we've had another one actually, not not so much a lovable, but a client was presented with a a solution said, we've been told that we can have this new site and it's being that the integration's been done. I'll get it sent to you by the end of the day. Okay. I think it came across and it was like, it's it's on Drupal and we thought no the the site's got to speak to WordPress. So no Rose, David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: give me a couple of hours and I'll get it in WordPress. And and ultimately again the person doing it was someone David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: that's that's like confident in AI but not knowledgeable.

So they're saying like David Bancroft: Yeah. Yes. James Coates: they're seeing this this website come out and they're going, give it to me in WordPress. Right. And David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: all it was doing was taking a HTML kind of block. And basically David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: injecting it and putting it into a WordPress thing and then David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: black page. So you've got WordPress, it's ticking the box, HTML. David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: Can you edit those content? No, that's HTML. There's no style David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: sh it's it's that. And I think the David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: the non-technical person won't understand that from that side. They see what they want to David Bancroft: Hmm. Hmm. yeah, I'm sure they wouldn't. James Coates: see. And that and that's yeah, it is if sometimes it's it's not a great position to be in because you've got to kind of educate at the same time. You've got to say, we can't do this David Bancroft: So these days, James, how do you find or what would be even recommended, even if there is one, time that websites should be up for? I know there used to be a refresh rate where you'd probably want to be refreshing a website every three or four years or so, but is that still the case or does it move quicker now? Really? James Coates: No, well longer. it depends it depends what you're trying to achieve, what you're doing, and the platform you're on and and how well Keep it maintained. David Bancroft: Okay, yeah. James Coates: the the technology has changed in the say in the last five years. What we were building five years ago is not what we're building today. You know, I remember David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: as a kid watching a Gillette advert, and it's like, our brand new race. I'm like, my god, you've only just brought out the last one, and it's very much that technology shifts, the way you David Bancroft: Yep. James Coates: do things progresses, and yeah, there's always a better version basically out there, and you can you know expand what you're doing. However, David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: we've got sites that we might have we've got one. Especially we launched in 2017 that is still going nine years later and they're David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: on WordPress, we've kept the website up to date. We probably David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: do updates on that on a weekly basis. They're having new features, sites, David Bancroft: Really? James Coates: new ground. But it's it's a constant thing. And they know that at some point, the way that it was built and the like the the core of WordPress, it's gonna David Bancroft: Mm. Mm. James Coates: be changed because it this was on something called classic editor. Okay, and the classic editors will come out, it has this block editor, which is a new way of doing work. Their site still lives on the classic editor. We need to bring them into the block editor. And these things of how you

evolve it, but you can do that within the Same system, so you're not David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: needed to change the front end unless there's a branding update or something changes where you know the direction of business changes and we want all new content. But most of sites David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: we build now are very modular built, so you can kind David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: of see that I can create an infinite number of page layouts with these blocks, and it might be that you just introduce new blocks, but yeah, David Bancroft: Hmm. Yeah. James Coates: lifespan. Most people promote four years. We try to say between six or seven would be an average lifespan of our sites. David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: but could be longer if you maintain them, could be less if you decide that actually we want to do something completely different now and try a different angle, yeah. David Bancroft: Go a different direction. Yeah, absolutely. And I guess it's whether it's stagnant as well. You're talking about a client there, so it's nine years, but they're consistently adding, they're consistently evolving and enhancing that. But if it's just sat there as the site that was, I mean, that limits what it will ever do for you, James Coates: This comes David Bancroft: doesn't it? James Coates: the timing as well, comes to the investment. now, if you are only David Bancroft: Yeah, okay, yeah. James Coates: willing to inverse a certain bit of money because you're not actively advertising to it, then you're, you know, like you're gonna want to leave that there longer anyway, even though it's doing nothing. but then you have some people David Bancroft: Hmm. Yeah. Yeah. James Coates: that you know you wanna you wanna be promo, you wanna be updating all the time. and David Bancroft: Hmm. James Coates: you buy Not necessarily spending over your budget, but you'd rather invest in something knowing that you've got the right foundations that's gonna last you longer. David Bancroft: Mm-mm. James Coates: some clients we have that have legacy sites, I think go back to 2011, something like that, and they don't touch them, but they we keep and maintain for them. But they either don't have but again, they're in a position David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: where they're like, well. The site's not that important to us. So we need one. It's David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: there. We don't really use the back end, but the front end is David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: still fairly modern. It doesn't look out of date. So it's like, well, it's it's okay. David Bancroft: I think sometimes a site is just validation that there's a company. do you? yeah, that's appropriate names because yeah, that's... James Coates: That's what this is. We call it a validation website, funny enough. Yeah. You do things like tenders and all you know, and that kind of thing. I need to see a couple of case studies, I need to see some accreditations, who you are, what David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: you do. It says it there, it's nothing overly fancy, validating David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: who I am so I can get in touch. David Bancroft: So just to break away a little bit from websites and WordPress, and I'm going to ask about WordPress in a minute, more specifically, but do you have a book recommendation? James Coates: To fix a problem. David Bancroft: It's not, no, this isn't a free diagnostics, but yeah, very specifically I'd like to know about, no, I don't have that, but I do have a question there. book recommendation from you because I think you like me and we spoke about this just in the pre chat chat and you're not a big reader, physical reader, but you like an audio book exactly the same as me. James Coates: I love a bit of Audible. Yeah. I've done, yeah, probably over a hundred books, I think, in Audible. but the one I'd I'd recommend, the one that made you you read some and you think, it's interesting, you know, I love a biography or whatever, but Cal Newport Deep Work. it's about kind of finding your focus. Now David Bancroft: Okay. James Coates: I You you have something like he called he describes in their flow and it is actually come up by a psychologist and I can't remember the guy. I can remember his name, I can see it in my head. David Bancroft: Hmm. James Coates: It's like Russian and it's really, really long. I don't know how pronounce it. He came up with the term flow. Okay. And David Bancroft: Okay, I want to ask you. Yeah. James Coates: it's like when you're Going in between easy tasks, and it's it's like you you're you don't need a lot of focus. If you do a lot David Bancroft: Mm-hmm. James Coates: of kind of really stout things or easy, quick, easy things, you you can't practice the muscle of focus or concentration. So you need to find things that you really enjoy, and that's where you can get into your flow of your deep work. And he explains that David Bancroft: Mmm. James Coates: in the book, but I struggle with focus, especially in in the day. I find emails and notifications and everything else. Before you know it, your your your brain is scrambled. But then at night David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: I find this this flow and it's like being in a walk zone, you put your headphones on, you've got some music on in the background. And before you know it's three o'clock in the morning, but you've got a load done and you've you've enjoyed the process. So that David Bancroft: Mm-mm. James Coates: that book changed the way that I understood that that flow and how you can kind of like switch off and you know, listen. I listen to kind of like a focus playlist as well. So like there's no lyrics and David Bancroft: well, okay. James Coates: the songs and things, so you can kind of that and it's trying to find that state of flow. But I discovered that from from from the deep work book or flow, if you if anyone else likes hard. David Bancroft: Yeah, awesome recommendation. We don't have it

in our a quick brew bookcase, but we do now. So I appreciate that. In the virtual bookcase it goes and we always link the books as well in the show notes. So if anyone wants to check that out, look in the show notes. James Coates: I haven't even got an affiliate link. David Bancroft: No, exactly, damn it. I have to work on that. Should we make flow word of the day? James Coates: Slow. Yeah, it's good. David Bancroft: Let's do it. Flow is word of the day. So getting back to specifically WordPress, do you have some WordPress facts for me? I haven't, I mean, I'm very much door-stepping you with this, but I know when you spoke in the past, you've said things like X amount of percent of websites in the world are built on WordPress or I think I remember you telling me was it White House or something like that is on WordPress at some point, but have you got any sort of hard hitting WordPress facts off your cuff? James Coates: It's still it's still the biggest CMS. I think it's it's David Bancroft: Are they? James Coates: dropped down. It might be under forty three percent now, but it's about four it was around forty three percent of all websites for WordPress. But they can be WordPress.com, which is like the smaller ones and the WordPress kind of dot all which is the ones that people self-host. But yeah, it's a big it's a big market. I do see it decreasing. David Bancroft: Yeah. Yeah. James Coates: I do see it decreasing where the smaller ends of the market will move to things like AI built websites. I do see that. So but David Bancroft: Mmm. James Coates: I I still firmly believe That from a WordPress perspective or from a client perspective, you've got the right the right client that you know you're not. One man band looking for a website, you are a team David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: of people that rely on that on a platform. I don't want David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: to be doing code pushes to to make updates, having a CMS, whatever it is, we're gonna say WordPress because we believe it's the one that you know we're investing in anyway. but you're still gonna need to make those changes in a in a CMS, it's gonna be where people are still gonna sit. Wherever that percentage decreases, I imagine it will, but yeah, how's that? David Bancroft: Yeah, no, and was, was their market share because they just hit the market with something that bloggers were able to use really easily. And that whole CMS was just so frictionless. that how they managed to get as much of the market as they did in the first place WordPress or? James Coates: I I think it's yeah, it's just ease of use more than anything. David Bancroft: Hmm. James Coates: the fact that y people can Change content, but it's not so much the end user because it's if you bought a website, unless you went David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: to WordPress.com, you're not really the one making that decision. It's the developers that are instructing it. So you need you they're making it easy David Bancroft: Understood. James Coates: for the developer to say, Can I build this content? But also, can the user at the end of the day maintain it? And that's where WordPress has won. Many people, I you know, being in web, I see all the adverts pop up and choose my CMS. I go on there, it's like it's built. for developers i'm like but i want it built for the client you know so the client can use it after we give it to you because that's that's where David Bancroft: Right, Yeah. James Coates: the you know they they're the ones that are going to be using it and wordpress is David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: very good for that so i think just out of usability and ease of use they've you know they've grown their market share David Bancroft: Something I've really enjoyed over sort of past years is some of your content on LinkedIn that you share about web development and web ideas and some of the little tips and tricks and hacks and sheets. And I really love that you've opened yourself to those kind of, that kind of knowledge and that kind of information, because a lot of people wouldn't, know, they'd hoard that for themselves. And, I love that you give away for free, just little crumbs every now and again. And I remember reading something about images and the weight of images on websites and how that can really affect the performance of a site. And it's not something that I'd ever considered. Obviously it's not aligned with what I do, but yeah, looking into it, that along with many other things, just to make a profound effect or difference, don't they, to the way your website performs. James Coates: Yeah, I I mean this is you know, anyone listening to this that's in web will go, that's a very small thing, you know, everyone knows that. But it but it this is David Bancroft: But that's it, you're in web, you know that. We're not in web, so we don't. James Coates: it's a prime example. You even clients don't know. and you've got people uploading ten meg files for a David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: one meg spa you know, a tiny little space file that you don't need and one meg will be huge still. David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: and every time someone visits a page, if that image is not showing at the the size it needs to be and the compression, y it's using bandwidth, it's using the resources from the server, it's is something is David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: b you can also you're loading that off say from a phone. We we do performance tests on websites and we're like, that page is sixty-five meg, you know, 'cause it's got a David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: twenty-five meg image on there and a thirty meg video and and so forth. And and people don't really understand, and this is coming back to your AI, unless you instruct that to say I need compression in my images, or I need the images to be as small as possible size without losing resolution or or quality, then people are gonna throw in their their massive images. So it's yeah, it's small

things, small things. But there's lots of things. And and going back to the content, I've been Well, the game on that lately. Yeah. David Bancroft: I was going to ask you about that. I don't want to bring it up, but yeah, you've been a bit off the game there. Cause I used to enjoy seeing those things pop up because that's what I like to see in my networks. I like information and knowledge sharing. I love the opportunity to just pick up something which I otherwise might not have known, or I maybe even didn't know I wanted to know, but I found that interesting. And I see different providers, different suppliers across all different industry verticals. And I think sometimes those little free little tips, tricks. cheats, they're really quite valuable, I think. I don't know, can we see you back in the saddle on that soon, James, or? James Coates: gee, just been busy. I I like I've got this this I used to be weekly doing an update and doing something and the social used David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: to be you know daily and I've probably not done nothing for well over twelve. Every now and again David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: there'll be a fit, but it's nothing consistent. And coming back to say the book we were talking about, a deep work and having that focus, it's allocating a piece of time in the diary to say, I'm gonna do that regardless, and block David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: out that time. But you need focus, you need that focus and flow to find that to be able to do it, and and interruptions don't help. you know, if if David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah. James Coates: if anyone watching, listening, etc. you you're trying to find your that that piece of flow. Working in a busy office, you know, where you've shoulder tappers, this, that, and the other, it is a nightmare. Remote working David Bancroft: Mm. Mm. James Coates: is great, but you've then got all of the electronic notifications that are pesting your left, right and centre. So it's just yeah, it's a it's a challenging one. And I will get back to it when I can find the two hours like it'll probably be up two o'clock in the morning on a Friday night. David Bancroft: Can we agree or can we make an agreement that you share this episode when it comes out on LinkedIn? Perhaps you can just, there James Coates: I will share this episode, yeah. David Bancroft: you go. So that will put you back into your flow and James Coates: Yeah. David Bancroft: maybe with a catalyst for your re-entry into LinkedIn land. Cause it rewards you for showing up. It rewards you for consistency, doesn't it? It doesn't want you to just dip in and out every so often. wants. James Coates: some of the ridiculous things that like you you create a very, very well-tailored piece that's very informal, you know, informative and you share that and you're like a hundred impressions or is it five hundred impressions or something. And then you share an absolute donut thing and there's David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: fifty-five thousand. You think, What? How does why it's yeah? David Bancroft: a picture of your cat or something like that. James Coates: I think it was like a a jumper. my wife had all my wife's mate brought around a jumper. And she says, David Bancroft: Hmm. James Coates: I ordered I don't want it was something like I I don't want a message, please have it blank. And that got printed on the jumper and I like, my I as soon as I see it, I went, That is brilliant. You keep that, that is great. Took a photo David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah. James Coates: LinkedIn loved it. David Bancroft: Yeah, talking of messaging, I'm quite a fan of opticians. James Coates: Yeah. David Bancroft: I don't know if any of our eagle-eyed audience will be able to see that. There we James Coates: No, I won't get it up then, yeah. See it's an eye test. David Bancroft: go. test the viewers on YouTube. How far down can you get? I'm onto the fifth line, I think. Probably don't want to see anymore. God knows what's in the really small print. James Coates: I do training videos and usually just recorded very similar to this and yeah it's it's that Easter egg. So it's David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah, James Coates: wise I have people that are not looking at me and they're going, Let's have a look at his background. What's he got up here? What is that? David Bancroft: Yeah, absolutely. Talking of EagleEyes, something else that you very much did use to share, which I always liked, you would talk about some user experiences that weren't so clean. you know, as someone who spends their time improving their clients. websites and the journeys that their users have. Sometimes you'd be met with a most absurd user journey on a website that you were using and you'd share that wouldn't you, think. Is that right? James Coates: Yeah, I yeah, I think would have been just social posts. You come across something, it's trying to you never know who the creator is as well. Like, it could be that it's David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah, of course. James Coates: the business owner's son, nephew, etcetera, and everything, and it's not it's trying to be nice so some people can kind of throw everyone under David Bancroft: Yeah, yep. James Coates: the bus, but it it's trying to point out the improvements on things. No. And David Bancroft: Yes. Yeah. James Coates: it it's not necessarily just saying, my God, look at this, it's terrible. but trying to look at it from a, you know, we went on this and you've seen this form. If you if you try and do this, this and this, this will make you better. So it's trying to David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: see the positives in things rather than just in some ways just just saying, caught look at this terrible website. Because most of the things again, it's David Bancroft: Calling it out. James Coates: it's down to the audience. You can have some really, really terrible websites that generate a really lot of business. the market, David Bancroft: Mmm. Mmm. James Coates: the audience

could be completely different, but it it's sometimes the way that a website works or that general usability that doesn't change. You know, the same way you pick up a remote control on the telly and everything's in the same way or or you get in a car and the car door is exactly where you expect the car door and the steering wheel to be. David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: Because that's that's usability, it's tried and tested. And there's certain things that work really well in websites and we just we just point out. So David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, okay. So where do you see websites going then in the next five years? Because tech is moving at a faster pace than I think it's ever, ever moved out at the moment, seemingly. But websites as we know them today, are they what we'll know in even five years time, do you think, James Coates: I hope so, but my gut feel is yes. you know, you think, well, okay, I'm gonna use AI to I don't know, find I don't need a website anymore, I'm gonna use AI to just tell me who the builder I need to use. But how David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: would you find that builder? How would the AI be able to tell you which builder to use without content. And a website is that platform. It's whether all the marketing comes David Bancroft: Yes. Yes. Of course it is. James Coates: into play or not, but you still need that central piece to share with everyone. So you update David Bancroft: Yeah. Yeah. James Coates: all your content. So I still see websites being around for a long time unless how they work, i.e. like David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: Bringing out the duo phone, and I'm like, is that another resolution you've got a design for? But it it is how they work is something different. David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah James Coates: Whether you're walking around like Mark Zuckerberg with glasses on your face, and you know, you're seeing the website come down or something is another thing. That's just an adaptation of how you know we'd have to change. But David Bancroft: Glasses, yeah. Mm-mm. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Because actually thinking about that AI search, almost you can get more niche, more granular, more on point, and you could probably manicure your online content and refine it and refine it and refine it and make it better and better and better for those models to actually pick you up. So perhaps websites have become... even more relevant because in the past we used to rely upon a human finding a site and we would invest in some SEO and try and get the first page of Google. But you're looking at someone scrolling through the top 10 options. But now give it to GPT. It's going to look at the web full stop. And if if someone wants a WordPress agency in Essex, well, then your websites could drive them to you, isn't it? So perhaps the content that we're putting in is will become even more valuable than it's ever been. James Coates: content's a lot easier to create now as well. is whether you David Bancroft: Hmm. James Coates: can create unique content. We not get penalized David Bancroft: Okay. James Coates: for having so much content that's very, very similar. But one of our David Bancroft: Are we talking about AI slop here? James Coates: A AI slop. Yeah, I mean, but don't be wrong, I'm using AI to write content. We're doing a like a brochure for impact and I need something and I'm throwing in my ideas of what I need. I'm getting that back and then I'm saying, okay, change that and include these points and do that. But it's going to write it probably in a better way than I'm going to write it. So I'm using that. But whether that's classed as slop, I don't know, but you're you're you're changing how it's not, you're not just saying write me an article. You're saying I need a a paragraph on this. And can I say David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: what I and I use something called Whisper Flow. so I don't I don't David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah, it's a very very good app, isn't it? Yeah James Coates: I I I don't even type anymore, I just put your finger on it, you know, and I I go, look, I'm after this, I'm trying to make this point. This is the audience I'm trying, that's what I'm trying to angle. You know, there's a few points that I'd make, and I might get a couple of sentences, but I might struggle to get the pen on the paper first time round, and David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: it'll be an absolute, brain dump, whereas it can refine it and make it clearer. So that's David Bancroft: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. James Coates: that's still very good, and you can get more content David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: on the site quicker. one David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: of our well say you're coming back to sort of like the the users, one of our David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: our values is is always about the user and and we contemplated this in the last couple of years on changing should it be human? Should it be about all about you the human? But it's like it's actually David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: not because a user could be a bot and you're creating this website not necessarily for a human now to intervene like interact with, it's can I get that contents thing by all the AI tools, you know, so David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: we can get recommended. David Bancroft: So that almost start coming back to what we used to, we, I'm talking about me, obviously not you. I'm sure you'd speak on levels above, but I would think of meta tags and all that sort of thing in the past where you just had to have these keywords, phrase, meta tags littered all over your website. Yeah. Just, James Coates: stuff to David Bancroft: make sure there's a, I even remember when people used to write words and color them white on a white background. So as they were sat on the page to give it ranking. But obviously not visible to user because it was just, you know, words to improve ranking. James Coates: You get down the bottom of the side and you it's a great big white footer. And then

you hover it David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: highlight going, okay, yeah. David Bancroft: Yeah, exactly. Recruitment Southend, recruitment Wickford, James Coates: Yeah. David Bancroft: recruitment Billerickey. But yeah, so, okay, now that, yeah, that's again, that's interesting. So much, so much to learn. And I think it's evolving, isn't it? But the core remains that it's a way to promote, a way to validate yourself as a business. But now perhaps, as you've said there, the audience is changing and a human might see it. but really it's the bots that need to see it first or at least be able to find it and reference it and qualify it first probably going forward more than ever. James Coates: So we yeah, definitely that. I mean I mean it's trying to appeal to humans and and bots obviously, but i content is the main thing, but it's an AI tool will will understand and be able to see AI written content. David Bancroft: Hmm. James Coates: And if you're not having any sort of human interaction in that whatsoever David Bancroft: Hmm. James Coates: they're not gonna see you as a you know as a as a relevant person or or business. David Bancroft: Mm, mm. James Coates: So it's definitely having you you still need to to interact with it or at least back and forth. David Bancroft: I think Grammarly, I don't know if you've heard of Grammarly, but I think they James Coates: Yeah. David Bancroft: have a plagiarism tool whereby you can just throw a document into Grammarly and it will tell you the probability that it's plagiarized perfectly from somewhere or that it is generated by a tool that's plagiarized something. James Coates: Yeah, all also depends what industry you're in as well. If you're in very, very niche industry, we had David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: a client that was like, Okay, well, I'll get the client I'll I'll get the content written, I'll handle that. I'll the client says we'll just use AI to write it. And it was funny because it it wrote based on their website because they were in such a niche industry. Their website was kind David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: of the the main source of of reference. And it's just odd. And you think, well, if you're in a a diverse industry, you've probably David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: you can speak to different things, but i if you're very, very niche, it's trying to get the the the knowledge out of your key senior people or the people who've got the most knowledge and get them to share. And and this is where the AOI tools will be good rather than getting it to write David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: content out of the box. Is actually voice recording, notes or something that you can get the information you need, maybe surveys David Bancroft: Mm. James Coates: and questions. We do this a lot with clients in workshops where we're taking all this information, we're asking as much questions, and then you're kind of putting it in and funding it to get the gump for what you need. You could do something

similar and then say, look okay, what could you write a piece based on these conversations? Martin, David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: obviously, you know Martin, he's my brother at at Impact. he is shocking. at sharing any sort of social or anything like that. David Bancroft: Hehehehehe James Coates: So what we have to do is we have to book something like this. We have a meeting and we just bombard him with questions and then we take David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: The answers and we put them into we use something called Fireflies, it records the evening. We put the David Bancroft: Okay, yeah. James Coates: kind of the export, the transcripts into sort of like an AI tour, and then we have that to then ask questions, right? If we ask this David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: question, we had that, can we pull that information into something else? So it's it's that. And you can get, especially if you're struggling to write case studies from technical people that haven't got time to speak to you. And that's how you can kind of extract some of that information. So it's not hard for them to do, they don't feel any pressure of, I'm not very good on screen. screen or I'm not very good at writing, I'm not creative, but you just talk to them, get the answers out, and then you get the tool to to do other heavy lifting. But then that's not AI David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: slop, that's produced work based on, you know, what you're discussing. In my opinion, David Bancroft: crosses. Yeah. James Coates: I'm sure that someone else might go, that's absolute slop. David Bancroft: No, I don't think it is because it's a tool. Everyone's used tools. I regularly speak with my co-host James about this. And if he's preparing to approach a new client, the first thing he would have historically done was Google the business, Google some of case studies, Google some of their success stories, understand their competition landscape and where they might be able to add value to that business. All of that was achieved via Googling and all of it was achieved via research. Now, what he would do today is create a command in one of the models and it would within 10 seconds return that information to him and he can manipulate that information. He can interrogate that information. He can qualify that information all within about 10 minutes. Now, in the past that would have been taboo. So, no, he's cheating, he's using AI. But actually, why wouldn't he? Because he's just utilizing his time better. He's asking the same question of one of these models. getting the answers that he otherwise would have got via research, but rather than dedicating half a day to it, 10 minutes, he's home and hosed, isn't he? James Coates: It's it's like having a a really good assistant, you know, and y David Bancroft: Yeah, of course it is. James Coates: you can, you know, fire this to them and can you get that? Can you have a little look at that? Can you do this? And in some cases I David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: use I use mine as a kind of a note taker. I'll set a project up and I'm like, well, I wanna build a you know, redo our support brochure and all I'm doing is kind of making notes and building out a file and then giving it structure and stuff like that, but just using it as a it's literally to harvest some of the notes and my my brain notes. So yeah. David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah. James Coates: It's it can be really, really good for that. David Bancroft: Well, look, James, I've enjoyed speaking with you. I found it really interesting and always do when I speak with you actually. So I appreciate your time. Before we close though, there is a customary ending and it's our golden nugget feature. I wonder, James, if you might just share the one thought, lesson or piece of advice that you'd like to leave our listeners with. I'll give you a little drum roll. You want to build attention? I want to build attention. James Coates: It's Friday. It's wine Friday. Is that the wrong golden nugget, sorry. so David Bancroft: Next one, next one. James Coates: progress comes from action, not perfection. That's something that we're very passionate about. we've long time doing websites. Chasing perfection is we've first hand paralyzing. David Bancroft: Yeah, yes. James Coates: you come after trying to be trying to be the best all the time and people always want and it this comes from a website perspective, front end looks really nice again, come back to usability and we always say usability first, beauty second. There's a kind of a something we say internally, but David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: Perfection, yeah, don't chase perfection basically. you know, action is progress is not perfection. That would be the the the main thing. a friend of mine introduced me to something when he tried to scale his business. So they had I won't say what it was because you probably know, but they had a business and it was doing really well and they wanted to scale. And you've only got these really good people that he spent years kind of taking from this firm and that firm. We've got some really good people. You've got to try and create another business with a 10 out of 10. And he said it was exceptionally hard. It takes you a while to recruit. So you took some of the 10 out David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: of 10 people and you moved them to the new one. And now they're David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: not they're not ten out of ten. And so trying to accept David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: a a well, he said seven out of ten is what he said his aim was. So I'm saying David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: making progress or having action is progress rather than trying to chase perfection. David Bancroft: and give it one of those. Love that one. That's a great golden nugget. And very similar actually to something that a past guest of ours, Kat, mentioned, which very succinctly, done is better than perfect was her quote. James Coates: Yeah. David

Bancroft: that was about, again, these projects that you can just get lost in the long grass on and sometimes done is truly better than perfect. I do a load of LinkedIn content where I'm walking and talking on mobile phone might be a new role that I'm looking to recruit for. James Coates: Same, yeah. David Bancroft: just a sort of thought or amusing or something like that. I have a one-take role. And if you've seen them, you'll know that they're truly one-take, because sometimes I'll get nearly run over or walk into a tree And yeah, whereas in the past that might be a blooper cut, mate, I lean into that. I don't care. It's done, it's been perfect. I've got a message. And in that scenario, it might be I'm thinking about something or I have a role that I'm looking to recruit some for. And the message is out there. Done is better than perfect. Yes. James Coates: It's genuine as well. I I found it, I think 2018 was the first time I recorded myself on video. And I remember going, you're getting all this anxiety of I, you know, what if I get it wrong and you might do a second take? And I remember sitting in the car and something had come out, a WordPress 5 had just been released. And I was like, you know what I'm gonna do myself a video. Sitting a car, I don't know, didn't didn't do the air and I thought I was just recorded and I talked first take, upload, done. And it was that very much that that was. David Bancroft: Yes. James Coates: You've got to get over that before you can then start doing more content. And you become more relaxed and you think, well, do I really care David Bancroft: Yeah. James Coates: about this? And do I really care about that? And and I d I I I always did my you referenced them earlier of like my little tips. They were called weekly website wins. And I recall them in one take. And if I didn't get David Bancroft: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I love that. James Coates: quite what I was doing, I'm like, that's what I'll do next week. You know, it'd be just something else, but David Bancroft: Yeah, and that's fine because you will be more critical than anybody ever would be. You you don't present yourself as Steven Spielberg. You're just sharing a bit of information and people buy into that. And the authenticity of this one take ideology, I think really shows in anything like that. And her nugget of done is better than perfect, you know, feeding into the nugget that you've just shared there. I think it all comes back. James Coates: Do you know what? It's ironic actually because the reason there's a lot less social, I would do a lot of social content is because of the quality of other people's social content. The editing, the crops to take this out and everything. I think, Christ, I haven't got time to do that. so now I'm David Bancroft: Mm-mm. James Coates: thinking mine is is not is you know it's inferior compared to everyone else's, so you kind of stopped doing it. And again, I following my own advice. David Bancroft: Yeah, let's do it. Well, James Coates: should just get it get it going rather than yeah, actually try and wait for it to be perfect. David Bancroft: you've already made the commit. You've already said you're going to share this episode and you're going to engage your network. So beyond that, perhaps that will be the, you know, the first stone James Coates: Capitalist. David Bancroft: that you toss and away you go back into regular LinkedIn posting. But James, it's been an absolute pleasure. As you say, it's Friday. So I'm going to let you go now. I really appreciate your time. James Coates: West Am I playing tonight? David Bancroft: Is it tonight? Is it? James Coates: Yeah. David Bancroft: Yeah, okay. can they go top if they win? I guess they must they're not James Coates: Possibly is it's Friday, yeah we won't wait until Saturday, I think, yeah. So we'll we'll we'll see. We'll see. David Bancroft: Yeah, absolutely. Should be a good season for them. At least you're not a City fan because they're James Coates: We might win something. Yeah. David Bancroft: my Windsor. You're my Windsor. Absolutely. But no, really appreciate your time. Thank you for that, James. James Coates: No worries, David, good to speak to you. David Bancroft: So there you go, another great guest episode and some, yeah, some really interesting website talk there. Not something we've covered ever on a quick brew. We speak a lot about AI, we speak a lot about tech, we talk a lot about advancements and the rise of the robots, but websites, which we've all become pretty comfortable with over the years, isn't a topic we've ever covered. So no, appreciate James' time. Also interesting little fact, James, I believe, is the first person who stood through an entire... guest episode. it was a tribute to his stamina and a pleasure to have him on. But until the next one guys, thank you for listening.