‘I often compare AI to an exceptionally talented intern’: How web agencies can scale value beyond the time-based model

While AI is shaking up all industries, few have been impacted as visibly or as quickly as web design.

No longer can agencies charge for time on repetitive tasks that can easily be farmed out to AI. This creates a challenge for businesses that need to prove their value to clients that are now eyeing up cheaper, faster solutions to their needs.

I caught up with Itai Sadan, CEO and Co-founder of dedicated agency website builder Duda. We talked about Duda’s new vibe coding tool, how it fits into his vision of the future of website building, and how he is seeing agencies demonstrate value through consultation and creative talent in 2026.

Interview with:

Itai Sadan

Interview by:

Owain Williams

AI has lowered the barrier to creating a website, but it has not solved the challenges agencies face when delivering websites at scale.

Agencies still need to produce work that reflects a client’s brand, collaborate efficiently across teams, maintain quality standards, and do it all within a business model that supports healthy margins. We built our AI capabilities with those realities in mind, rather than adapting generic AI products that were never designed for professional web creators.

Our approach combines the speed of AI generation with the capabilities agencies already rely on in Duda.

Website generation turns a prompt into a production-ready starting point while preserving access to Duda’s drag-and-drop editor, performance, SEO foundations, and the flexibility to refine every detail before launch, either by prompt or by simply clicking with a mouse, which is many times faster and more cost-efficient.

Duda Vibe expands those possibilities with an AI-native environment for creating websites and applications that remains fully connected to the Duda platform.

Agencies can collaborate with their teams and clients, white label the experience under their own brand, and operate with the predictable pricing and workflows they depend on to scale profitably. Our goal is to help agencies take full advantage of AI while strengthening the systems and processes that make their businesses successful.

In many cases, agencies will have an opportunity to deliver greater value than before, and their pricing should reflect the outcomes they create, not the time they save.
Itai Sadan, CEO and Co-founder of Duda

I don’t think AI changes the fundamental value proposition of an agency. Clients aren’t paying for time spent on repetitive tasks. They’re paying for expertise that produces measurable business outcomes, whether that’s more qualified leads, more appointments, or more online sales.

There’s no shortage of website builders, and now even AI coding tools, built specifically for small businesses to use themselves.

What an agency brings is the ability to translate business goals into digital results. That includes understanding how a website should be structured, how it should be written to attract and convert visitors, and how it fits into a broader marketing strategy that may include SEO, paid advertising, social media, and other services. AI can accelerate many parts of that process, but the quality of the outcome still depends on the experience and judgment of the agency using it.

When I speak with agencies, they don’t tell me they’re working less. They tell me they’re spending their time differently. The hours saved through automation are being reinvested into higher-value work, whether that’s providing a more consultative client experience, expanding the services they offer, or helping clients adapt to new opportunities like AI search.

That’s been Duda’s philosophy from the beginning. We’ve always focused on removing the repetitive work so agencies can spend more time on the work their clients actually value.

As AI continues to improve efficiency, I believe that principle becomes even more important. In many cases, agencies will have an opportunity to deliver greater value than before, and their pricing should reflect the outcomes they create, not the time they save.

I often compare AI to an exceptionally talented intern. Give that intern a clear objective, the right context, and the supporting materials, and they’ll produce impressive work.
Itai Sadan, CEO and Co-founder of Duda

We’ve tried to address that challenge at the platform level.

With Duda Vibe, for example, the planning stage interviews the agency before it begins generating anything. That additional context consistently produces better results because the AI is working from a clearer understanding of the project’s goals and requirements.

We’re also continuously improving the models behind our AI website generation so they can interpret briefs more accurately and produce websites that require less refinement before launch.

That said, AI should never be treated as a substitute for professional review. We recommend that agencies establish a quality assurance process for every project, just as they would with work created entirely by humans.

Duda’s AI Copilot can assist with that review by identifying areas for improvement before a site goes live, while our Optimization Center continuously audits websites for common SEO, accessibility, and AI search optimization opportunities that might otherwise be overlooked.

AI is most effective when it’s used throughout the entire workflow, not just at the point of creation.

I often compare AI to an exceptionally talented intern. Give that intern a clear objective, the right context, and the supporting materials, and they’ll produce impressive work. Give them a vague brief, and they’ll fill in the gaps with their own assumptions. That’s why we encourage agencies to be as specific as possible.

Duda supports rich prompting with reference documents, images, and other project assets so agencies can provide the context the AI needs from the very beginning. The better the guidance, the better the outcome.

Most vibe coding tools are designed to help an individual create an application as quickly as possible.

Agencies need much more than that. They need a platform that supports collaboration, client management, security, governance, and long-term maintenance across dozens, hundreds, or even thousands of projects. That’s the gap we set out to address with Duda Vibe.

Duda Vibe is fully integrated into the Duda platform, giving agencies a centralized workspace where they can manage every project, whether it was built with our traditional website builder or in Duda Vibe.

Teams can collaborate throughout the development process, clients can securely review their own projects through a fully white-labeled experience, and agencies can continue using the workflows they’re already familiar with.

Beyond development, Duda Vibe includes the operational capabilities agencies depend on, including automatic version history, secure data storage, reliable hosting, and performance insights that help them monitor both site performance and AI visibility over time.

We’re still in beta, but our roadmap is firmly focused on the needs of agencies and the way they work.

One feature I’m particularly excited about is bringing our popular inline commenting workflow to Duda Vibe. Clients will be able to leave feedback directly on the project, just as they do today in our website builder. Once the agency reviews and approves a request, Duda’s AI Stack will understand the context of that comment and carry out the requested changes automatically. It’s another example of how we’re applying AI to reduce the operational overhead of working with clients, not just the time it takes to build an application in the first place.

Although great for quick builds, vibe coding apps can lack the architecture, stability, and security required for long-term success. How does Duda Vibe help agencies maintain web apps without creating technical debt?

The technical debt challenge with AI-generated applications usually isn’t the code itself. It’s everything required to run and maintain that application over time.
Itai Sadan, CEO and Co-founder of Duda

The technical debt challenge with AI-generated applications usually isn’t the code itself. It’s everything required to run and maintain that application over time.

Many AI coding tools can generate a working prototype in minutes, but agencies are often left responsible for hosting, security, authentication, payments, infrastructure, and long-term maintenance. That’s where technical debt begins to accumulate.

Duda Vibe takes a different approach. Every application is built on Duda’s managed platform, so agencies have a foundation they can depend on long after the application is launched. Hosting, security, DDoS protection, high performance on metrics such as Core Web Vitals, platform updates, and other operational capabilities are built in from the start.

We also provide native services for capabilities like authentication, eCommerce, payments, and other backend functionality, allowing agencies to rely on platform services rather than AI-generated implementations for some of the most critical parts of an application. That reduces complexity, improves reliability, and significantly limits the technical debt that can accumulate over time.

Our view is that AI should accelerate development without shifting long-term maintenance risk onto agencies. The platform should handle the operational complexity, allowing agencies to focus on building applications that deliver value for their clients.

Clients generally don’t know what their agency’s website builder can and can’t do out of the box, so it’s important for agencies to not get too caught up in individual widgets.

What makes a great website is how all of those widgets come together on the canvas and how well that collage of widgets meets the needs of the client. A great way to differentiate is to focus on the latter: the client’s needs.

For example, one agency building on Duda used the Widget Builder to generate an interactive carousel of 3D beer cans for a brewery. Not only did this look great, but it really elevated the overall design of the website. It was a nice touch that showed a level of care that I’m sure the client appreciated.

For agencies looking to stand out, I’d recommend double-clicking into the needs of the client. Breweries are in the hospitality industry, so a level of showmanship is beneficial online, but that same widget showing a rotating carousel of 3D toothbrushes would be odd to see on a dentist’s website. Understanding your client’s industry, then building widgets specifically for that vertical, is a great way to stand out and showcase expertise.

Agencies need to be able to produce something better than if an owner asked Claude to create a website for their business—which is not as easy as it sounds.
Itai Sadan, CEO and Co-founder of Duda

Agencies are being impacted by AI from dozens of different angles. Whether that’s changes to the way they work or the rise of AI search impacting how their clients get found, it’s an extremely adaptive and exciting time to be an agency. Staying ahead of it all is going to be the biggest challenge.

Take website building, for instance. The floor is going to continue to rise. Agencies need to be able to produce something better than if an owner asked Claude to create a website for their business—which is not as easy as it sounds.

Platforms like Claude are getting better each and every day. Whether that’s a better experience, a better product, or both, agencies need to be prepared to add something special that AI can’t offer by itself.