Dogma

Dogma NYC already had a strong visual identity. The homepage used beautiful dog photography, playful brand details, and a warm personality that fit the business well. The issue was not that the site looked bad. The issue was that visitors had to work too hard to understand what Dogma was, what it offered, and what step they should take next.

The UX review focused on making the site easier to understand, easier to navigate, and more effective at building trust with dog owners.

The biggest issue was the hero section. The homepage opened with a strong image and the Dogma logo placed in the center of the page, but there was no clear headline explaining the service. Visitors had to infer the purpose of the business instead of understanding it immediately.

The navigation also blended into the main content instead of behaving like a standard website menu. Important links were placed in the middle of the hero, which made the page feel less familiar and made it harder for visitors to orient themselves.

Below the hero, the page had useful content, but the order was not helping the user journey. Brand story content appeared before visitors had enough context about the service. The founder section appeared before trust had been established through reviews or social proof. Customer reviews were placed too far down the page, where many visitors were likely to miss them.

The service section was useful, but it felt a little crowded. The first visit call to action was mixed in with the service cards, so it did not stand out as an important next step.

The page also lacked a proper footer with expected information like contact details, legal links, and secondary navigation.

I reworked the homepage structure around a clearer visitor journey.

The logo was moved into a more familiar top-left position, with a standard navigation menu across the top of the page. This made the site easier to understand and gave visitors a consistent way to move around.

The hero section was simplified around one clear message and one primary call to action. Instead of using the center of the page for the logo and navigation, that space became focused on explaining what Dogma offers and why it matters.

The service content was moved higher on the page so visitors could quickly see what Dogma provides. The services were reorganized into a cleaner layout, with fewer items per row and a stronger standalone call to action for first-time visitors.

I also adjusted the order of the homepage content. Social proof was brought much higher up, directly after the services, so visitors could see evidence of trust before being asked to read more detailed brand or founder content. The founder section still had an important role, especially for a dog care business where trust matters, but it worked better after visitors had already seen what the service offered and that other dog owners recommended it.

The full review section was moved into the main body of the page rather than being buried near the bottom. The Instagram feed stayed in the flow because it supported the brand well and gave visitors a more personal look at the dogs, the space, and the experience.

Finally, I added a proper footer so the page ended in a more conventional and useful way, with clear access to contact information, navigation, and legal links.

The updated homepage keeps the personality of the original site, but gives it a clearer structure.

Visitors can now land on the page and quickly understand what Dogma is, what services are available, why other dog owners trust it, and how to take the next step. The design still feels warm and brand-specific, but the experience is more intuitive, more scannable, and better aligned with how people actually evaluate a local dog care service.

In addition to the website work, I have managed Dogma’s Google Ads campaigns for the past five years.

Before I took over, the account was running through the simplified version of Google Ads, formerly known as Google Ads Express. That setup limited access to more advanced campaign controls, which made it harder to refine targeting, separate campaign types, and understand how profitable the ads really were.

My initial audit uncovered several issues. The location targeting was not tight enough, so the campaign was picking up junk clicks from people outside the right service area, including some searches from other countries. I tightened the targeting so more of the budget went toward people who could realistically become customers.

I also found that branded searches were being handled inefficiently. Dogma was paying more than it needed to for keywords that included the word “Dogma,” often around $1.50 per click. I separated those searches into a dedicated brand campaign, which brought many branded clicks down to around $0.10 per click.

That mattered because people searching for Dogma by name already knew the brand and were usually looking for the website directly. By lowering the cost of those clicks, more of the budget became available for searches from people who were looking for dog care but had not chosen Dogma yet.

The account also did not have conversion tracking in place, so there was no reliable way to judge whether the campaigns were profitable. I set up conversion tracking and built a profit calculator that helped us plan around different budgets, project future profitability, and make better strategic decisions.

I continue to manage Dogma’s Google Ads campaigns, keeping the account focused on qualified traffic, measured conversions, and a cost per conversion that has stayed better than the industry average.