We run two FindaBiz Networking groups, in Hinckley and Lutterworth, and we built FindaBiz’s website as well. So read this as the people who did the work, not as a neutral review. It is the story of how a networking organisation swapped a pile of apps and paid plugins for one system it actually owns.
The brief
FindaBiz needed something modern for networking in 2026 and beyond. A tool members would actually want to open, rather than one more login they put up with. It also needed to replace what had built up over the years: a WordPress site held together by a page-builder theme and dozens of plugins, a separate admin app for hosts, and mailing lists living somewhere else again.
And it had to cost less to own. A lot of those plugins were paid, every one of them renews, and every one is something else to update, patch and hope does not break when the others change.
The decision: keep WordPress, own everything on top of it
We did not throw WordPress away. It is good at pages, posts, logins and editing, and the members already had accounts on it. What we got rid of was the layer of other people’s plugins doing the important work.
Instead there is one custom plugin that holds all the logic: groups, venues, members, seats, events, bookings, check-in and email. Alongside it is a plain, fast theme of our own. The plugin does not depend on the theme, so the look can change without touching the data.
Then we went down the list of paid plugins one by one and gave each a replacement. The events calendar and its ticketing add-ons became our own events and bookings. The custom fields plugin, the faceted search, the form builder, the mega menu and the permissions plugin were each rebuilt as part of the one plugin or swapped for what WordPress now does on its own. We kept two free plugins on purpose, for backups and security, because those are jobs where a well-tested specialist beats anything we would write.
The rule was to retire nothing until its replacement was working, and to move the data across rather than start again. Nobody had to re-register, and nobody had to reset a password.
One login, one place
The old admin app for hosts is gone. Members and hosts now use the same site, with the same login, and the app screens live on the main website.
A member lands on a home page showing their group, their connections and their upcoming meetings, with a check-in button when a meeting is on. A host gets a console for their own group: the meeting roster, QR self check-in, follow-up emails to visitors, and a note to any member who missed a meeting, telling them when the next one is. The weekly online session works the same way: log in, press Join, and the site takes you to the meeting. The link itself is never published.
The networking rules are in the system rather than in somebody’s head. One business per trade in each group. How many times a visitor can come before joining. Which events count as a visit and which do not. The numbers are settings, so FindaBiz can change them without asking us.
Data driven, and careful with it
A networking organisation runs on personal data, so privacy was designed in rather than bolted on. The site only collects what a feature actually uses. Consent is recorded. Hosts see their own groups and no one else’s. Every time a host or admin looks at member data, it is logged.
That same data also does useful work. Every group, venue and event is structured, so the site builds its own local area pages and keeps them up to date overnight, instead of waiting for someone to remember. It can also draft a page for every trade a member holds, and a monthly round-up of what is on, for FindaBiz to check and publish.
AI where it earns its place
There is AI in the site, but none of it is decoration.
- Writing help in every editor. A host writing a group introduction or an event description gets a first draft from the group’s own facts, written to rules that strip out the usual AI tells.
- Found by AI search. When someone asks ChatGPT, Copilot or Claude about networking near them, the answer should be right. So the site publishes a plain-text summary written for AI assistants, built fresh from live data, marks up every group and event properly, and tells search engines within a minute when something changes.
- Every penny counted. Each AI call is costed from what the provider reports, shown in pounds, and summarised in a monthly email to the admins.
And then there is Fabby.
Fabby, who tells terrible jokes
Fabby is the pink speech bubble in the corner of every page. Ask her for a group near your postcode, an open seat for your trade, or what is on next week, and she finds it and links you to the page that does the booking.
She only knows what is on the public website. That was a choice, not a limitation we are apologising for. She cannot see bookings, accounts or anything a member has not made public, which is the honest answer to the first question any business asks about a chatbot: what does it know about my customers? Conversations are kept for 30 days so we can see what people ask, and then deleted. FindaBiz’s own privacy notice says all of this in plain English, including which AI provider writes her replies.
She also changes colour and mood with the day of the week, gets sleepy late at night, knows the weather and the bank holidays, and tells some incredibly bad jokes. She tells bad jokes because Patrick does. That is the bit we are proudest of, because it is the clearest answer we have to the idea that AI makes everything sound the same. It sounds like whoever built it.
How it was built
Patrick wrote it with Claude Code, starting in mid September 2026 from a copy of the old site running on his laptop, and the new platform went live in October. Every decision went into a written log as it was made, so FindaBiz could see and sign off what was being built, and so the next person to work on it can see why things are the way they are.
That last part matters more than it sounds. Custom code is only cheaper to own than plugins if somebody can still understand it in two years. Writing it down as we went is what makes that true.
What we would tell anyone thinking about it
Start with the plugin list and the renewal dates. Most sites like this are not expensive because of hosting. They are expensive because of a dozen small subscriptions, each doing one job, all of which have to keep agreeing with each other.
Keep the parts that work. WordPress was never the problem.
And if you are going to put AI in front of your members, decide what it is not allowed to know before you decide what it can do.
You can see the result at findabiznetworking.com (opens in a new tab). Say hello to Fabby while you are there. We take no responsibility for the jokes.
