6 Ways to Get More Customers at Your Pet Business
Having trouble getting customers over to your business? Or maybe business is steady but you’re struggling to grow your business and fill your space to it’s max capacity? We’ve combined our 5 best tips for bringing more customers to your business and then creating those pet owners into life-long customers.
1. Everything leads to your website
Whether someone found your business on a search engine or heard about you from a friend, they are going to contact you through your website. Your website if your most important marketing tool, it will most likely be the deciding factor as to if you get a potential customer or not. It doesn’t have to be perfect, but it needs to display all the information that a potential customer is looking for.
Your website should include these major items:
- A list of your services and prices
- Your business hours
- Contact information (address, phone, email)
- Customer reviews
- Photos (the more photos of your facility and pets, the better)
Optional but helpful:
- Book appointments on your website
- Social media account links
- Before and after photos (if you offer grooming)
- “About Us” page introducing staff
2. Branding matters
Brand consistency is key. It builds credibility to your business, as well as remaining recognizable to your customers and potential customers. For example, if your company colors are blue and green, but are red on your social media, your business could look unrecognizable or appear to be a different business entirely.
Think about big companies like Target. They are known for their bold red colors, which are on all of their stores, website, marketing materials, and all that they do. So even if your business isn’t as large as companies like Target, it still will still look more professional and recognizable using consistent branding (colors, logos, fonts) than not.
3. Join a community of pet industry professionals
This step may be one of the most helpful, not only when trying to grow your pet business but when having any questions or seeking advice in your industry. There are several communities you can join for free where people post questions, asking advice, meet others in the pet industry, build connections, and collaborate with others.
Here are two communities we suggest joining:
4. Write a blog
Blogs are a great way to get on more search results and will build credibility and trust with current customers as well as interested pet owners.
Not a writer or can’t find the time to write a blog? Don’t worry!
Writing a blog can sound extremely overwhelming, especially for busy business owners and anyone who feels like they aren’t a great writer. Instead of trying to write a blog post each week, start with one blog post a month and see how it goes. Blogs can range in length so don’t put pressure on yourself that it has to be perfect and lengthy. Some blog posts may even be a 1-2 minute read.
So what do you write about?
You can write about a variety of topics, but just remember to keep it related to the pet industry. Here are some great blog topics you can write about when getting started:
- Your favorite dog parks
- Your top 10 favorite dog products
- How you taught your dog to do this trick
- Your business’s “Pet of the Month”
- Your company’s story. How you got started.
- Easy pet treats recipe
Some of the easiest (and most viewed blogs) are the rankings of different things (i.e. My Dog’s Top 5 Favorite Treats) and DIY’s (i.e. How I Built My Dog’s Kennel Topper)
5. Send out a regular newsletter
Sending out a newsletter is similar to our last point in writing a blog. But the difference in a newsletter is that you can include new blog posts in your newsletters and be consistently reminding your customers of your services. Here are some newsletter email subjects things you can include in a newsletter that will rapidly drive your sales and get your current customers coming in more frequently:
- New Blog Post!
- Our Pet of the Month is…
- Take Advantage of Our Holiday Special
- This Weekend Only: Get a Free Daycare When You Board
- Download Our New App!
- Submit a Review and Be Entered to Win a Gift Card
6. Instant messaging with customers
Instant messaging with your customers give you so much power and holds unmatched potential. You can create marketing campaigns with text that allows you to do everything in a newsletter but increases the open rate by over 70%. A study recently showed that 99% of text messages are opened, with 97% of messages being read within the first 15 minutes of being delivered.
With messaging, you can upsell your services to customers by sending texts like:
“Bailey is having a great time with us today! Would you like to add an extra play time for her?”
Or “We only have limited spots this holiday so don’t forget to board Bailey! Do you want to go ahead and schedule her appointment with us now?”
What next?
If you don’t already have access to do some of the points we’ve listed, we’d love to show you how.
You can schedule a free consultation HERE or watch our video highlighting some features that you can implement in your business. Whether it be getting your own custom-branded app, scheduling appointments online, customer reviews, messaging or designing a website.
We can’t wait to help!