Why the process matters to a trainer
Most trainers commissioning a site are running classes four evenings a week and writing behaviour plans at the weekend. The build is not the problem; finding the hours to feed it is. So the process is designed around when you are actually free and what only you can supply.
Here is how a dog training and behaviour website build runs from first conversation to live.
Stage one: the conversation
Half an hour, usually on a call. What we are establishing is the shape of the business rather than the design: how many class types you run and where, whether behaviour work is half the income or a sideline, whether you travel, whether anyone else teaches for you, and what your current site or your Facebook page is doing for you now.
Two questions decide most of the structure. Which of the two routes, classes or behaviour, brings the money in. And what happens today when someone wants to join a course, because that is the process we are replacing.
Stage two: the plan
We come back with a page list, a recommended tier and a price. For a training business that is usually the Essentials shape: home with the two routes on the first screen, class pages with a timetable, a behaviour page with the consult and the intake, methods and qualifications, trainer profiles, prices, online training where you offer it, reviews, FAQ and contact. See our pricing for what each tier includes.
You approve the plan before anything is built. Changing the page list here costs nothing; changing it in week four costs a week.
Stage three: the booking decision
This comes early because everything else depends on it. Classes book as places through TeamUp, Bookeo or Acuity. Behaviour consults book as appointments with an intake questionnaire, which Acuity and Square Appointments both handle. Some trainers run one platform for both, some run two.
If you already have a platform with clients in it, we build around it. If you do not, we agree one now, and you set up your services, courses and prices in it while the site is being designed. That parallel work is what keeps the schedule honest.
Stage four: content
The stage that determines the launch date. What we need from you:
- Your approach, in your own words. A voice note is fine; we will write it up.
- Qualifications and memberships with the awarding bodies, years and register links.
- Class details: names, lengths, number of weeks, group sizes, venues, parking.
- Prices for classes, consults, follow-ups and packages, and what changes them.
- The behaviour process as you actually run it, and your position on vet referral.
- Photographs. Your own classes, your venue, you working with a dog, with owner permission. This is where most trainers stall, and where a morning with a photographer pays for itself.
We draft everything, you correct it. Correcting a draft takes an evening; writing from a blank page takes a month, which is why we never ask you to.
Stage five: design and build
Two to three weeks for most training sites. You see the home page and one inner page first, comment, and then we build the rest to the agreed direction. The intake questionnaire is written and configured in this stage, the class timetable is embedded on its own page, and the price tables are built as records you can edit yourself.
Stage six: testing
Everything gets tested on a real phone, on mobile data, including inside the Instagram in-app browser where much of your traffic arrives. We buy a test class place and book a test consult end to end, check the confirmations, the intake and the notifications, and run the accessibility and speed checks. We also check the site against the country checklist for claims, prices, cancellation terms, company details and privacy.
Stage seven: launch and handover
Going live is the least eventful day. We move the domain, keep the addresses of any old pages working, submit the site to Google, and confirm the booking flows on the live version. You get a recorded walkthrough of the things you will actually change: prices, class dates, trainer profiles, a new course page.
Where the schedule slips
Almost always photographs and prices. Two things you can do in the first week: book a photographer for a morning of classes, and write down every price including the ones you have never published. Do that and the build runs to time.
Where this sits
This is the same process behind every pet business website we build, with the parts that matter to trainers given more room: the booking decision taken early because two routes need two mechanisms, and the content stage weighted towards methods, qualifications and the intake questionnaire. Two routes, two bookings, credentials you can verify, and prices anyone can read.