Improve your dog walking or daycare website for more clients
- Author: Manon Weiss
- Reading time: 7 minutes
Most dog walking services or dog daycare businesses do have a website. This website is enormously important for every dog walking service or dog daycare business. It is a calling card for new clients and an important source of information for your current clients. That makes it one of the most important marketing instruments.
But how do you make sure that enough (potential) clients actually visit your website? Just ‘having’ a website is not enough. You also have to bring in visitors!
In this blog we give you 3 tips on how to make your business easier to find online, and thereby increase your business’s name recognition. And that in turn helps enormously with attracting new clients!
Tip 1: Make sure you have enough of the right web pages.
It starts with the basics: making sure your website has enough of the right content. We think you should give your website at least the following content. You may of course use a different or shorter table of contents; what matters is that the content mentioned is present somewhere.
Content you need:
1. Home page
This is the page visitors see first, and it should be designed so that it attractively draws attention to the most important message: who we are and what we do. Also make clear what the visitor can do next on the site; for example a button with ‘Schedule an introductory meeting’, ‘Book a service online’ (with a link to DoggyDoggy.app) or ‘View our services’.
2. About us
Potential clients have to have the confidence that their pet is in good hands. The ‘about us’ page will therefore be visited frequently. Add a photo of yourself with a short biography, as well as of your team members.
3. Services, rates and discount schemes
Set out here, in a clear overview, the services you offer, including rates and discount schemes. Avoid more complex discount schemes – keep it simple! That prevents questions afterwards.
4. A page with unique content, such as blogs or a unique service or product
This page is the hardest one straight away, but also one of the most important. This page is also called a ‘landing page’. In other words: the page where clients ‘land’ when they run a specific search on Google. Google uses the content of web pages, and the more unique the better. Because then you automatically rise to the top of the list.
This page with unique content could be, for example:
- A blog about a fun topic that interests a lot of people. Also name your service area in the blog so that it is a local story that can be picked up by Google
- A unique service you offer that is not readily offered elsewhere
- A unique product that only you offer
The content of this page is a precondition for being able to carry out Tip 2 properly.
5. Frequently asked questions
You are bound to already get questions that are asked frequently. How handy is it to get ahead of those questions and answer them on the website in advance. That saves you and your potential client time!
It is not a problem if this information overlaps with other parts of the website. Because some visitors will skim past it there, and can then get their answer this way.
Finish with a way to ask questions that do not yet appear in the Frequently asked questions section. For example with a form with a ‘More questions?’ button, where people can ask their question in free text.
6. Reviews
Reviews from happy clients are very important when it comes to winning trust. One way to do this is through an external review platform, for example Google or Trustpilot.
7. Vacancies
If you grow and you need staff, a vacancies page is really necessary. Explain on it what kind of team people will be joining and what their role in it would be.
8. Contact
Last, but certainly not least, the contact page. Use a contact form for this with an anti-spam option such as ‘ReCaptcha’. That prevents ‘robots’ from sending SPAM to your business email. If you offer a daycare service, make sure the address is on it as well, preferably with a link to Google Maps or OpenStreetMap so that visitors can easily request directions.
Tip 2: Use Search Engine Optimization (SEO) to make your website easy to find in Google
Now that you have a good website with enough content, it is also important that your website is easy to find in Google. Besides a technical question, this is also a question of content. Namely: which ‘keywords’ do you want to be found on? These keywords have to be embedded somewhere on your website as text, photo caption or as ‘meta tags’. ‘Meta tags’ are bits of code in your web page that a user does not otherwise see.
First think about which keywords you want to be found on. Generic terms such as ‘dog walking service’ can of course also be found on many other sites and are therefore not distinctive enough to end up high in the search list on Google.
A combination of the places where you deliver your services, your service descriptions and your unique content (Tip 1, point 4) give good handles for keywords.
Now you can ask your web builder to install a so-called ‘SEO plugin’. Chances are your website was built with Wordpress, in which case we recommend the SEO plugin from Yoast.
In Yoast you can then assign to your pages the keywords you have come up with. And specify the title and subtitles that Google gives to the relevant links to those pages.
Also add a link to DoggyDoggy.app to your website. The more relevant links, the better that is for your Google ranking.
Once you are done with this, also make sure that your web builder explicitly informs Google that it should ‘index’ your website page again. If your web builder is not familiar with this, send them to this help page. Also have your web builder submit the site structure to Google, so that Google can display the sublinks in the search engine as well.
It can take a day or two before Google has re-indexed your page. But then you will be easy to find in Google.
Tip 3: Set up a local marketing strategy in a combination of online and offline
Now that your website is easy to find, it is important to actually attract new visitors and tempt them to visit your page.
That works best with a combined strategy of online and offline marketing. Because a dog walking service or daycare mostly offers their services locally, it is not a strange idea to do the marketing very locally as well.
Think of a marketing strategy along the following lines:
| Offline | Online |
|---|---|
| Putting up a note at the local supermarket | Facebook advertisement by boosting a ‘Post’ to a geographically defined target group |
| Advertisement in the local newspaper | Daily facebook/instagram post with a photo of the dogs that are being walked or staying in daycare |
| Facilitating word-of-mouth advertising. For example, ask your clients whether they know more people who are looking for a dog walking service or daycare. | Google Adwords advertisement, so that your dog walking service is visible above the number 1 in the list. This is especially important until you have reached number 1 naturally through the SEO strategy. |
| Organising competitions and raffles | Email marketing to people who have given their email address for this purpose. Make sure the message is personalised, for example with a tool such as Mailchimp. |
| Getting yourself interviewed by a local newspaper | Blog posts about interesting topics |
| Taking part in local volunteering activities as a company team | |
| Sponsoring a local club, for example with a logo on club clothing | |
| Setting up a teaching programme and educating people |
Of course you do not have to carry out all the activities mentioned. Choose the ones that suit you. And there are bound to be many more!
Finally
Your website is an important gateway for new and existing clients. It is important that you present the right and complete content. Next, with Search Engine Optimisation you make sure you are easy to find on Google. Finally, we advise you to combine online and offline marketing so that you actually get new visitors on your website!
Questions and/or comments about this blog post? We are always open to feedback and discussion, just as we are about our software. Unfortunately we don’t make websites, but feel free to send us a message if you have questions and get in touch.
Other blogs:
Going Green in the Digital World: DoggyDoggy Does It Sustainably!
At DoggyDoggy we are aware of our negative impact on the climate. When you think of climate change you may think of traditional sectors such as oil companies and airlines, but as a software company we also contribute to global warming. Time to tackle that!
Read more
The importance of a clear cancellation policy for your dog business
As the proud owner or employee of a dog business, you're no doubt familiar with the challenges of working with dog owners. Your clients trust you with the care of their beloved pet, but there can be situations in which clients have to cancel their appointment. That's why it's important to draw up a clear cancellation policy for your dog business.
Read more
7 steps to starting a successful dog walking service
As a dog lover with a passion for the outdoors, starting a dog walking service is a dream that can come true. Not only can you turn your love for dogs into a successful business, you can also contribute to the wellbeing of the dogs. In this blog you'll discover how to build a thriving dog walking service step by step.
Read more
Certification for dog walking services
In principle anyone can start a dog walking service. Over the past five years the number of dog walking services has risen by more than 50%, from 941 in 2016 to 1,428 in 2021. There are many dog walking services in South and North Holland in particular, and in Flevoland there are no fewer than 24 dog walking services per 100,000 households.
Read more
How do I set the rates for my dog walking or daycare services?
This is one of the most pressing questions for dog walking services or dog daycare businesses that are just starting out. But for established businesses too, this remains a highly relevant question.
Read more
