Websites and e-commerce

A domain is a website’s address on the internet, for example company.lv. It is registered for a set period and has to be renewed regularly. Choose a short domain that is easy to say and spell and relates to your company name; for the Latvian market .lv is usually used, for international ones .com or .eu.

A website with an AI agent is a custom-built site whose content you change just by writing what you want — for example, "change the phone number in the contacts" or "add a new service". The agent knows the site’s structure and style, makes the changes, checks them and shows a preview, but nothing is published without your approval.

SEO (search engine optimisation) means adapting a website so that Google and other search engines show it when people search for your services. It covers technical quality (speed, structure), content that answers people’s questions, and credibility (mentions, links). Good SEO means customers without paying for every click.

Hosting is a service that provides the server where your website or system is stored and served from. The domain is the address; hosting is the place where the site "lives". Hosting determines the site’s speed, security, availability and where its data is stored.

Start with the goal (enquiries, sales, credibility) and the customers the site is for. Then prepare the structure and content, choose a domain, build the design and technical side with SEO, add forms and analytics, publish — and update the content regularly.

Choose a platform that fits your volume and complexity (Shopify, WooCommerce or a custom platform), prepare the product catalogue and images, add payments and delivery, connect the store to inventory and accounting, and take care of SEO and the legal terms.

Make sure Google can index the site (Google Search Console, a sitemap, no blocks), every page has a unique title and description, the content answers specific searches, the site is fast and works well on a phone, and links from other trustworthy sites point to it. Results usually come gradually — over weeks and months.

AI search — Google’s AI answers, ChatGPT search and other assistants — uses content that is easy to find, understand and cite. So you need a technically accessible site, clear and direct answers to questions, structured data, specific facts with sources and information about the company and its experience. There’s no guarantee AI will cite you, but good content greatly improves the chances.

The price depends on whether it’s a template site or a custom design, how many pages and languages there are, whether you need integrations (bookings, payments, CRM), how much content has to be prepared and how the site will be maintained. A template or AI-generated site can cost a few hundred euros; a custom company website costs more, but it is built to win customers.

The cost is made up of the platform (subscription or development), design, preparing the product catalogue, payment and delivery integrations, the connection to inventory and accounting, and running costs — subscriptions, fees, hosting and maintenance. A simple store on an off-the-shelf platform is cheaper; a custom platform costs more but has no platform limits.

Maintenance costs include the domain, hosting, security and software updates, backups, monitoring and content changes. For a small site it’s a modest monthly cost; for systems and online stores it’s higher. The biggest variable is usually content changes, which can be reduced with easy editing or an AI agent.

For a simple business card — sometimes, yes. But AI-generated sites usually use a template, have generic texts, minimal SEO and no integrations, so they rarely bring in customers from Google. If your website has to work as a salesperson, it needs a well-planned structure, specific content and technical quality — AI can help build it, but it doesn’t replace strategy.

Most businesses do fine with a good mobile-friendly website or web app that opens without installing anything. A mobile app is worth it if customers will use it regularly, you need phone features (notifications, camera, Bluetooth, location) or it controls devices. Building and maintaining an app costs more.

WordPress is a popular content management system — quick to start, with plenty of themes and plugins, and you can edit the content yourself. A custom-built site is faster, more secure and fits your needs more closely, but changes usually need a developer or an easy-to-use editor. The choice depends on how often you change content and how much speed, security and integrations matter.

A simple site can be built in a few weeks; a company website with a custom design, several languages and integrations usually takes one to three months. Most often the timeline is set not by programming but by preparing the content: texts, images, project descriptions and decisions.

If a website processes personal data — contact forms, enquiries, analytics, cookies — visitors must be informed with a privacy policy, only the necessary data may be collected, consent is needed for non-essential cookies, and the data must be kept secure. The GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation; VDAR in Latvian) applies to all EU companies.