011- Advertising

Ever wonder where to look for new clients? How do you go about advertising to them? This week on the podcast we share our experiences getting new clients and give ideas that may work for you too!

PSI has some great times for marketing on a budget

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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE

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Collin 0:16

I'm Collin. And I'm Megan. And this is pet sitter confessional, an open and honest discussion about life as a pet sitter.

Meghan 0:25

Hey guys, welcome to Episode 12. This episode is going to be all about how to find your clients and about advertising. So we get asked all the time about how do I find clients? What's the best way to advertise? During this episode, we're going to answer some of those questions. So first, before we talk about advertising, we're going to talk about who are your clients. So we have found that there is a big need in two areas. The first is elderly pet care, and the second is medicated pet care. And a lot of times those two go along together because a lot of times the pets that need the medication are elderly pet, the

Collin 1:00

people typically seek out this kind of pet sitting because either kennels or other boarding facilities won't take their pet, or it would be way too costly for them to be able to have that kind of service. And so this is an alternative that we have found a lot of people are very surprised exist to be able to have their dogs cared for in someone else's home or in their home and not have to take them someplace.

Meghan 1:24

So we specialize in providing those kinds of services like Collin was saying, through gaining the experience and the referrals over the years. Our clients know that we specialize in those areas and we have an elderly dog ourselves, when thankfully he doesn't need medication. Yeah, but he is almost 12 years old. He's a little dachshund named Cody, and he is just wonderful. Our favorite. Yes. So you may see a big need for our puppy care or walks in your area, like we talked about before, especially in larger cities where if a client has a puppy and they're not able to come home during the day because they work long hours, or they need walks in the middle of the day. So part of the research is talking to clients that you do have about their needs, and then getting to know the groomers and vets in the area. And asking what they see is a need that you can fill.

Collin 2:17

So you could specialize in a certain kind of care, that's a great way to be able to charge more and higher prices. And you can also seek out getting specialized training and certifications for that so that people can again know and trust you for that care whenever they need it. Or on the kind of other side of that is to aim for the middle of that bell curve of needs to be filled and clients to go after and just kind of go for the app, the biggest audience possible to kind of grab as much as you can to see the most growth. One concern with specializing too much is that they may limit your growth potential if the market is too small.

Meghan 2:55

So once you figure out who your clients are, then you can go ahead and start advertising to them. What are some of the best ways to advertise? Well, there's a lot of different ways. And some of them include business cards. You can deliver business cards to groomers to pet smart or Petco to veterinary offices. There's also an option to do bulletin boards at a local community center. Some people do yard signs,

Collin 3:19

we got listed on Yelp when we first started and that was another way of making sure that our name bubbled up to the surface when people did searches but just a cautionary tale. It is almost impossible to get that taken down or edited once it's up, which we really struggled with. Once we moved and trying to get our old business address taken down. It was quite the ordeal. So just know that some of this stuff you have to be cautious with so that you don't get too involved with it.

Meghan 3:48

So Yelp will say that you are a closed business but I don't believe there is an option to completely delete your business and remove it. Another online option is a website called next door calm This will list all of the neighbors in your area. And you can advertise to them. So if you have a small service radius, this is really important to send out your request to your next door neighbors or in the neighborhood adjacent to you. And a lot of times, this is how people this is how pet sitters get a lot of their clients, because they have a lot of their neighbors who talked to each other, or they're out walking their dog in their neighborhood. And so they're able to advertise that way.

Collin 4:29

Yeah, next door is a great way to stay very, very local. And people tend to trust them more, especially if they can have a neighbor sitting there dog that's a little bit easier to swallow, then maybe a complete stranger that doesn't even live nearby. In addition to next door, you can also join local Facebook groups as a good way of again, getting involved in letting more people see your content and see your ads so that they know that you're local and can a lot of times people will trust that a little bit better. And this is all circling around. The idea of having a lot of good word of mouth advertising. And we were very fortunate that there's a local vet, that's all one of our postings on a local Facebook group. And that has gone on to tell many, many clients that we offer these services. So someone is out there referring people on our behalf. And that's work that we're not having to do. So we're very thankful that there is that. And so part of this is getting really good reviews and testimonials from friends and past clients that you can show to people so they know you're trustworthy. And definitely don't be afraid to ask your past clients, especially longtime repeat clients, to tell their friends and family about you. And one way to possibly incentivize This is to give them a discount for everyone that they refer.

Meghan 5:48

So with Halloween coming up, a great idea is along with handing out candy to the kids that come to your door. You can also hand out business cards or dog treats.

Collin 5:57

Craigslist has kind of fallen out of fashion with a lot of this advertising. And when we first started, it was one of the only ways that we advertised at the very beginning. But most of this kind of things, these kinds of things have shifted to next door and Facebook groups, because there's a picture associated with the post and you can see their profile. And so there's a lot of things that build up trust with those kind of venues as opposed to a Craigslist post.

Meghan 6:21

So again, just anywhere that dogs go pet smart groomers, pets offices, these are all great places to get connected, and to get your flyers out there to get your business cards out there to make friends. When you take your dog or cat to the vet office and tell them about your business so that they can refer you to their clients as well. And also dog parks are a great way to get your name out there and when you're taking your clients or your own personal dogs to the dog park so dog parks are a great way to get more clients and attract people to your business.

Collin 7:00

Sometimes they'll have a posting board there to where you can leave a flyer or leave a business card so that people can see that when they're coming by.

Meghan 7:07

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Collin 7:42

seeking out networking events is another great opportunity. Our city hosts dog specific events throughout the year, the host of barking the park and a dog a hunt for Easter. These events are excellent ways to get out there and have flyers and business cards and let people know what's services you provide. also seek out young professional events or local business organizations and meetings as well. This is a great way to not just necessarily get to know potential clients, but a way to get to know other business owners in the area. So you can talk about the struggles that they're having, or ways that have worked for them for that specific area. There's a group in our town that gets together about once a month of small business owners to socialize and brainstorm how to strengthen the business community as well as to make sure that everybody's kind of on the same page is where they want to be going. So again, that might not be a specific training brand new clients to pets, it is a way to get connected with other business owners to know how to market and an options that they're using.

Meghan 8:47

an awesome way to advertise is to get a car magnet. Some people do just their back windshield or a little side panel on the door, but I've also seen entire cars wrapped in their logo, which is pretty good. cool to see. Be cautious though some people don't like to do this because when you are at somebody's house that lets other people know that the owner isn't home, so it could potentially be a security issue but for others they don't mind at all. Another great way is to get t shirts made as I mentioned, so you can wear them out when you go to the grocery store, or a dog parks, or really anywhere that you go just to let people know that you are a pet sitting business. Hats and jackets are great for that as well or hoodies for when the when it's not t shirt weather or when it's raining outside. Really anything that can be branded with your logo, you should do it so that you can get the most exposure for your business.

Collin 9:42

Megan loves wearing her rover shirt wherever she goes. also providing gift certificates for local auctions and charities or raffles in your service area began as a way of helping people to know that you're there. Social media is also huge. As we all know, it's a way to get your name out there. So create your own Facebook page, Instagram account for both you and your business. Now part of that is making sure that you have removed all negative social media images of yourself, though, if there are things that you'd rather not people know about. Once you start this advertising, and people start searching and looking specifically for you, you want to make sure that those aren't there. Some people will say that you should pay for ads, you could potentially pay for Facebook ads, or Instagram ads, just know that this could get very costly. And if you don't have it set just right, people way outside of your service area are going to be seeing those. And so it might not be that helpful.

Meghan 10:40

But you can on Instagram and Facebook, you can set the ad to specific people, whether it be in your city, or what age they're at.

Collin 10:49

So again, with those ads, you have to make sure that they're set just right. So making sure that it's set to be limited to people to be shown in your city and people with pets and making sure again All of that stuff is set up before you send out the ad. So you're not advertising to somebody four states away. This all revolves around SEO, Search Engine Optimization. What is this? This is basically making sure that when somebody types in your name or your pet sitting business, you are one of the first if not the first items to show up in Google. So great way to get ahead of this is to get a website. We love Squarespace. And that's a great way to get out there. It's very easy to set up You don't have to know anything about coding or anything like that. They take all of that it's it's a great way to get your name out there. Another part of SEO is generating content for your website and social media. So the more new content that's put out there with associated with your name, the easier it is for people to find you. So you could blog about your pet sitting business or post photos of your stays again so that when someone searches for your name, you're the first one to come up.

Meghan 11:53

And along with advertising your logo on paraphernalia, you could also do a contest on Your Facebook page or Instagram, and give away some of your product. You can also give away your product to your clients or your family so that they can wear it out in the city that you're in so you can get your name out there even more. Ultimately, though, it is all about name recognition. Obviously, this is going to be easier if you live in a small town versus a big city, because you'll have an easier time penetrating the pet City Market if you can network and work off of referrals. If you're in a big city, you can get drowned out and lost in the noise very easily because there's a lot of competition out there. we advertise primarily through local Facebook groups. So the buy sell trade groups on there, we we post our link on there.

Collin 12:45

Also the local city groups where people talk about things going on in the city.

Meghan 12:50

And then also next door as well for the neighborhood, local community.

Collin 12:54

And then referrals as we've mentioned, as well, that's been huge for us and we've been very thankful For the people who continue to refer us to their friends and family, we used to give out a lot more business cards than we currently do. And I think that's part of the fact that as we've gotten more referrals and posted to those other groups, we've kind of switched how we've how we've chosen to advertise over the years and

Meghan 13:16

we hope that this episode is provided you with some options about when you're going to advertise your business. And I think that wraps up our thoughts on advertising, but if you have anything else that we missed or questions, you can send your feedback to feedback at pet sitter confessional calm. You can follow us on Facebook and Instagram at pet sitter confessional, you can join our Facebook group sitter confessionals, and on Twitter We are at PS confessional. Make sure you're subscribed on iTunes, Google Play Spotify or really anywhere that you listen to your podcast so that you never miss an episode. We thank you for joining us today.

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