What the clicker actually is to your dog
Right now the clicker means nothing to your dog. It is just a small plastic box that makes a sharp sound, and some dogs notice it, some ignore it, and a few find the noise startling on first hearing. The clicker only becomes useful once your dog learns the sound predicts something good arriving immediately. That learning step is called charging, and skipping it is the most common reason clicker training seems not to work — the owner starts marking behaviours with a sound the dog has never been taught to care about.
Charge it in short, boring sessions
Sit somewhere quiet with no other animals competing for the treats. Click once, then feed a pea-sized piece of something genuinely exciting — soft, smelly, and quick to swallow works better than a dry biscuit he has to crunch through. Wait for him to finish and look back at you, then click and treat again. Ten to fifteen repetitions is plenty for one session. Run two or three of these sessions, spread across a day, and watch for the change: his ears prick at the click and his head swings toward your treat hand before the food appears. That anticipation is the sign the sound is charged.
If your dog flinches at the click, muffle it inside a pocket or a folded cloth for the first sessions, or work at a distance, and let the volume rise gradually as he relaxes.
Timing is the whole skill
Once the click is charged, use it to mark the precise instant your dog does the thing you want — his bottom touching the floor on a sit, his eyes flicking to you on a crowded pavement. A click even a second late marks whatever he did in that second instead, which may be looking away or standing back up. Treat after every click, even if your timing was off; the click is a promise, and breaking it teaches him the sound is unreliable. Keep sessions to a few minutes. Dogs learn marker timing skills in short bursts far better than in one long drilling session, and ending while he is still keen leaves him eager for the next round.
Move from charging to one simple behaviour
Pick something he already offers often, such as touching your hand with his nose. The moment his nose meets your palm, click and treat. Within a few repetitions he will start offering the touch deliberately, and you can add the word later. Resist the urge to click for several behaviours at once in these early days — one clear lesson at a time builds his confidence that he can make the click happen, which is the engine of all later clicker work, from recall to loose-lead walking.
Keep every trainer consistent
A dog whose owner clicks for eye contact while a partner clicks randomly for cuteness learns a blurry lesson. Agree in the household what gets clicked this week, and note which behaviour you are on. KinsLe's Care Teams helps here because each charging or training session can sit as an assigned duty on his profile, marked complete with a timestamp, so the next person picks up exactly where the last session ended.