How to create the perfect show dog website

Blog Tips

3 December 2018

How to create the perfect show dog website

What makes a good show dog web design?

Let’s examine the content first.

You need to publish your dog show results.

You need to publish great photos and pedigrees.

And you need to blog about your show dogs, their dog show adventures and wins.

What about the actual web design?

It should be mobile friendly and be easy for your visitors to find what they need and to read your content.

How to start building your show dog website

Our website builder is made specifically for show dogs and dog breeders.

It’s easy to sign up and you can start creating web pages straight away. Or you can request a free website build.

Get started with Breedpost

Get us to build your website or transfer your current website!

What to publish on your dog pages to make the perfect show dog website

Let’s assume you have some dog pages published.

Maybe you’ve added a description, uploaded some photos and created some breeders, owners and handlers.

That’s great.

But now we need to think about publishing show results, creating a photo gallery for each dog and building pedigrees.

You need to think about these dog pages from the perspective of a website visitor.

I understand that you breed dogs mainly to improve the breed. So you need to advertise litters and puppies.

Although in this article I’m focusing on show dog web design.

So does a perspective puppy buyer care about your dogs’ performance in the show ring?

Maybe. It may give you some credibility. I don’t know, because I’m an ex exhibitor, and I’d be very interested in your show results even if I were searching for a companion dog only.

I’d be more inclined to describe your target audience as (in order of priority)

  1. perspective show dog buyers
  2. perspective stud dog enquiries
  3. perspective companion dog buyers

You should focus on providing potential show dog and stud dog buyers with all the information they need.

Publishing your show dog results will improve your online credibility

We have a dog show results system integrated into our website builder.

You can actually use it to keep track of your dog show results and judges.

You don’t need to publish every result on your website but you can enter all of them into the system for your own records.

It’s easy to view show results by judge.

Over time you can easily see what awards a particular judge has given your dogs and at which shows.

A screenshot of a show dog judge page in Breedpost admin

You can also view and search awards that each of your dogs have been given.

A screenshot in Breedpost admin of a dog and their show results

How do you publish show results on your website?

When you start using the show results system, each result will automatically publish to the relevant dog page.

You don’t need to do any design or formatting on your web page.

All you need to do is enter the result into the show results system and the rest is taken care of for you.

The highest award, dog show and the date will appear in the listing in chronological order.

The award is linked to the dog show results own web page.

A show results list on a dog profile page

Why does each dog show result have its own web page?

So you can present

  • each award including the judge
  • a critique
  • photo gallery of your day at the show

This makes your site a true show dog website. Your visitors can view all your wins, critiques and photos easily from the dog’s page.

A screenshot of a show results page including the judges critique

The show results system is database driven.

You only need to add clubs, shows and judges once and you can use them over and over again.

This videos shows you how to set up a club, create a show and publish a result.

Remember you don’t need to do any fiddly website formatting or design yourself.

This saves you time. It also means that your show dog web design is consistent, making it easy for your visitors move around your website.

Which show results should you publish on your website?

You can certainly publish all of your show results on your dog pages.

Publishing all of your results won’t reduce the quality of your show dog website and its design.

I think it’s up to you which results you publish as long as you’re consistent.

Maybe you only want to publish big wins and specialty results. Or maybe you’d like to publish them all.

Visitors will certainly enjoy viewing the dog show result pages, especially if you’ve published some great photos.

Make sure to publish your dog show critiques

Publishing critiques from dog show judges will help to improve your online credibility.

When you add a critique to a show result, the critique will display on that results web page.

All published critiques will display on the relevant dog’s web page.

A critique on a dog’s page consists of

  • the dog show’s title
  • the critique
  • the judge
  • a link to that dog show result page

Now you’re really starting to create a true show dog website.

Publishing photos of your show dogs

How important are photos of your show dogs?

Very important. Wouldn’t it be great if show dog websites stopped publishing tiny little photos scattered in between web page text?

I’ve seen this so often. The photos are too small and it makes reading the text very difficult.

Our website builder automatically creates a gallery once you upload one or more images of your dog.  

Again, you don’t need to format or optimise the photos for the web.

All you need to do is upload photos taken straight from your phone.

The photos will look great on your website and be small enough in file size to load quickly.

A lightbox image gallery will be created automatically where visitors can cycle through and view large photos and captions of your dogs.

What sort of photos should I publish?

If you’re focusing on show dog web design you should publish photos of your dogs

  • stacked
  • on the move
  • headshots

Building pedigrees that look great on any device

What’s a show dog website without pedigrees?

Remember that your target audience for your show dog website, is potential show dog buyers and stud dog enquiries.

I’m sure they could find your dogs pedigrees from a major pedigree database in many cases.

But why should they have to search for that?

And do you really want a potential enquiry to leave your website? They may never come back.

So you need to supply them with what they need on each of your dog pages.

You need to publish your dog pedigrees and they need to view well from all types of devices.

Our website builder includes a fully integrated pedigree generator.

This means, like the show results system, your pedigrees are also managed using a database.

They are quicker and easier to update and you don’t need any design skills to make them look great on your website.

Check this video out to see how easy it is to create a three generation pedigree for your show dog website.

Write a compelling description and engage your website visitors

When you’re writing a description of your show dog you need to consider your target audience.

So think about what you’d like to read about a particular show dog.

Maybe you could focus on their

  • breed type
  • conformation
  • temperament

You could also discuss their parentage or lineage.

Make sure to keep your sentences short because that will make the content much easier to read online.

Our show dog web design templates have been developed for legibility and readability.

So again, you don’t have to worry about formatting text, headings or paragraphs.

When creating your dog’s content, you should also consider search engine optimisation.

You may want to improve this particular dog’s search engine ranking or help improve your website’s in general.

Consider some keywords that prospective website visitors may enter into search engines to get to your website.

You could weave these into your text. But make sure to do it in a natural way.

Some example keywords or phrases may be

  • best in show winning Border Collie
  • top winning Newfoundland
  • best of breed Crufts Japanese Spitz
A screenshot of a Breedpost template animal profile page

Start a blog about dog shows and your dog show results

Dog breeders and show dog enthusiasts should blog more.

Blogging helps to improve your

  • search engine optimisation
  • online credibility
  • website’s engagement rate

Our website builder includes a full blogging platform. So you can write hundreds of posts about your dogs and dog shows.

What should you blog about on your show dog website?

Blogging doesn’t mean you have to write big long posts.

You should write some long posts. But these wouldn’t need to be about dog shows and dog show wins.

Big long posts are for search engine optimisation and to help solve a problem for the reader. Or knowledge articles to cement your online credibility as an expert in a particular area.

I’m talking about news articles that a website visitor can read quickly.

You could set up a blog category named dog shows or dog show results or both.

Then you could blog about each dog show. It needn’t be a long article.

What it will do though, is show that your website is continually updated and looked after.

By regularly updating your website you will

  • improve your online credibility
  • improve visitor engagement and loyalty as they will return more often expecting new updates
  • improve your search engine optimisation because your website will be indexed more often than a static site

All you need to do is publish a few photos from the dog show and write a couple of paragraphs about the day.

Our blogging platform also provides an easy way to link to a dog, show results, litter and other article pages.

At the end of each blog post make sure to link to any dogs that you’ve mentioned.

This is called internal linking and can also help to boost your search engine optimisation.

It is also very useful to your visitors. They can easily click on the link and visit a dog’s page that they’re interested in.

Keep your site up-to-date and publish the perfect show dog website

So now you’ve created some really great content that makes your website the perfect show dog website.

You should have

  • dog show results on all of your dog pages
  • complete pedigrees on all of your dog pages
  • critiques on your dog pages
  • good selection of show dog photos
  • some great written content about each of your show dogs
  • a blog with at least a dog show or show results category

We take care of the show dog web design by providing

  • show results system
  • dog pedigree generator
  • blogging platform
  • modern, user-friend show dog templates that look great on mobiles, tables and desktop computers

Building and maintaining a good website does take time and effort.

We want to make it easy for dog breeders and show dog enthusiasts. You should only need to worry about creating great content.

We will worry about the professional show dog web design, so you don’t have to.

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Author: Janelle

Janelle is a Breedpost Founder, ex show dog exhibitor, Corgi owner and loves to build websites. She's a content management specialist, has a Master of Information Technology and Diploma in Web Development.

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