Six tests, ten minutes
A daycare and boarding website has six jobs. Each has a test you can run on your own phone between drop-offs. Do them on mobile data in a private window, as a stranger would, not as someone who knows where everything is. The first two are the ones almost every kennel site fails.
1. Show the place
Test: find a photograph of the room a boarding dog sleeps in, and one of the play area with enough of the room visible to judge how big it is. Time yourself.
Pass: photographs of every area an owner cares about, taken on a working day with real dogs in them, plus a ninety-second walk-through video following the route a dog takes from the gate to bed.
Fail: the sign on the gate, a stock beagle in a meadow, and a paragraph about being passionate about dogs.
Fix: a shot list walked in the order a dog experiences the building: reception, the assessment space, each play area with the group size visible, the outdoor space and fencing, sleeping quarters with real bedding, the quiet room, the kitchen. A photographer for a morning, or a good phone in daylight with the lights on. Owner permission for the dogs, added to the consent form in your booking software so it is covered from now on. Then a premises page and the same images spread across the daycare and boarding pages.
2. Say what a day is
Test: find what time dogs go out in the morning, when they eat, whether there is a rest period, and who is on site overnight.
Pass: a daily routine page with a daycare day and a boarding day, hour by hour, in plain words, including what happens to a dog that does not settle.
Fail: "your dog will have a fun-filled day with lots of playtime".
Fix: write the routine as you would say it to a nervous owner at the gate, then publish that. Include the arrival and collection windows, whose food you use, and how dogs are grouped.
3. State the requirements before anyone rings
Test: find what vaccinations you need and how far in advance, your neutering policy, and whether you take puppies.
Pass: requirements on the daycare and boarding pages and in the FAQ, with vaccination upload and consent collected inside the booking flow.
Fail: nothing, or a line in the terms and conditions saying dogs must be fully vaccinated.
Fix: a short requirements block: vaccinations with timing, kennel cough, neutering above a stated age, flea and worm treatment, temperament, entire males, minimum puppy age. Then configure the same fields in Gingr, PetExec, Revelation Pets or Kennel Connection so the booking cannot complete without them.
4. Let a new dog in
Test: as a first-time owner, try to book an assessment or trial day without phoning anyone.
Pass: an assessment page with its own bookable item and its own button, primary for anyone who has not been before, explaining what happens, how long it takes and what to bring.
Fail: a Book button that only offers stays, or a note saying "call us to arrange a trial".
Fix: create the assessment as a service in your software, give it a page, and make it the first step in the booking route for new clients.
5. Take the booking, with the money and the policy clear
Test: try to book five nights over the Christmas week for two dogs sharing.
Pass: live availability or an honest same-day request, daycare and boarding as separate routes, peak dates named, second-dog rate stated, deposit taken, cancellation policy on the booking page.
Fail: a contact form asking for dates and a message, or rates that do not mention peak nights.
Fix: embed the platform deep-linked per service, publish daycare rates by day and package and boarding rates by night, and make the site's wording match what the software charges.
6. Prove it and measure it
Test: find your licence number and inspection rating in under fifteen seconds. Then ask whoever runs the office how many assessments the site booked last month.
Pass: licence and rating in the footer and on the boarding page, insurance and canine first aid stated, a team page with names and photographs, Google reviews near the buttons, and booking clicks, call taps and enquiries recorded by page.
Fail: the licence on a legal page nobody opens, and nobody able to say what the site produced.
Fix: move the licence and rating where owners look, add the team page, and set up events for booking clicks, call taps and form submissions by page. Ten minutes looking at it once a month.
Scoring
Six out of six and the site is doing its job. Keep the photographs and peak dates current and reshoot when the building changes.
Four or five: fix the failures individually, no rebuild needed.
Three or fewer, with tests one or two among them: the site is losing first-time owners every week, and the ones you lose in October are the daycare regulars that would have filled February.
Where this sits
This is the launch checklist for every dog daycare and boarding website we build, and the first ten minutes of a diagnosis on one you already have. The same six jobs, in different forms, sit behind the wider pet business websites we make. For a kennel, test one is the one that changes the phone calls fastest.