Quick Start

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Start with the outcome you want. Ploy will help you choose the right path.

When you set up your first workspace, Ploy asks a few short questions about your website, its design, and your goals before work begins.

Step 1: Set up your website context

  • Confirm your website under Is this your website?, or enter it under What's your website?. If you do not have a website yet, choose I don't have a website yet. Under Tell me a little about your business, you can add your business name or a few words. This is optional. If you leave it empty, Ploy's Agent asks what your business does and who it serves before it starts work for your business.

    If you confirm a business website, Ploy takes a short look at it before you choose goals. It shows What I learned about your company: My read of your business, in three highlighted lines about who you sell to, why they pick you, and why they stay, followed by the gaps it found. To correct the summary, choose Edit, change the highlighted text, and choose Done. Ploy updates its recommendations to match. Choose Continue to see what Ploy recommends for each gap, plus Here's what else I can do for other goals that fit your business. Ploy leaves out goals that don't fit. For example, it does not offer Find more qualified leads when you sell to individual shoppers. Each gap shows where Ploy found it, such as a page on your site or a competitor's site. If Ploy can't make tailored recommendations, it says so and shows the usual starting points. If Ploy can't tell that your site is a business, it skips this step and shows the usual goals.

  • Under What do you want help with?, choose one or more goals: Migrate my site to Ploy, Organic traffic, Conversion rate optimization, Improve brand positioning, Ad campaigns, or Find more qualified leads. Organic traffic is selected for you; clear it if you don't need it. If Ploy looked at your website first, it selects the goals that match the gaps it found instead, and adds Ad campaigns if your site already runs ads. Migrate my site to Ploy and Improve brand positioning appear only when you entered a website. To add a goal in your own words, choose Something else and describe what you need. Then choose Continue.
  • If you have a website, Ploy then asks What's the vision for your site?. Choose Create a new design, Enhance my current design, or Keep my design as is, then choose Continue to finish setup. If you do not have a website, setup finishes when you choose Continue on your goals.
  • Each question has a Continue button. To change an earlier answer, choose Back; your choices are kept. On a phone, Continue and Back stay at the bottom of the screen while the options scroll.

If you already have a specific request, you can describe it in your own words instead of starting with a broad goal.

Used Ploy before? When you set up another workspace, you can choose Skip setup to skip these questions. Skip setup appears for the person who created the workspace if they have used Ploy before. It does not appear for first-time users or after you submit your answers.

Out of AI credits? Setup needs AI credits to start your first chats. If your organization has used all of its AI credits, choosing Continue on the last question opens Setup needs AI credits. Your answers are saved. Upgrade, and when you return from checkout, Ploy submits your saved answers and setup continues.

Already submitted a prompt? If you signed up from a prompt box, your first request comes with you. Ploy uses that request instead of asking the generic goal question again.

After setup: the welcome tour

When you finish setup, Ploy shows a three-step tour while your first chats start working.

  1. We started a few chats for you: see the chats your goals started and what each one is doing. They keep working in the background.
  2. Connect tools you already use: Ploy suggests a few tools based on your site and your goals, with a line on what each connection adds. Connect any you want. Chats that are already running learn about the tools you connect here. You can add more integrations later.
  3. While you wait, here's what else Ploy can do: browse a few tips, then choose Go to your chats.

Choose Continue to move to the next step, or Back to return. To see the tour again later, open Help & support and choose Getting started under Resources. When you finish or leave a replayed tour, you return to the page you started from.

Step 2: Start your first chat

After the welcome tour, Ploy opens your first chat. The chats your answers started keep working while you go through the tour. Your first chat may show a few suggested requests above the message box when Ploy's Agent is not replying. Choose one to put the full request in the box, edit it if you like, then send it. The suggestions go away after you send your first message.

  • Migrate my site to Ploy: Ploy's Agent explains that the move happens one reviewed step at a time, takes time and credits, and changes nothing on your current site until you approve the switch. What happens first depends on your answer to What's the vision for your site?. If you chose Keep my design as is, Ploy's Agent asks how to start: rebuild your homepage and shared layout from your current site, move your CMS content into a database, or import from source code. It offers the CMS and source code options only when they fit your site. If you chose Create a new design or Enhance my current design, Ploy's Agent starts with that design flow and builds your new homepage first. Either way, it then assesses the rest of your site in the same design and asks you to approve a plan before it builds any other page.
  • Create a new design, or no website yet: Ploy's Agent asks a few quick style questions about your business, then paints three different full-page homepage designs for you to compare. Pick one, and add notes if you want changes; Ploy repaints only the design you picked. Ploy's Agent then builds your homepage and design system from your pick. With no website, this also creates your site's navigation and footer.
  • Enhance my current design: Ploy's Agent captures your site's design foundations and asks a few short questions about your business. If you also chose Improve brand positioning, it asks four: what your customers would use instead, what visitors should see and feel first, which proof to show, and any claims to avoid. It then rewrites your homepage copy from what it learns. If you did not, it asks only what visitors should see and feel first and which proof to show, and keeps your current copy word for word. Either way, it keeps your brand colors, tells you in a few lines which direction and fonts it chose, then builds the improved homepage without waiting for approval. Ask in the chat for any changes.
  • Keep my design as is: Ploy's Agent starts building a design system from your current site, tells you which goal chats are already running, and then waits for your next request.

Each goal you choose, except Migrate my site to Ploy, also starts its own chat that begins work right away. If you chose Enhance my current design, Improve brand positioning runs in your first chat instead of its own:

  • Organic traffic: audits how your site ranks in search and how often your business appears in AI answers, and shows the top three opportunities in the chat. It then builds the top one on your Ploy site without asking, and names the other two as next options. Once the page is built, it asks whether to keep improving it every week. If you say yes, it saves the work as a Ploybook and runs it weekly.
  • Conversion rate optimization: picks the page where better conversion matters most and shows three hero mockups for you to choose from. It builds your pick on your Ploy site and names the conversion event that measures it. Once the page is built, it asks whether to keep improving the page every week. If you say yes, it saves the work as a Ploybook and runs it weekly.
  • Improve brand positioning: researches what your customers say about you and how your closest competitors position themselves, then works out who buys from you and why. It shows three hero options with clearer messaging as mockups, each with a one-line reason, and builds the one you pick on your Ploy site. If you chose Enhance my current design, this work happens in your first chat instead, where Ploy's Agent rewrites your homepage copy.
  • Ad campaigns: creates three ad creatives for you to choose from, then prepares paused draft campaigns. It asks for your approval before it changes anything in an ad account.
  • Find more qualified leads: defines your ideal customer, finds matching companies, saves them to a database, and builds one page template that gives each account its own tailored draft page. The pages stay out of navigation and search. It saves a Ploybook so you can add more accounts later.
  • Something else: researches what you described, writes recommendations, and proposes a plan with a goal and tasks.

A goal chat that needs to build a page waits until your design system is ready and usually continues on its own when it is. You can also ask in that chat. You find these chats in the sidebar under Your chats. If you keep your current design, Ploy opens one of your goal chats first. If your site has never been published, Ploy's Agent publishes the first page it builds and checks, so you get a link you can share. It publishes to your site's Production and Preview addresses on ploy.build, and your current website does not change. This happens once, even with automatic publishing off. After that, new pages stay on your Ploy site until you publish. To keep the first page unpublished, ask Ploy's Agent before it builds.

If you arrive with a specific request, Ploy can proceed with that job without repeating broad goal-setting steps. For example, you can ask to add a page or fix a heading directly.

Step 3: Work with Ploy

Once the goal and route are clear, Ploy carries out the work using the relevant context from your workspace. Depending on the job, that can include your sites, brand system, documents, assets, integrations, and prior decisions.

  • Steer important choices: pick from the focused options Ploy presents.
  • Review work as it appears: pages, documents, images, and databases open in the workspace viewer.
  • Refine in plain language: describe what to add, remove, or change.
  • Approve sensitive actions: after Ploy's Agent publishes your first page, later publishes, domains, and other consequential changes remain under your control.

Step 4: Review and Publish

For site work, review the desktop and mobile preview before publishing. Check the copy, links, forms, and important visitor paths, then use Publish when the saved version is ready to go live.

To go back to an earlier version later, restore it from Versions and publish again. To use your own domain, open site settings and follow the Custom Domain Setup guide.

Working from Overview

Already in a workspace? Open Overview to start your next task.

  1. Enter a request under What should we work on?, or choose a suggested prompt.
  2. Review the request, then send it to start a chat. Sending a suggested prompt starts work; it is not just an example.
  3. Follow the conversation, answer any questions, and review the output.

For a reusable workflow, browse Ploybooks from Overview before deciding what to run.

If you leave setup before you finish, open Overview and choose Finish setting up your workspace to return to it. If your answers were saved but setup did not complete, the link reads Resume workspace setup.

Follow up in For you

For you shows recommendations and work awaiting a response. Categories may appear as filter chips. When applicable, open Filter for Needs and Channel. On mobile, open For you to see the cards.

  • Needs input identifies work waiting for a response. Open the related chat and answer its question if you want work to continue.
  • Needs input cards show only questions sent to you. To hide one, choose Dismiss. The card stays hidden on all your devices, and the question still waits in the chat. Choose Undo in the confirmation to bring the card back.
  • To close a question from inside the chat instead, choose Close on the question card. The chat shows Question dismissed, and the question no longer appears as Needs input on any of your devices. To answer it later, ask Ploy's Agent in the chat.
  • Recommendation identifies a possible next task. Read the card before deciding whether to act.

Cards may show Open, Chat, or View. A suggestion starts work only when you choose its action. Not every card has the same actions.

What's Next?

  • Understand the platform: read Core Concepts for the main terms and building blocks.
  • Work effectively with Ploy: see Ploy's Agent for capabilities and practical guidance.
  • Improve your requests: use Tips & Tricks for clear, efficient collaboration.
  • Connect your tools: set up Integrations when a job needs outside data or actions.
  • Prepare a site to go live: review Publishing & Deploys.