Getting started with your Marketli website

With Marketli, your website is yours in the most literal sense: the code lives in a GitHub repository you control, you change it by talking to an AI assistant in plain English, and Marketli takes care of hosting, publishing, your domain and SEO. No page builders, no logins to hosting platforms, no waiting on an agency for copy tweaks.

This article covers the one-time setup (about 15 minutes) and how day-to-day changes work after that.

First: what's GitHub, and what's a "repo"?

GitHub is a website where code is stored and shared: think of it as Google Drive, but built for software. It's free for what you need, and it's where millions of businesses keep the code behind their websites and apps.

A repository (everyone says "repo") is one project's folder on GitHub. In your case, that's your entire website: every page, every image, every setting, in one place. Two things make a repo better than an ordinary folder:

It remembers everything. Every change ever made is kept, with who made it and when, so nothing is ever truly lost, and any change can be undone.
It's the trigger for publishing. When a change is saved to your repo ("pushed"), Marketli's machinery automatically checks it and publishes your site. The repo isn't a backup of your website: it is your website.

Your repo belongs to you: it sits under your GitHub account's access, you're the administrator, and if you ever left Marketli you'd take it with you.

Two ways to work on your site

There are two ways to make changes, and you only need one:

Path A (recommended): connect ChatGPT to your repository. Nothing to install. You describe changes on the ChatGPT website, its Codex assistant proposes them, and you approve with a click. Best if you use ChatGPT.
Path B: work on your own computer. Install a couple of small tools once, then any assistant that runs locally (Claude Code, Cursor, Codex CLI) edits the site on your machine. Best if you already use one of those, and the fallback if Path A is ever unavailable.

Either way, steps 1 and 2 below come first. Then follow the path you've chosen.

What you'll need

A GitHub account (free): GitHub is where your website's code lives.
An AI assistant on your computer: this is how you'll make changes. Claude Code, ChatGPT's desktop app with Codex, or Cursor all work; if you don't have a preference, we recommend Claude Code.
For Path B only: Git and the GitHub CLI, covered in that path's steps.

One-time setup

1. Create your GitHub account

Sign up at github.com with your business email. Choose a username you're happy for us to see, then send that username to your Marketli contact.

2. Accept your repository invitation

We'll invite your GitHub account to your website's repository (it lives in the Marketli-Sites organisation, and you're made an admin of your own repo: it's your site). You'll get an email from GitHub: accept it, and you'll be able to open your repository in the browser.

Path A (recommended): connect ChatGPT to your repository

No installs. You'll do this once:

In ChatGPT, open Codex and choose Connect to GitHub (the ChatGPT Codex Connector).
When it asks where to install, pick Marketli-Sites (the organisation your repository lives in), not your personal account.
That sends an approval request to Marketli. We approve it the same day and scope it to your repository only. You'll get a GitHub email when it's done.
Back in Codex, choose your site's repository and you're connected.

From then on, making a change looks like this:

Describe what you want in Codex, the same way you'd brief a person.
Codex makes the edits and opens a pull request: a proposed change, with a preview link so you can see the result on a private copy of your site.
Happy with it? Press the green Merge button on the pull request. The site's checks run, and if everything passes it publishes automatically in a couple of minutes.

If anything fails a check, the pull request says exactly what and why, and nothing publishes until it's fixed. You can't break the live site from a pull request.

Path B: work on your own computer

This is the step people most often skip: without it, your assistant can read your site but can't publish anything. Two separate tools are involved: Git (saves versions of your site) and the GitHub CLI (connects your computer to your GitHub account). Installing one does not install the other.

Mac: open Terminal and run brew install gh, then run git --version. If Git isn't installed yet, your Mac offers to install it: accept.
Windows: open PowerShell and run winget install --id GitHub.cli and then winget install --id Git.Git. When both finish, close PowerShell completely and reopen it, then run git --version to confirm Git answers with a version number.

Then close and reopen the terminal and run gh auth login. It asks a few questions, one at a time (use the arrow keys and press Enter). Here is every prompt and the answer to pick:

Where do you use GitHub? Choose GitHub.com
What is your preferred protocol for Git operations on this host? Choose HTTPS
Authenticate Git with your GitHub credentials? Type Y and press Enter
How would you like to authenticate GitHub CLI? Choose Login with a web browser

The terminal then shows a one-time code (something like 2F5A-A07F). Copy it, press Enter, and your browser opens GitHub's Device Activation page. Check it says you're signed in as your own account, type the code into the boxes, and press Continue.

GitHub then shows an Authorize GitHub CLI page listing what access the tool gets, with a yellow warning box naming the city and time of the request: that's you, just now, so it's expected. Press the green Authorize button. Back in the terminal you'll see a "Logged in as …" confirmation.

Finally, connect Git to that login with one last command:

gh auth setup-git

That's what lets your assistant publish under your account.

You only ever do this once per computer.

Prefer no terminal at all? GitHub Desktop (desktop.github.com) does the same job with buttons.

B2. Get the site onto your computer

First, move to your Documents folder. Terminals often open somewhere you can't create files (on Windows it's usually a system folder, and the clone fails with "Permission denied"), so this line matters:

cd ~/Documents

(Works the same in PowerShell and on Mac.) Then:

gh repo clone Marketli-Sites/YOUR-SITE-NAME

(Your Marketli contact will give you the exact name.) This creates a folder called YOUR-SITE-NAME inside Documents, with your whole website in it.

B3. Open it with your assistant

Open that folder in your AI assistant (in Claude Code: cd into the folder and run claude). Your site ships with an AGENTS.md file: a manual written for your assistant. It explains where everything lives, what the brand colours are, and the rules of the site, so you can ask for changes without knowing any of that yourself.

Your first change: make the site yours (both paths)

Your new site starts with placeholder details, and a yellow SAMPLE banner shows on every page until the real ones are in. So your first job is the one only you can do. Whichever path you chose, tell your assistant (Codex or your local one) something like:

"Read AGENTS.md, then replace the placeholder business details in src/site.config.mjs with my real ones."

and give it:

your email, phone and location (town or city, and the areas you serve)
your registered legal entity name (and ABN)
your credit licence disclosure, word for word as your licensee or aggregator provides it. Don't paraphrase this one: it's regulated wording, and your assistant is under instructions never to invent it
your privacy policy (your licensee usually supplies this too)

When those are saved and published, the SAMPLE banner disappears on its own. The site's built-in checks verify the details are complete, so if anything is missing or malformed, nothing publishes and your assistant will tell you exactly what to fix.

Making changes day to day

Just describe what you want, in the folder, to your assistant:

"Change the hero headline to …" · "Add a blog post about fixed vs variable rates" · "Swap the photo on the About page for the one on my Desktop"

The assistant edits the files, runs the site's built-in checks, and pushes. Then, automatically:

Checks run on every push: broken links, missing page descriptions, contrast and the Marketli footer attribution are all verified. If something's wrong, nothing publishes.
Changes on a branch get a preview link posted on the pull request: a private copy of the site you can click through before it goes anywhere.
Changes on main go live, usually within about two minutes.

You never log in to a hosting platform. Publishing is fully automatic once checks pass: that's Marketli's half of the deal.

The three rules

Your site's checks enforce these, but they're worth knowing:

Your disclosures are yours, but your licensee owns the wording. You can edit the credit-licence text, credit guide, privacy and complaints copy whenever you need to. Before a change to regulated wording goes live, confirm the new text with your licensee: it's a legal requirement from them, not marketing copy.
Never delete the files in .github/workflows/. They're the machinery that checks and publishes your site. The "Powered by Marketli" footer link also stays: it's the one condition of Marketli hosting, and the build refuses to publish without it.
If checks fail, ask your assistant to read the error. The messages say exactly what's wrong. Nothing breaks while you figure it out: the live site only ever updates from a green build.

What Marketli handles for you

Hosting, SSL and your domain, including the switch-over when a new site goes live.
SEO: sitemaps, indexing hygiene and ongoing monitoring, with weekly audits.
Live features: your booking calendar, lead-capture forms, referral form and the website chat widget are Marketli embeds, one line in your site, managed from your Marketli dashboard. See capturing leads, booking calendars and the website chat widget.

Launch day

While your site is being built, nothing is charged: your card is on file, and that's all. When the build is ready, Marketli shows you a launch step in the app. Press the button and your site goes live; your monthly website subscription starts from that day.

The launch screen also invites a voluntary contribution. Your website build was free; if it was worth something to your business, choose what to pay. This never affects your website or your service: pick a suggested amount, enter your own, or choose "Launch without contributing". Amounts include GST and are charged once to your saved card.

Common questions

Do I need to know how to code? No. The assistant does the editing; you do the deciding. The checks stop anything broken from publishing.

Can I break the live site? Not really. Work on a branch gets a preview first, checks gate everything, and every change is in version history: anything can be rolled back.

What does it cost to change things? Nothing per change. That's the point. Your assistant subscription (e.g. Claude) is the only tool involved.

Can someone else on my team edit too? Yes. Send us their GitHub username and we'll add them to your repository. Same setup steps on their computer.