451: Offering Pet Detective Services with Annalisa Berns
Ever wondered what it takes to be a pet detective and how you could add it as a service to your business? Annalisa Burns, The Pet Detective, sheds light on the unique skills and training required for pet search and rescue. She discusses the challenges and emotional aspects of tracking lost pets, emphasizing the critical role of understanding animal behavior. She shares about the growing demand for pet detective services across the U.S., and ways to add it as a service, or a grow a business around it.
Main topics
Pet Detective Role
Training Essentials
Search Techniques
Service Demand
Main takeaway: Being a pet detective is critically important and in high demand, especially for trained pet detectives in locating and safely returning lost pets to their owners, utilizing a blend of specialized training, understanding of animal behavior, and various search methods.
About our guest:
Annalisa Berns, is the owner of Pet Search and Rescue and Pet Search and Rescue Investigations. She dreamed of working with animals from a young age. Annalisa found her life’s work when she read Kat Albrecht’s book, “The Lost Pet Chronicles.” She is passionate about educating people about how to bring their lost pets home.
On a lost pet case Annalisa usually works 2-3 Search Dogs. She also coaches people how to find their lost pets. She is a licensed Private Investigator in California and Florida. She has also completed California Association of Licensed Investigator training NLITE. Annalisa helps train Search Dog Handlers to help find lost pets. She was a guest speaker at the Western States Veterinary Association twice and the American Veterinary Medical Association conference. She completed FEMA training with the Emergency Management Institute in Animals in Disaster: Awareness and Preparedness and Animal in Disaster: Community Planning. In 2023, she presented two mini sessions for Pet Sitters International. She also completed Introduction to Animal Psychology Certificate on Pet Behavior.
Links:
Previously on: https://www.petsitterconfessional.com/episodes/417
https://www.petsearchandrescue.com
https://www.instagram.com/petsearchandrescue/?hl=en
https://www.facebook.com/PetSearchAndRescue
training on calming signals for dogs: https://pethelpful.com/dogs/Dog-Behavior-Understanding-Dog-Calming-Signals
Phone: 310-880-8268
Kat Albright: https://www.missinganimalresponse.com
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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Provided by otter.ai
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
pet, search, dog, work, service, pet owner, offer, training, client, talking, business, community, pet detective, drones, lost, cases, rescue, missing, pet sitter, helping
SPEAKERS
Collin Funkhouser, Annalisa B
Collin Funkhouser 00:02
Welcome to pet sitter confessional and open and honest discussion about life as a pet sitter. Today, we're brought to you by time to pet and that brailles. Today, we have Annalisa burns, the pet detective joining us again, she was previously on episode 417. And she talked about what to do with lost pets and more importantly, how to prevent them and the educational aspects that we can bring to our clients. But today on Elisa, I'm really excited to have you on to talk about what we can do with this as a service, what it means to be a pet detective, whether that's something we do full time or an add on service to our business and what all that looks like. Because that's an I know, this is a service that I have never thought of adding before. We've talked about nails and grooming and all sorts of things. So I'm really excited to dive into this. But for our new listeners on Lisa, could you please introduce yourself and tell us a little bit more about all that you do?
Annalisa B. 00:52
Thank you so much for having me here. And I am so excited to talk about this. This is really one of my passions. I just started in the industry. When I adopted a rescue dog from an animal shelter. And she had some behavioral issues, she chewed up my favorite pair of flip flops, and also basically the entire house. So the behavior is told me maybe she needed some a job to keep her active and occupied and build her confidence. I was a little skeptical, and tried out a bunch of different careers with her. And I found this amazing, amazing opportunity to help find lost pets using a search dog. And I went through the training with her. She loved it. I loved it. And we loved working together as a team to help find missing pets using my search dog. And that was over 18 years ago.
Collin Funkhouser 01:51
I know you mentioned that word the industry there. And so what what is the industry really the landscape of pet search and rescue?
Annalisa B. 02:01
Well, it's definitely a specialized service. It's in very high demand. But there aren't enough people doing it, which is why I reached out to you and said, I really want to share this with your listeners. That demand is so high, I get called from every state in the US and around the world people begging for help looking for their lost pets. Now the primary person that we look to who sort of led the way with training a search dog to find a missing pet, instead of a missing person is Kat Albrecht. And she is an amazing author. You can read her books, I highly recommend them. And she tells about how she ended up using her search dog to find another last searched dog. And she got this idea why don't we train search dogs to find lost pets. And she started offering training and I took her second training I think it was in June 2005.
Collin Funkhouser 03:01
So it's there's, it's been around for a little while coming up on kind of, you know, 20 ish years of this being being a thing. And so the kind of searching that you're talking about, is that is it specifically to doing searching with a dog? Or are there options for not doing the dog search as well?
Annalisa B. 03:19
Absolutely. There's both options. My passion is working with the dogs because it's an amazing collaboration working as a team. And I just honestly can't put it all into words, because it's amazing when you train with your dog and teach them to alert in a particular way when they find something. And then the first time they do that, and they communicate back to you. It's it's better than than anything you can imagine that that sense of satisfaction and fulfillment of working together. So I'm partial to working with the dogs. But there are also many ways that people can help with the loss pet problem, and ways that don't involve training a dog. People
Collin Funkhouser 04:05
may be listening to this and going okay, well. So what exactly do you do? What it what does this mean to this profession? Kind of what are what is the daily things look like or kind of how do you work each day?
Annalisa B. 04:18
That's a great question. And I want to mention that each state has its own laws about requirements to get to become a pet detective. Some states have requirements that you need to be a licensed private investigator, which I am and other states you don't have to be a licensed private investigator right. jaw drop right there. Yeah, yes.
Collin Funkhouser 04:42
I want to be a private I mean, I got fedora and you know,
Annalisa B. 04:47
and the bloodhound is perfect for this work. So yes, so I'm a licensed private investigator and my my day is mostly looks like fielding calls also in educating people about lost pets, their behavior and how to recover them. It can include doing phone consultations, email consultations, reviewing maps, satellite maps, marking maps with where techniques can be utilized sending people examples and pictures of what we recommend. And then if somebody books me to go out in person in search, I drive to their location, I collect a scent article from their pet, like bedding, toy and old collar. And I work my search dogs, I currently have four search dogs. But usually I work two to three on a given case, one at a time, I give them scent, and I see where the search dogs lead. And each one is trained differently. And there's different ways to train your dogs. But that gives you the short version of what it looks like being a real life pet detective.
05:59
You mentioned it, it sounds like there's a lot of prep work, a lot of desk work. A lot of you said map reconnaissance and data gathering. Well, how important is that to the work that you do? Well, it
Annalisa B. 06:13
really is very critical to the work is knowing what search you're getting into making sure you really can help with the logistics. So for example, if someone hires you to look for a lost cat, down in the Grand Canyon, versus in downtown Los Angeles, it's two logistically different terrains and scenarios. And you want to make sure Can I really help with these particular cases. So the prep work is definitely an important part of that. And I want to add, specifically for our pet sitters and dog walkers, that prep stuff is nice as an option of work to do at downtimes or slow times because pets go missing all year round. And also, it's an option of something to hire someone else to do the back end work. So those are some other opportunities for your business.
Collin Funkhouser 07:10
There's there's a lot of different aspects of this, there's the admin work the behind the desk work, then there's actual field work. So it sounds like there's always something going going on.
Annalisa B. 07:23
There can be there can be, it depends on also the area how populated the area is as to just logistically how many lost pets go missing in your sort of service radius, given
Collin Funkhouser 07:35
the kind of the variation of the kind of work that that you do, what kind of qualities of it at the personal level would be required to go into something like this
Annalisa B. 07:47
very similar qualities to what makes a good pet sitter and dog walker, being friendly, having strong communication skills, being able to keep your cool when a dog is barking at you. And being good with animals, all of those are good qualities to have. I would also add an attention to detail is important because those minor details like looking for evidence. Or if you're working with a Search Dog watching the dog for their natural or trained alerts, those are really important. And of course, if you're working a dog, having some background in dog training is very beneficial. You
Collin Funkhouser 08:28
started off by talking about being friendly and communication skills. And I was, you know, the given the kind of worked at this is kind of what's your interaction with the general general public and working with the client one on one?
Annalisa B. 08:43
Right? Well, it's really important to communicate with our clients and get the details of their case, what they've been able to do so far, what maybe they've had possible sightings where somebody saw their dog running down the street, we have to be able to gather all that information and to then decide what resources need to be deployed in a given case. Now, some cases can take it to an investigative side where you really do need a pie license, for example, theft cases or dispute cases where they need somebody to go and interview individuals who might be involved do stake out, and if you are into that, that would be amazing. You totally can have that as a job if you want it. But if you are looking for something more helping locally with your community, more low key, there's options for that too. Like for example, checking the animal shelters for the missing pet. If you're looking for something to do online after hours, you can be looking on social media or Craigslist or online force for sale ads or found ads so there's really a wide range of things. because you can you can do in that regard.
Collin Funkhouser 10:02
Yeah, I mean, we're really, really seeing this in the in the private detective world I'm getting the sense of, right? If somebody's watch gets stolen, you're going to go and you're going to check the pawn shop, you're gonna go, you know, look for places where it's going to be offloaded or sold in second or third hand stores, or because I wasn't even thinking honestly on a lease of like, oh, dog theft, like, have you? Have you been called out on those kinds of cases before?
Annalisa B. 10:24
I have. And I've been called out on cases that started not as a theft, and then we realized it was a theft. So those are things to be aware of. But, you know, if you love to watch TV mysteries, like old fashioned Murder She Wrote, or modern day mysteries, and you're like, that would be such a cool job. That was me. I love those sorts of things. But I also love animals. And I never thought you could combine the two. So you really can you can work a search dog or work with animals. There's also humane trapping, using wildlife cameras, all sorts of other surveillance techniques. And focusing on more the animal behavior side, and of course, the Search Dog side, but also looking for clues and be your your own Nancy Drew.
Collin Funkhouser 11:19
I mean, that's, that's a side of this, that I again, I just was not in thinking of it all. Because again, when I think of lost pets, I think doing sightings fliers, setting out traps, and
Annalisa B. 11:30
that's the bulk of the work. And that's really the most important part.
Collin Funkhouser 11:35
Okay, yeah, because I can easily see how that's, you know, I guess that's my own kind of misconceptions about this as well. Like there's a whole other world inside to this that may, if you don't want to be setting out the traps or doing the late night stakeout. So those kinds of things, there are other aspects that you can provide in this in this kind of service. Absolutely.
Annalisa B. 11:56
And I want to add that the number one thing that the industry is is meeting right now is more people who have a genuine heart of wanting to help animals and people to learn and educate others about how to keep pet safe, and also what to do if they go missing. So the first part of it is even your dog walkers, your pet sitters, learning about pet recovery methods so that when neighbor's pet goes missing, they can say, Hey, make sure you put out neon posters, flyers aren't big enough. Make sure you know that Hamilton County ends on our street, there's another county that picks up strays right across the road if your dog went across the road. So starting with that education, that's like the biggest thing that we need is just people to get informed and encourage people to search and find out about methods to use. And you can do that with I recommend missing Animal Response Training with cattle brick, she does that online. And it's a course that you can sign in and take and really amazing information, you can't get other were anywhere else. And then the second thing within that that is almost as high a demand is people to go out in person and offer an in person service. So that's one reason why it's great for dog walkers. And in home pet sitters. Because they are already going out, they're already going to someone's house, let's say on a schedule and walking the dog they're out and about in a particular neighborhood, they can already be keeping an eye out for the dog handing out a flyer to a neighbor they come across, or even put it in their schedule to be helping the pet owner with whatever tasks they decide that they want to offer in the pet owner needs. The list is really endless. I made a list about 15 years ago and I came up with 100 specific items that a person could do in a lost pet search.
Collin Funkhouser 14:12
And I think that's the other aspect of this too of going there's there's always something to do and realizing what Where do my strengths lie where's my passion lie? Because right if if we're running our I've just put him put this in the context of like, I'm running a business I'm I'm busy doing pet sitting visits, but if I have downtime, I could be checking Facebook marketplace, I could be calling pounds, I could be calling other rescues in the area. I could be doing this kind of back end work that might not be the you know, the big. I'm gonna see, you know, glamorous kind of stuff, right that that again, things like I didn't even think of, but that's incredibly helpful and beneficial to people. I mean, just here in our local area. We had a lady who let out her dogs into the backyard and had no idea that the toddler had opened up the back gate And all three of the dogs ran out. And so over the course of four or five days, there was a big community search out helping them. And, you know, there was one aspect of okay, who's gonna report sightings? Okay, who's documenting this? Where are we putting fliers who else to be contact was we watching for, but like, the the other, I mean, the administration side just gets so overwhelming and for the client for a particular person to try and do all of that, especially when it's an such an emotional thing for them, it's just a little bit we can take off of them. So it's not a burden
Annalisa B. 15:31
100% And it's not realistic, I'm gonna say it again, not realistic to expect one person to successfully conduct a search and find their own pet. Without community help. It's just not possible, it takes a whole community, a whole team of people to come together unless you just happen to be, you know, you just lucked out and your your dog is sitting across the street, you know, looking at you. But otherwise, you really do need help. And I want to drop a suggestion out there. There's things that as a pet sitter, a dog walker, you can do with very minimal effort and labor and time, that dramatically helps in the search and recovery for someone's pet. Now, whether you charge for it or not, it's volunteer, you know, it might be something you do as a service for the community. But consider this. If while you're out, driving around from one gig to the next one client to the next, or just going out to the pet store and getting dog food, whatever it might be. What If, on the back of your car window, you had written with a removable marker, you wrote last black lab, and the pet owners phone number. So you're literally a driving billboard for the lost pet when you're out driving around the community. And virtually no effort at all, but really, really helping. Right?
Collin Funkhouser 16:59
Because in that aspect, it is it is a community. And the biggest aspect of that is just getting people aware that there is a problem aware of because it's shocking the number of people who see these kinds of pets. I mean, we've all been in a Facebook group and somebody said, Hey, here's the last dog or hate who's seen this dog before. And there are 200 comments of like, oh, yeah, I saw him a week ago. Oh, yeah, he's over there is Oh, yeah. But nobody asked, right. Nobody said, Oh, this is a problem. So nobody speaks up, unless they're a truly concerned citizen. And so it's, it's surfacing that information. And instead of having to go door knocking or instead of having to, you know, go pounding the pavement or whatever, which we could do while we're out walking dogs as well. So just thinking of those as it's very passive, but also it's active in the same sense.
Annalisa B. 17:44
Exactly. And witness development is the number one technique that gets pets back. So whether that's billboards, flyers, you know, talking to the neighbors, we prefer giant neon signs, or riding on our car windows, or even posting a sign on our front of our car windshield while our cars parked at the grocery store. We prefer big witness development to get the word out. And that is the number one way that most pets are recovered and returned home. And that's something that most small businesses can integrate into what they're already doing in their daily activities.
Collin Funkhouser 18:27
Have you heard of time to pet dog from that to the home pet care of has this to say
Doug 18:31
time to pet has made managing my team and clients so much easier. Our clients love the easy to use app and scheduling features. And our sitters love being able to have all of their information organized and easily accessible. My favorite feature is the instant messaging by keeping conversations on time to pet we are able to monitor our team and ensure nothing ever falls through the cracks.
Collin Funkhouser 18:51
If you're looking for new pet sitting software, give time to pet a try. Listeners of our show can save 50% off your first three months by visiting time to pet.com/confessional. Now I can tell you have a license and a private detective because you use the word witness development and is that really just awareness or what else is involved in that process?
Annalisa B. 19:14
That can interview involve interviewing, but that can be everything from following up on leads. Like for example, I think I saw the dog but I'm not sure it was late at night of going and talking to that person. It could be doing an interview on local TV channel, the news channel may be radio. It could be putting an ad in a newspaper or a classified ad getting an article written about the search effort in the local newspaper. Anything that involves getting the word out looking for witnesses and developing those potential leads.
Collin Funkhouser 19:52
Again, that's where that that communicative nature, the friendly aspect, the personal touch, where you know we all I'd like to think we have that in our businesses now, it's just being applied in a slightly different way of kind of being that that face of the problem at
Annalisa B. 20:07
that point. Exactly. pitching in and helping out. You
Collin Funkhouser 20:12
brought up, whether, you know, it's a service that we get paid for, or we volunteer for. And I know that there are a lot of heads racing through right now with gears turning listening to this going, asking is, is it okay to get paid for this? Isn't this a community volunteer aspect? So I don't only say like for you to kind of walk us through that process, and, and maybe how we decide what we asked to get paid for versus what we do as a volunteer basis for our community.
Annalisa B. 20:40
Right? So the first question is how we feel about it. There's not a right and a wrong when it comes to this question it it depends on what you're comfortable with and what your logistics are, it's going to be different than my logistics and someone else. So on one end of it, you can decide this is going to be a public service, a volunteer effort, maybe your business is really successful, and you're not in need of an additional source of revenue. And you say, I'm going to offer for free to any of my clients, maybe it's just for your clients, maybe it's for a certain community that you want to advertise in, you offer this free service of writing on your car window about their last pet for two weeks, and maybe you post their last pet flyer with your business logo on your Facebook page in your website, maybe it's a free sort of community offering. That's wonderful. And we need so much more of that, I really encourage people to consider how they can adapt that into their business model that best serves their business and also their community because it is desperately needed. On the other side of things. If you want to find another stream of revenue for your business, this is an extremely beneficial service or community needs. And it also can provide a healthy stream of income also, because it is a specialized service where someone comes to your house or the client's house and offers one on one communication coaching an actual search efforts for the pet. This isn't such a high demand, there are so many people who cannot. Whether it's because of a physical disability, whether it's because of family kids work, they cannot search for their pets. And so providing the service of coming out and searching when they can't. I mean, it really, you can't you can't put a price on it. But you have to cover your time, your time away from maybe another service you can provide. And also your expenses training and to stay in business
Collin Funkhouser 22:59
areas. And that is definitely a hard thing to walk through. But you know it here in the pet care business, a lot of us have already done a lot of this prep work in our hearts. Because we are so passionate about pets, a lot of us feel guilty for charging what we do to run our businesses. But at the end of the day, we realize we're helping people but that doesn't mean I can't benefit or shouldn't be able to benefit as well for the service that we're providing the professionalism that we bring the training that we offer, the fact that they physically sometimes can't do this, it's just not in they're not in their schedule. And you brought up a lot of reasons why that's not possible. That doesn't mean that they don't worry about it, or it's not important to them. It's just their life prevents them from doing these things doing the late night stakeouts and doing the driving around and everything involved. And so this really is is a lot in that same vein of going okay, how like this, if this is a passion of mine, what would that look like for me to charge for maybe not everything I do, right? I'm not going to charge them by the hour when I write the name on the on my back windshield. No, this is an hourly rate. And after 72 hours I race it it's but fine carving out those little things of okay, maybe like you said, when I show up at your door, and I'm taking this on. That's that is a charge versus absolutely other other things that I can do in my downtime, right?
Annalisa B. 24:19
And people it's just like having a specialty service. So I give the analogy of like a veterinarian that does house calls. And so you know you when you go to your vet, you expect you're going to have a vet visit a cost of that. But then if the vet comes to your house, you know that it's going to be a higher cost because they're providing that service at your home and your pet you and your pet don't have to leave. So it's the same thing here where we can offer off site services or we can also go in person and charge for you know what we're doing there and across the industry. Rate, some people decide to charge an hourly rate. And some people charge a flat rate, no matter how many hours or maybe for a certain set of hours, like a package. So this would really come back to your business plan, how your business is structured, how much revenue you're looking to generate from another service. And what skills and what fits with you. The most revenue is with if you have trained search dogs, and there's a huge demand for search dogs. And it breaks my heart when people call me from so many places, Chicago and St. Louis, and just they call from all over the US saying, Please, will you travel here and help me? And I'm like, No, I can't, I can't travel there, it would be, you know, so expensive. And so many days of searching, Isn't there anybody here who will help me with anything, they are so desperate, and need help in their search. And to me to have to say there's nobody available, nobody that's trained or even trying to get trained in their area. It's really heartbreaking. So I'm reaching out to people. And actually, frankly, just begging them, please consider how you can offer this service, include this in your business, or maybe who knows someone who is looking for a job and loves working with animals, but maybe pet sitting isn't quite right for them, to have them. Doing something like this, there really is a huge demand, whether it's volunteer or paid all across the US.
Collin Funkhouser 26:46
I did want to ask additional follow up about the charging as far as rates go. This is something that again, I completely unfamiliar with. But I wouldn't even know where to start for or charging an hourly rate. Let's you know, I know, you said that there's the most revenue. So it sounds like the most costly would be if you do have that train search dog out there. What what is that kind of difference between having a st train search dog out there versus us going out and offering boots on the ground service with without? Yep,
Annalisa B. 27:15
absolutely. I'd love to give you some specifics, I'll say that this varies greatly depending on your geographical area and demand. So maybe rural area might be a lower rate versus an urban area might be a higher rate. And the same thing with you know how much training what credentials the individual has, in my experience, I would say most people charge between if it's an hourly service, between $25 an hour, and $300 an hour, which is a pretty broad range, I would say most people are in the 50 to $100 $150 an hour range. And then for services with search dogs that can run like 151 75 an hour, all the way up to a package which might be a few $1,000.
Collin Funkhouser 28:13
It's putting in a lot of that that context is so important. And I appreciate your bringing that up to have it's going to drive a lot of where you are what your what you're actually offering because again, like there's it's everything from the all inclusive, I'm sure of like, yeah, we make the signs, we get this out, we have a team that puts together with the admin and the dogs and everything all the way up to well, I'm gonna I'll do some phone calls. And I could do some other this other stuff as
Annalisa B. 28:41
well. Exactly. And I want to focus on coaching for a minute because there is a demand and need for that. And the current going rate is about $50 to $200 for a coaching service. So that usually is one hour of phone coaching. But sometimes it does include follow up. So that gives you an idea if you wanted to provide more of the encouragement work from home, do it you know, here or there to bring in an extra stream of revenue, you would expect 50 to $200? What what all
Collin Funkhouser 29:19
is involved in in that in the phone coaching aspect?
Annalisa B. 29:23
Well, first of all, it's obtaining the information from the person about the loss pet, usually people have a questionnaire or they just do a phone interview. To get details like is this a chihuahua or a great day that went missing? Is this pet data that they give missing yesterday or a year ago getting the important details and asking questions of the pet owner like what are you able to do what has been working? What really has been a challenge for you in your search and helping the pet owner sort of work through some of those issues? Um, and then looking at a map, looking at the picture of the pet what the pet owner has done already, like maybe they put out a flyer, but it has a really bad picture of the pet like a black lab on a black sofa where you can't even see what it is. And then and then having conversation with the person with a strategic plan of action based on we hope, some training and education versus I really want to caution people not to just make recommendations, this isn't something to be taken lightly, or just because I read it on the internet, we're talking about really studying animal behavior, recovery methods and resources, and then making a strategic plan to give and recommendations to the person. Sometimes it involves giving them a satellite map back where certain techniques are marked, where to do them. And again, like picture examples, or even sending them links to resources or places where they can buy the supplies. When
Collin Funkhouser 31:03
you talked about the strategic plan, that's where I started to think of like, okay, this is somebody who's calling, and they may be doing this for a little bit, and they're kind of at their wit's end, and they're needing someone to come alongside them. And really, okay, systematically, let's work through this and come up with with with an idea of how to move forward, and maybe have some tough conversations with them to 100%.
Annalisa B. 31:25
And if you think about it, in the context of this is an industry that is caught with it copied off of humans search and rescue. So if you think inhuman search and rescue, we would if there was a missing child, we wouldn't just go outside and scream for the kid. We as you know, professionals, we would have a plan of doing a grid search of using helicopters of bringing out teams of volunteers canvassing, you know, there would be we would use every resource we possibly can. And in this industry, we apply those same principles when searching for a last pet. What's the
Collin Funkhouser 32:08
role and technology during the search, as far as maybe getting a little bit of a head here, but like, you know, use of drones and things like that in the search for pets these days. Oh,
Annalisa B. 32:20
my gosh, if anybody is into drones, that definitely is a great avenue revenue Avenue. And also a way you can help in your community. More and more people are using drones to search areas, clear areas for lost pets, especially in large farm areas where your pet can get great distances without obstacles, and you physically can't, you know, search all that territory, but you can with a drone. So that's one great way also wildlife cameras, or motion sensor cameras, even security cameras, that can help generate a sighting, or rule out an area where a pet is not. So those are definitely technologies that we're relying on more and more in helping to search for lost pets. And of course, there's all of the software things with just searching for pets online, and searching on social media and shelter websites and rescue websites. And the list is endless. You've
Collin Funkhouser 33:33
mentioned a couple times now as far as like split, like, depending on how well you're trained and that this is something to be taken seriously, not just oh, well, I found a pet one time because I set out whatever, whatever. And that worked specifically on at least what kind of training should somebody had have? And I guess my preamble to that is you started off by talking about some states require having a detective license. How do I know if that's required for my state or not? Who do I talk to about that?
Annalisa B. 34:01
It's pretty easy. There's usually a licensing bureau in each state. And you just call them up and ask them say, I want to help people search for their last pets do Am I required to have a pie license? And they will probably pause. might ask you to repeat the question. But whatever they say you want to ask them to get it to you in writing. Can you get me an email that says, you know, and you want to be clear that you're talking about focusing on animal behavior, and helping people with their last pet search efforts and get that in writing? If they say yes or no. If they say you do need a pie license, I encourage you to reach out to local private investigators, because that's the easiest way to get your license. As to work with them or reach out to me, I would love to have more private investigators across the US helping to search for lost pets.
Collin Funkhouser 35:10
So let's say we've gone through that way we've seen we do or we don't, what additional training should we look into for this specifically? Well,
Annalisa B. 35:17
I think pet sitters and dog walkers already have a really great strong foundation. If someone doesn't have that foundation, where they understand about things like basic body language, basic animal behavior, you could take the same initial training as you would going into petsitting. Now to take it one step further, you do want to specialize in Lost animal behavior, and specifically techniques to recover missing pets. And there's multiple resources out there, I highly recommend, as I mentioned, the books by Kat Albrecht where she writes about how to train your dog to find lost pets. She writes about her adventures looking for pets, and it has a lot of really great information about animal behavior and sort of her thought process. How did she develop the ideas to do these things, which is really from human search and rescue. So one of the things that you can do is get training in humans search and rescue. There's books, online training, and in person searching, training for looking for missing people. And
Collin Funkhouser 36:34
I guess it also all gets back to what we what services we want to offer, right? And I think because you know, when you start talking about got ahead of this, but like about the drones and stuff like that, like okay, well, that's other maybe some licensing and other things that you may have to pursue down the line as well as these things develop, but really sitting and going, Okay, where am I at right now? How can I help? What can I offer now what matches that? And then maybe grow from there or change and expand as we get that experience?
Annalisa B. 37:03
Absolutely. When I first started out, I really didn't know what the majority of my business was going to be. Because it was the first time anything like this had been done. I started in San Diego, California. And I had like I did a business plan where I brainstorm just a whole list of what are things that my community might possibly need, like where what is the need in my community. And I made a list and I wrote it all out. And I put prices and I did my due diligence was figuring out how I was going to do this. Well, by the third or fourth case I worked, I realized that that was all whittled down to like three or four things were really needed in my community. And those were the things that I chose to focus on. Now, I can still offer the other things on a case by case basis, but I know primarily what people need help with in my specific area.
Collin Funkhouser 38:01
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Annalisa B. 39:27
Well, you you bring up a really important point. The and I want to share with you the first time I went to a I can't remember it was some sort of pet conference rescue conference in Southern California. And I had a booth and I was handing out my business cards to everybody who was coming into the conference. And I will tell you it was a big dud. So don't do what I did. Because the reality is people don't want to hear about losing their Pet, before they've lost their pet. So instead, what I recommend is connecting with people when they need the specific services. So that means connecting with the animal shelters connecting with where people go when their pet goes missing. So that means online social media, maybe the local pet stores, and maybe local rescue groups, who people will reach out to and look for help. And remember, humans search and rescue, I get a lot of referrals, because people will call human search and rescue looking for search dogs. And they are told no, we don't use our search dogs for pets. But I do know this person who has a Search Dog and they help. So that's the really important is you want to get in front of people when they need that particular service. But honestly, the demand is so high. And if you go on to a community Facebook page, and post, my business is offering a free listing on our website for local lost pets, or we're posting on our Facebook page, or we're offering a free in our email newsletter will include your lost pet picture, if you put that on a couple Facebook pages, people will be sharing your business information without much hesitation. Because there the the need is so high. And if people are offering then pet owners with lost pets are desperate for resources.
41:41
Yeah, I mean, you mentioned that of free or free listing on a website or on a newsletter. Like I just again, I'm writing a lot of notes down. Because if
Collin Funkhouser 41:53
we're if we are already doing newsletters, if we're already having a website that we're that we're updating regularly in contact with and things like that, it's going okay, how else can I use this? How was it because also for our core business, if we want to be a member of the community, we want to be doing these things. And so okay, I can maybe reshare something out on Facebook that I see, but what can I do? What can I take on in my responsibility? And then like you just said, letting people know that that's an option, because people go where as someone has lost pet, they're thinking, Where do I put this information? Where can I go? Who who has another posting board who has another community board who has another email list? And if we can just offer that as something as a connection point to that. It's a great way to start building those those relationships. Absolutely.
Annalisa B. 42:40
And I will tell you, I want to share a story about one of the first cases I worked, I mean, not first cases, but it was towards the beginning in San Diego when I opened my business, and a veterinarian hired me because a dog had gone missing from her facility. And you would think that in in a person's mind you would go wow, that that was negligent or not knowing any details, you would just maybe jump to a conclusion. They did something wrong, because how could a dog go missing from their, their facility? Well, when I went around and did witness development, and I told people this veterinarian had hired me to help find the last pet. It actually got them clients because they people were so impressed that this veterinarian was no holds barred going all out to find the missing animal. They understood accidents happen. And it also showed them a level of of compassion that they were surprised about people were surprised that this veterinarian was searching so much for this last pet by the way, the pet got out because it turned out on the security cameras. Someone had broken in through the doggie door to steal drugs. No way and let the dog out. Yes. So accidents happen and that's another good reason to have security cameras at your pet care facility.
Collin Funkhouser 44:24
Wow because Yeah. Oh, I just wild
Annalisa B. 44:29
right? Yeah. So absolutely. And it's a great way to market a business. It's a great way to help the community and we're all animal lovers you you don't do this unless you're an animal lover. And that's what I see as a big a big common thread between what I do helping to find lost pets and people who provide veterinary care and pet care services like cat sitting. You have to like pets to to work with them and I love I love pet
Collin Funkhouser 44:58
we mentioned earlier about, you know, technology use drones, cameras, motion sensors, those things. What other kinds of gear equipment software should we think about having on hand? Or do I just need to have a truck full of traps? Like, what? How do I want? What do I know what to get for this? Right?
Annalisa B. 45:17
Well, one thing I want to point out is if you focus on searching for lost dogs, versus lost cats, you do have some similar equipment, some similar techniques, but then there's also some things that are quite different. And you can even specialize in searching for lost reptiles, birds, pocket pets, the opportunities really are unlimited, um, farm animals, I wouldn't bring up farm animals for a second, because in many parts of the US, we have lots of farm animals, and they do go missing. And sometimes people need to hire someone to search for farm animals. So that's also a possibility horses go missing cattle go missing sheep, goats, you name it, and, and somebody wants to find them, if they if they get out of their, their barn or whatever. So anyway, the really any type of animal but for the equipment that's necessary. The most important thing is, is you as a human being, your time, your energy and your communication. Because that's really what people need versus a lot of equipment, talking on the phone, giving a strategic plan of action, going to the shelter and checking the shelter, taking fliers, to the nearest emergency vet, you know, putting out giant signs. Looking under the deck with a flashlight, I'd say a flashlight is a must.
Collin Funkhouser 46:59
Check I'm writing that flashlight, absolutely.
Annalisa B. 47:01
Signage is important for witness development. But for cats, traps can be helpful. But you don't have to humane trap a lot of times, we will recommend to the client that they trap, maybe coach them on how to do it, but we won't actually physically do it. The wildlife cameras are very helpful for both dog and cat cases, as are high powered spotlights for searching at night. And then there's new technology like night vision equipment and heat sensors. And you can really take it as far as you want to go. When I first started, I'll tell you this, I had a huge list of all the fun gear I got. And I got everything I got it. I was so excited. And then I was working my cases. And I was like, actually what I need is knee pads crawling on the ground and searching. So don't spend a lot of money at first, before you actually get out there and do what you like doing now. That's what I like doing. I am I'm I love being in the woods and hiking and searching and solving mysteries. But if that's not for you, you know that's okay. But you want to make sure you have the right equipment for what you're actually doing.
Collin Funkhouser 48:30
Right. So I'm going to take the trenchcoat off of my Amazon shopping list right now. Sorry, just a second. Like you said, it is important to think through exactly what we want to offer how we want to offer it and like with anything, not just jump in and dump 1000s of dollars into nightvision and heat sensing equipment and drones and stuff. If that's bill, it's okay to build up to this you don't have to come in with, you know, loaded to the GIL with everything. And as I really appreciate how you said you know your time, your energy, your training your thought process. That's, that's what is really going to make the difference with this at the end of the day. Now we can then implement some of strip some strategies that we develop with these tools. But we've got to get to that point where we are trained and ready for this.
Annalisa B. 49:16
Absolutely and encouraging people. The number one thing is that people give up too soon in the search for their last pet. And so being a good cheerleader and encouraging people and telling them you know your pet wasn't found deceased. Your pet hasn't been beamed up by aliens. Your pet is out there and I'm here for this search. That goes a long way. As
Collin Funkhouser 49:42
far as getting connected with other people doing this. Is there a network join conferences to attend that kind of stuff? Absolutely.
Annalisa B. 49:50
I want to ask people to definitely reach out to me. I offer free consultations to talk to you about your book Business about what you're interested in and answer any questions you have about getting into this industry because it we need more people in here. So you can reach out to me on my website, pet search and rescue.com. And I offer like I say, free consultations, I'll talk to you on the phone, answer your questions via email, or even do a zoom with you at no charge and and see how I can help in helping you figure out what your next steps are. I also recommend cattle bricks group, she has missing Animal Response Network. And that is a network of people focused on loss, pet recovery, they have training and they also have membership, they have monthly meetings. And they also have Facebook pages where you can ask other people questions about cases and have resources. And if you go through their training, they also will list you on their Facebook page for consultations. And I think they pay $50 for an hour consultation and they actually send you the client referral.
Collin Funkhouser 51:15
Yeah, and I'm on the data directory to I think, where you get where you get listed where people can find you. And I was just scrolling on that. And I think the most listings there are in any one given state are like six or seven. That's people in any state. So that really does speak to what you're talking about here on Elisa have this really underserved, massive need for for this kind of service.
Annalisa B. 51:42
Thank you for pointing that out. Exactly. So when someone says to me, you know who's in this place or that place, and I want to point out to you, some of those listings are people who only specialize in cats or dogs. So you have a lot of states, where it might just be people helping search for loss cat and there's no buddy searching for lost dogs. And some of those if you actually click on them, you will see that they are like in Maine, but listed in South Carolina, because there's nobody to help. Yeah, you
Collin Funkhouser 52:16
mentioned that I just clicked on our state we live in Missouri and I wanted to see connected because I wanted to start making some, you know, some connections with people, the two people listed here. One is in Maryland, and one is in Arkansas. So technically, there's nobody listed here in Missouri. So yeah,
Annalisa B. 52:28
that that gives me goosebumps and tears in my eyes at the same time. Because it's such an untapped market. It's such a high demand people and the animals that we can save, we can save them from being euthanized in shelters, we can save them from being hit by cars, there's so many ways that we can potentially help and the demand is is so high.
Collin Funkhouser 52:54
Well, Annalisa, I really want to thank you for coming and talking to us about this really important topic and not just as a as a way to expand our businesses, but really is a passion for people and just letting people know that that need is there. And important that there are trainings, there are things that we can do and be equipped with, to help out in our local communities. But this is obviously a huge thing that you're extremely passionate about. So I know you mentioned your website, a pet search and rescue.com What other ways can people get connected with you and start having a deeper conversation about this?
Annalisa B. 53:28
Thank you so much. Yes, and also specifically for the dog aspect of it. So if people have a dog, like my Lily, who was chewing apart the house, a dog who needs a job, this is a really fun scent work thing that they can do with purpose and help the community whether it's just for fun helping the neighbors or whether it's doing something more serious with a business. You can reach out to me on Facebook, pet search and rescue. I also encourage people to give me a call, you can call me at 800-925-2410 anytime day or night 800-925-2410 And on my website, my phone number and email is also directly linked. And I want to say one other thing because people if you've listened this far into our interview, and you go Yeah, I don't think my dog would do that my dogs getting up there in age or I have this, you know, dog that has this weird behavior. Or I have this client who has this, I don't know Doberman and I they're, they would be great at this. You know, try to think outside the box because there are things that we can work with our dogs that and teach them to do that is beyond our imagination. And it's really something amazing. And it gives them such purpose and they love to do it. So don't disclude a pet talk to me first. And see, because there's a lot of ways to work with animals and what they love to do naturally. Yeah,
Collin Funkhouser 55:18
well, I'm glad again, you brought that up, I just have merely had, oh, we have a client that has retired, she retired her bloodhound from doing scent work, he was like, uh, you know, he did state championships and stuff like that. Also, in our local area, we have the national barn hunt Association, where they train the dogs to go find the rats and barns and things like that. And like, what a great way to get connected with them to find other jobs and, and connections that they can make in the community as well. So finding those resources, again, is is making those connections is is incredibly powerful.
Annalisa B. 55:51
Yeah, and one of our search dogs was actually a human search and rescue drop out. So it can be a second career. So if your dog needs a career change, like Bloodhound, or like our search dog, this is an opportunity to, and I also am offering three conferences across the US and 2024. I'm really passionate about getting this out and in front of as many people as possible. So we're doing January, in Tampa Bay, Florida. We're doing April in Los Angeles, California. And we're doing July in upstate New York. And these are weekend mini conferences, to do training, and also in person training, specifically with the search dogs for people who are interested. And that is on my website, pet search and rescue.com. Awesome.
Collin Funkhouser 56:45
Well, I will have links to that your phone number and everything we've talked about to cattle, bricks, information, and that that network is in the show notes so people can get connected right to that, and start learning more about this. Not only so thank you so much for joining us again and covering this topic. I can't tell you how much I appreciate this conversation. Thank you. Absolutely.
Annalisa B. 57:05
I'm so grateful. And I appreciate your help getting the word out about the lost pet needs in our country.
Collin Funkhouser 57:14
What is this in service to? It's a great question that we should always ask ourselves when we look to make changes in our business, whether that is in the services that we offer at the service radius? How do we offer services or anything along those lines? What is this in service to when we think about offering a service as far as an animal pet detective, consider your skill sets. Consider where you are in your business do you have the capacity to take this on in addition to your pet sitting services is something that you think you could mentally and emotionally handle when things get tough and they don't turn out the way we hoped them to. This is a very personal kind of service and it's a service where we interact with a lot of people. And those skills are incredibly important. As we look to the services that we can offer in our community, consider small ways that you can help contribute to the search of a lost pet. Everything from offering those free fliers that you may print out for your existing clients to a full fledged private detective service for pets with heat vision goggles, night vision goggles and drones flying overhead. However you choose to do this or not make sure it's something that will work for you and that you can serve people in the best way possible because at the end of the day, that's what this is all about. We want to thank today's sponsors time to pat and pepper rails for making today's show possible. And we really want to thank you for listening. Thank you so much. We hope you have a wonderful rest of your week. We'll be back again soon.
