What dog owners check before they book a walker
- Do you cover my area? Name the neighbourhoods or postcodes. "South Dublin" is vaguer than "Rathmines, Ranelagh, Rathgar and Milltown", and people outside the list then don't book.
- What a walk costs, and what kind of walk. Group or solo, how long, how many dogs at once. A small price list ends most "how much?" messages.
- Can I trust you? Insurance, a background check where your country has one (Garda vetting in Ireland, a DBS check in the UK), pet first aid, and how long you've done it. Say what you have; don't hint at what you don't.
- How keys and the house are handled. Where keys are kept, whether you lock up, what happens if the dog is unwell or you can't make it.
- Photos of you with dogs, ideally ones you've walked (with their owners' permission).
The sections a dog walking website needs
- Top of the page: what you do and where ("Dog walks from your door in Dublin 6"), the starting price, Book a walk and your phone number as a button.
- Prices and booking: each walk or visit with its length and price, and booking right there.
- Where you walk: the areas you collect from, and the parks you use.
- Trust: insurance, checks, first aid, how many dogs per group, keys.
- How it starts: a free meet and greet before the first walk is the usual way; say how to arrange it.
- Contact: phone, email, and your hours.
Booking walks online, with the address
The difference between a walker's booking and a salon's is the address: you go to the dog, so the booking has to say where, and there has to be time to get from one house to the next. In our example, Ginta set this up by itself from "I collect dogs from home": the booking form asks for the address for the visit, and it leaves 30 minutes of travel time after each booking (change it in Settings).
Owners get a confirmation email with a calendar file, a reminder the day before, and a link to move or cancel. You see the week's walks in Ginta, with each address.
One honest limit: booking gives each time to one owner. A group walk with four dogs from four homes can't be booked by four owners at the same time. Two ways round it: book group walks as Events (a walk with 4 places, repeating every weekday), or keep booking for solo walks and visits and arrange group places by message.
Things worth putting in writing
- How many dogs you walk at once. Some councils limit it: in Tower Hamlets, for example, one person may walk four dogs, or up to six with the council's professional dog walker licence (Tower Hamlets FAQs). Check your own council's rules before you promise a number.
- Lead or off lead, and that you ask the owner first.
- Cancellations: until when owners can cancel, and what happens with late ones. Booking online can close at the time you choose (24 hours before by default).
- Bad weather and heat: shorter walks in the heat, what you do in a storm.
Keep medical details out of the booking form. Ask what you need to walk the dog safely (pulls, reactive to other dogs, recall) and talk through the rest at the meet and greet.
Getting found locally
A dog walker is a service-area business on Google: set up your Google Business Profile with the areas you cover and no public address if you work from home (service areas), put your website on the profile, and keep the business name as it really is (guidelines). The step-by-step: how to get your business on Google.
How it works with Ginta
Write what you'd tell a new client: the walks and visits with lengths and prices, the areas, your hours, your insurance and checks. Ginta builds the website with booking in about a minute, and asks only what's missing. Our example's message took 97 seconds and 18.3 credits; it asked nothing. Then:
- Change prices, hours and days off in the website's Parts tab yourself, without the AI.
- Add your own photos of walks by sending them in the chat ("use these instead of the photos you picked").
- Take a deposit or the full price online through your own Stripe account, if you want people to pay when they book; Ginta adds no fee.
- Free plan: up to 30 bookings a month per website, at a
name.ginta.pageaddress with a small badge. A walker doing several walks a day goes past that quickly: no booking cap and your own domain start at €5 a month (with your own Claude or ChatGPT) or €19 on Light.
More on choosing a booking tool: how to add online booking to your website.
Questions
Do dog walkers need a website?
Not to start; plenty begin with word of mouth and a Facebook group. A website pays off when you want to fill gaps in your week with people who don't know you yet: it shows your areas, prices and checks, and takes the booking.
Should a dog walker put prices online?
Yes. Owners compare walkers by price and type of walk, and a clear list saves you answering the same message. Say what changes the price (an extra dog, a longer walk, weekends).
Can owners book recurring walks?
Each booking is one walk, so a "Monday to Friday at noon" owner books each walk, or you add them yourself in Ginta's calendar. Owners can book up to 60 days ahead by default.
Can I do pet sitting visits as well as walks?
Yes. Add each visit as its own service (a 30-minute cat visit, a puppy visit) with its own length and price.
