Every shelter’s website tells a story — not just about the animals in their care, but about how the organization connects with its community, encourages dog and cat adoptions, recruits volunteers, and raises support. In this Shelter Roundtable website review, we evaluated a member site with a focus on usability, content quality, and search visibility.

At the request of the member, we’ve omitted their organization’s name and URL. Because of this, we’ll focus on more general observations and improvement suggestions that also apply broadly to many animal shelter and rescue websites. It will also limit our discussion design and images.

Site Overview

The site we reviewed is visually clean and mobile-friendly, with clear navigation and an organized layout. Key pages are in place, including adoption listings, a volunteer form, and donation options. The branding is consistent across pages, and the mission comes through in the tone of the content.

There are a few key areas where the site could be strengthened to better serve both its visitors and search engine visibility. Some important pages, such as a central “Services” hub or a dedicated “Success Stories” section, are missing.

A few calls to action could be more prominent, and some technical elements like header tags and metadata could be better optimized to help search engines understand the content. A broken link on the donation page also stands out as something that should be addressed quickly.

What Could Be Improved

From a technical perspective, the site is off to a strong start, but would benefit from rewriting and completing the page titles and adding meta descriptions. These elements are important for search engine rankings and can improve click-through rates in search results.

On the home page, the use of header tags should be refined — each page should have one H1 tag followed by H2 and H3 tags in a logical structure.

We also suggest moving the homepage tagline and introductory paragraph (‘Our goal is to match the animals…’) above the three informational boxes. Right now, this message,  which defines the organization’s purpose,  is visually understated and could easily be missed by first-time visitors.

One of the most valuable updates the shelter could make is to add a single Services page that outlines all the services offered — such as adoption, fostering, volunteering, and educational outreach — with clear links to more detailed pages. This helps both visitors and search engines understand the scope of the organization’s work.

We also recommend renaming the “Angel” page to a “Success Stories” page, so it is more recognizable, at least on the site navigation. Sharing past adoption successes is one of the most effective ways to build emotional engagement and encourage visitors to take the next step. (And the page needs a call to action on the bottom!)

Images are another area of opportunity. We suggest physically resizing images (not just compressing) before upload to improve load speed, especially for larger banner graphics. Alt text should also be reviewed and added where missing to improve accessibility and image search visibility.

In terms of overall layout updates, several small improvements would increase clarity and engagement:

• Events: Since you host many events, consider integrating them more prominently into the homepage and throughout the site. Same with your Blog posts to give them more exposure.
• The Contact Us information is in the site footer, but there should be a dedicated contact page (with hours listed).
• Outside Links: Consider making any link that goes to an outside site open in a new window.

We saw one of our legacy graphic templates used as image on the site – cool! 

Finally, we noted that the “Shop” link from the Donation page is currently broken and leads to a 404 error. This should be fixed or temporarily removed to prevent frustration and avoid deterring supporters who are trying to help.

Final Thoughts

We want to thank this rescue organization for the opportunity to review their website and provide feedback. It’s clear that they’ve already built a solid foundation. With a few strategic adjustments, they’ll be in an even stronger position to reach adopters, volunteers, and donors.

If you’re a member of Shelter Roundtable and would like your own site reviewed, let us know. Know someone else working on their shelter’s website? Sharing this post might give them a head start. And if they haven’t joined yet — we’d love to have them.