The dog-walking and pet-sitting business have gained significant momentum over the past decade. Most people consider it a side hustle and a way to earn some extra cash. The pet care industry has a lot of potential if you want to start a business with no money. In this article, we will explore applicable strategies for both business owners and individual dog walkers. Our strategies are based on gaining the trust of your customers and standing out among the competition.
Gaining customers’ trust
Pet sitting is a competitive business. There are many apps and online websites for individuals who are active in dog walking and pet-sitting. So, how can you stand out among so many people? The answer is simple yet complicated. You have to persuade pet owners that you are the best option for walking their dogs and watching their pets when they are not home. You might wonder that dog-walking is a simple procedure and doesn’t need a degree, so how can you be best at something like that? By meeting your customers’ expectations. In this business, you have to focus on customers’ expectations rather than the process of dog walking or pet sitting. Dog owners are sensitive about the quality time their pets spend outside. They monitor their pet’s diet and plan for their pet’s physical activities and general health. Pet owners don’t just give you a leash to take their dogs to the park.
Gaining your customers’ trust as a dog walker can be a little tricky, especially if you don’t have a lot of references and customer reviews on your website, which is expected because you may have just started your business. The first thing to consider is building a persona that pet owners will trust. Understanding and analyzing your customers is crucial for creating your persona as a dog walker. Believe it or not, pet owners expect you to be educated, and being educated doesn’t mean a college degree; you must have some certification that makes you look qualified for your job. Customers also need to be sure that you are a dog person and have a genuine passion for taking care of pets. So first, you have to prove your merits via certification or customer reviews and then provide documents of your interaction and relationship with animals. Include actual evidence that you can back up on your resume or online website. It is essential not to lie on your resume because the bond that is created between you and your customers is based on trust.
Get a third-party certification in pet care
One of the reasons that pet-owners have high expectations and find it hard to trust another person to take care of their pet is the negative news that spread once a while. News about dog walkers that steal dogs or pet sitters that harm and abuse pets when they are supposed to care for them. News of such incidents spread only when people lie on their resumes and make false claims to get the pet-sitting gig regardless of the responsibilities it includes.
One way to gain customers’ trust is to get a certification from a third party. The third-party part is crucial because it helps you create a professional picture and show the fact that you can be trusted. Customers can check your certificate and even ask the organization that you got your degree for a character review. Professional animal care certification council (PACCC) is an organization that offers both certification and education on pet care. Getting a certification from a verified company can boost your pet-sitting business and help you get more customers as a dog walker. PACCC organization collaborates with other organization so they might even refer you to workplaces after you get your certification. Notice that getting a certification from organizations like PACCC is not just a formality, you have to take it seriously and prepare for their exams, otherwise you may not get a certification. The strict nature of PACCC certification is the reason behind its validity.
Use social media to prove your love for animals
Claiming that you love dogs is not enough to get the job. Nobody admits that they hate dogs or animals, at least not when they want to get a dog walking job. You should have evidence of your genuine interest in taking care of pets. Basically, your customers should be convinced that you are taking care of their pets because you like to do it for the pets out of the kindness you have in your heart and not for money. Obviously, your goal has to be money, but you should not emphasize it when you are negotiating with your pet’s parents. Creating an Instagram account with content related to the pet care business is a reliable strategy for gaining parents’ trust.
The content you provide on Instagram should have depth. Create high-quality content by using proper narration and characterization. Posting a picture of yourself hugging a dog will not do the trick. An idea for high-quality content as a dog walker or pet sitter is telling the stories of every pet you have ever had since childhood. Write scenarios and talk about your experience taking care of your pets. If you can find videos from your childhood interacting with a dog or any other pet, then you will be golden. Use pictures and videos and post them in a sequence. Do voiceovers for the pictures and try to tell a personal story in order to compel others that you have a genuine love for animals. Make similar posts with images and videos from your previous experience walking dogs or sitting pets. Be careful to ask parents’ consent before posting videos of their pets to avoid looking unprofessional. Again, you can narrate the experience you had taking care of other people’s pets; you should aim to present that experience as rewarding and exciting as taking care of your pets.
Collaborate with pet shops and vets
To add authenticity to your character and business as a caretaker for pets, you need endorsements from veterinarians and pet stores in your local area. To get an endorsement from other companies in the pet caretaking industry, you either have to approach them or wait for them to approach you. Different companies will only approach you when they see that your job has potential, and collaborating with you helps them develop their business. If you have just started as a dog walker, you have to approach them. Asking other companies to collaborate with you is not straightforward because they need a reason, and if you directly ask them for help, you may get a lot of rejection or resistance. Now, we explore scenarios in which you can approach other businesses without getting rejected.
Social media is the easiest way you can start interacting with other businesses and shops. First, identify the famous veterinarians and pet shops in your area. Analyze the services they provide. Go to their shops and purchase a product or use a service. Create an Instagram place and share your experience in their shop. It is kind of like a review post but with a positive attitude. Before posting the review video, make sure that you follow their account on all social media platforms. A positive review video can turn into a gateway for actual collaboration. Basically, you give them a shout-out and wait for their response.
Pet-siting for famous pets
This phenomenon has been trending on social media platforms such as Instagram and TikTok for a couple of years. People create accounts for their pets and post their pictures in different outfits and locations. Nala is the name of a cat, but not just any cat. Nala has 5 million followers on Instagram! Based on the potential audience that these pet influencers have, identify the most famous ones near you. Next, you need to interact with the influencer pet page. If you are still in the developing stages of your business, it is unlikely that they will agree to collaborate with you for free. If you can afford to pay for the promotion, you can choose to do it; otherwise, you have to persuade the pet parent that they need your service.
Host events to raise awareness for animal shelters
Nowadays, people tend to adopt their pets, especially dogs, from animal shelters. The tricky part is that most of the animals in the shelters have been abused and abandoned by their previous owners. So, their behavior is somewhat different from that of animals in the pet store. Animals in the shelters are usually more aggressive and even depressed compared to normal pets. Some people even abandon the adopted dog or cat because they don’t know how to handle and take care of those poor animals. By hosting events about animal shelters, raising awareness for the animals, and educating people on the different methods they can use to cope with the pets they adopt from shelters.
These events are a great way to gain positive publicity while collaborating with animal shelters. People who attend these events are likely to spread the news about what you are doing. Some may even share pictures of the events on social media platforms.
After an event, animal shelters may start recommending you to others as a dog walker or a pet-sitting business owner. At the end of the event, you can promote your pet-sitting business to people and explain that you offer exceptional care for pets that are adopted from animal shelters. Offering special care so you can pet-sit for adopted animals is a great business opportunity because people with adopted pets go through a hard time looking for someone to look after their pets. Notice that you have to educate yourself first and prepare the necessities for taking care of adopted pets.
Make your pet-sitting website unique.
Your online website plays a significant role in attracting customers to hire you as a dog walker or pet sitter. You need to develop new ideas to attract pet parents. We cannot offer you ideas directly because yours will not be unique. But with an example, you will get an understanding of what we mean by new ideas for website development.
An innovative idea is to let pet owners create a profile for their pets. For example, they can upload pictures of their pets and even write a biography. Provide a section where they can write their pet’s hobbies and games that they like to play. Then, they can send their request and ask for a sitter. If you have multiple dog walkers and pet-sitters, create profiles for them on your website, too, and then they can choose to accept the request from the pet or not. When your employees take a request, pet owners get to see the person who is going to look after their pets. Then, they can choose whether to choose you or ask for another pet sitter. This strategy creates competition among your employees, but you need to adjust it in order to avoid conflicts.
On your website, you can provide a section in which people can choose from a list of activities and games you want for your pets. Also, you can include special offers such as toys and food. By creating a long list, you attract the customer’s attention. Some of the activities you offer are free, but you have to mix in activities and foods that cost a little extra money. The way you arrange the list is essential because customers must be compelled to ask for activities that cost extra money.
Emergency Button
There are times that people need to leave their houses suddenly, like a business trip or, God forbid, something happened to a relative, and you have to leave town and see them. At these times when you have to leave your house so suddenly, it is challenging to find someone to take care of your pets. You can provide an emergency button on your dog-walking or pet-sitting website so people can hire you and leave their pets in the hands of a reliable caretaker. The price you offer should be volatile; for example, based on the number of employees and customers, you may have to charge people more money when they click on the emergency button at night.It would be best if you adopted all the strategies mentioned in this article based on the size of your business, budget, time, and facilities. Some of the strategies may require you to spend a little more money than your budget. If you need to spend money but don’t have any, you can apply for a business grant.
