Get Your Blog Listed in The Blog/Podcast Guide for $5 a month

Filed Under Pet Business Tips, My Pet Business | May 1, 2008

I just had my listing in The Blog/Podcast guide approved this week. Please come and find me and show your support for Working with Pets by leaving your comments and reviews about this blog by visiting me here.

I wanted to let you know about their special $5/month offer so you can join me in the Pet section. If you have a pet related blog or podcast and you want more people to find and read your posts this is a great and reasonably priced opportunity.

The BP Guide has been created by Larry Genkin, the publisher of Blogger & Podcaster Magazine. He teamed up with USA TODAY to launch The Blogger & Podcaster Guide last December.

For the $5 subscription you will get:

Promotion to over 10,000,000 monthly

To reach a mainstream audience

Incoming links from each publication that helps your SEO

To cancel at any time if you feel it’s not worth the price

Click this link to get to the $5 offer page and get your blog out where people can find you.

Please your support for Working with Pests by leaving your comments and reviews about this blog by visiting me here.

Tags :My Pet Business, pet business tips

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Pet Business Interview - Pawfriendly Landscapes

Filed Under Pet Business Interviews | April 29, 2008

Today I have an interview with Elizabeth Bublitz, President of Pawfriendly Landscapes. Elizabeth works with pet owners to design pet friendly backyards that they can enjoy with their pets. They can also complete the project construction work if you live near Golden, Colorado.

1. What kind of business do you run? a complete landscape design/build company that designs yards for dogs and their humans.

2. How long have you been in business? 10 years on Sept. 4. We started Sept.4, 1998.

3. Why did you choose to start a pet care business?

I always felt it chose me. I have always loved animals and plants and decided to go into landscape design after college in the early ’90s. I was “just” a landscape designer who kept hearing people complain about their dog destroying their yards, etc. so I contacted my childhood vet and asked her advise about specific situations. She gave me her input, we applied her techniques, combined with my knowledge of landscape material and plants, and voila, we began to create “pet friendly yards.” I was always an oddity in my industry because everyone was improving landscapes with new outdoor kitchens, pergolas, etc. but we were catering to the dogs. Anyway, a few years ago, we began to be taken seriously by suppliers (they’d call us and ask if we could try new products, etc.) and our clients weren’t calling anymore asking, “what do you mean pet friendly?” they simply “got it” and called to say, “we need you guys, my dog destroyed the yard.” One of the biggest compliments came from
Lowe’s Home Improvement in 2006 when they called and said we were the nation’s only pet friendly landscape company and would like to feature us on their “Lowe’s For Pro’s” site. We changed our name at that point from Home & Garden Landscapes to Pawfriendly Landscapes because we needed to trademark our trade secrets so nobody would steal them. Anyway, it was blessing, our new name tells people exactly what we do!

4. What advice would you give someone about to launch a new pet
care business?
It’s a lot of work but very rewarding! If you love what you do, you’ll survive. If you’re not taken seriously at first, stay with it, I’ve noticed the world is evolving and considering pets as part of the family (finally!)

5. What has been the greatest challenge in growing your business? So many! Good employees are hard to find, but worth it when you find them! They will be the best support you’ll find. Also, don’t get discouraged if things don’t go as planned, many times they don’t because there are better options, always see decisions that didn’t work out as new opportunities. Promote at every opportunity. Many times I kicked myself because I would invest to a certain market which I thought was a bust and years later people told me they had seen me in that market. It proves it’s always a good idea to stay in front of people, sometimes it will be a real bust but you never know!

6. What are the pros and cons of your profession? Pros: People do not relinquish their dog because they can have a beautiful and functional yard. My audience is the best - they know what’s important (their dogs) and I’m not being called out to outdo the “Joneses.” My crews and support staff are amazing - all animal lovers who love working in with our philosophy. I meet many amazing people, some I would have never met because of our niche.

Cons: I hate the administrative part of it - the business side to me is so boring. As an owner, this seems to be all I do - I don’t make much time for a personal life (I’m sure many people do) but it consumes me all the time. I don’t see that as bad, but people around me always remind me to do other things outside of my company, it’s too hard, it’s always on my mind.

7. What daily tasks do you enjoy most? Meeting with clients. They love their dogs so much, I really love it. Then I get to draw up a custom design based on their dog’s needs. Very rewarding and fun!!!!

8. If you could have done anything differently what would it have been? I would have offered national pet friendly landscape designs a long time ago. I started offering them last year due to popular demand and I think of all the people I could have helped since day one.

9. Did you have a mentor or business coach? If so how did they help you? Not a business coach, but my bookkeeper keeps me in check, I have lots of small business owner friends and my childhood veterinarian who helped me write my book. They are like a support group when I feel down about business or have general questions. They’re always there - it’s very nice!

10. What form(s) of marketing have you found the most effective in
reaching pet owners? Helping shelters. I have always helped shelters and that’s where most of my clients hear about us. It was a complete accident, but it is how many people hear about us. Very nice audience.

11. Do you offer clients incentives for giving referrals?
We mail out thank you cards with free passes to our local botanic gardens. We do offer discounts to people who support animal shelters by adopting their pets from them.

12. At what stage of your business growth did you choose to take on help? 8 months into it. Back then, the economy was great and people were moving to Colorado in an abundance. I had to bring on a staff. Very scary to trust people with my company but I had to do it.

13. Did you choose to use employees or independent contractors? Why? At first subcontractors, then I brought them “in house.” We’re back to using both, some subs some employees. We have so much work, I needed to bring on more crews.

14. What have you found is the best way to find new staff members? It’s hard, it is so very hard. Nobody tells you this and I was always trusting. I’ve been burned a lot so I’m not very trusting with employees anymore but thankfully, since I’m wiser, I can choose wisely. I have chosen wisely and for the past few years, I’ve had the best people. I know the difference now between good and bad and it is huge. But in life, nothing takes the place of experience so when I hear a small business owner is getting burned by employees, I tell them it happens to all of us and if people say it has never happened, they’re lying. But, after going through so many them, you really find great people! Just stay with, create limits and watch them very carefullly for the first month. Some people interview great but deliver very poorly. Let them go immediately and call the second candidate, the right person will be found. It’s all trial and error.

15. What have you done to differentiate your business from your local
competitors? Everything! Nobody else caters to the pets and my colleagues still chuckle at me because I don’t have minimums but that’s not my philosophy (many like high end jobs only) I want to cater to the pets.

To contact Elizabeth and read more about her services visit her at http://www.pawfriendlylandscapes.com.

If you would like your business highlighted here please send me an email at daniellechonody@gmail.com

Tags :dog friendly backyards, pawfriendly landscapes, Pet Business Interviews, pet friendly lanscaping, pet garden design

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Use Press Releases to Attract More Customers, Get Recognized, and Get Website Traffic

Filed Under Pet News, Pet Business Tips, My Pet Business | April 25, 2008

This week I sent out my first press releases for distribution on the internet. This has been on my to-do list for some time but one of those things I’ve been procrastinating about. It was so quick and easy I won’t delay next time I have something to publicize. I found some great tools to make the writing easy and with some website recommendations I went out to about 8 sites to fill out their submission forms and get them published on the web.

Press releases can be a great way to get more traffic to you website and get local publicity with news shows and papers. They can also be an inexpensive method of advertising and connecting with pet owners. Getting press releases published via online services will also get you back links to your pet business website which will help your rankings in the major search engines.

A press release is typically appropriate to send out whenever you launch a new service or product, to announce a promotion or competition, highlight a community event or fundraiser you participated in, or to announce a special event or anniversary. There are also special pet weeks such as Pet Sitters International “Take Your Dog to Work Week” that you can promote. If you don’t currently have anything to announce get involved or start your own competition or event for your customers!

You will need to format your release correctly to make sure it is accepted by the editorial staff at the submission site or local news office. Here is a quick example of the standard layout:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Contact:
Contact Person
Company Name
Telephone Number
Fax Number
Email Address
Web site address

Headline

City, State, Date — Opening Paragraph (should contain: who, what, when, where, why):

Remainder of body text - Should include any relevant information to your products or services. Include benefits, why your product or service is unique. Also include quotes from staff members, industry experts or satisfied customers.

If there is more than 1 page use:

-more-

(The top of the next page):

Abbreviated headline (page 2)

Remainder of text.

(Restate Contact information after your last paragraph):

For additional information or a sample copy, Contact: (all Contact information)

Summarize product or service specifications one last time

Company History (try to do this in one short paragraph)

# # #
(indicates Press Release is finished)

Once you have your release written submit it online using the forms at the following sites:

http://www.prleap.com

http://www.prweb.com

http://www.addpr.com

http://www.openpr.com

http://www.express-press-release.com

http://www.free-press-release.com

http://www.pressreleasespider.com

http://www.i-newswire.com

Most allow free submission. PRweb.com is the most recognized distributor and I highly recommend spending a few dollars to get your release on their site. Their site says that you have to pay $40 fee but when you get to the pay part of filling out their form, click the button that says “Choose Other Amount” and change the $40 to $10.

If you also want to distribute to local news and radio you can research and find contacts in the yellow pages, and by reading newspapers and magazines and noting the names of reporters that cover similar topics. Their contact details should be listed with the story. You can also use online directories to find contacts such as http://dir.yahoo.com/News_and_Media/

Once you have their contact details call them and find out how they want to get your release: email, fax, or snail mail. Send out your release to each reporter via their preferred method to get the best response.

To write my press releases I used a tool from Alice Seba called the Press Release Pack that gave me ready to use, fill in the blanks, customizable templates. These templates allowed me setup my press release for the launch of

Pet Business Success Circle

in less than 15 minutes. There are several packs for different situations and are reasonably priced - you can see them all and get more info at http://www.allpresscontent.com/.

You can also have press releases written for you by Rachel Monroe. I used Rachel to write a release to announce my pet charity donation program last year which I distributed to local newspapers. Rachel specializes in pet business copywriting and knows what to write to connect with pet owners.

Tags :My Pet Business, pet business tips, Pet News

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Unusual Pet Career - Pet Friendly Landscaping

Filed Under Unusual Pet Careers | April 25, 2008

Pawfriendly Landscaping Inc A backyard designed with your pet in mind - what a great idea! Pawfriendly Landscapes Inc based in Colorado specialize in landscaping your yard around the needs of your pets.

They take an inventory of your pets habits (good or bad), work up a custom design for you, and do the full installation. A practical yard for your pets and a beautiful space for you.

Their website shows examples of backyard designs that include innovative pet features such as:

Outdoor cat litter boxes

Doggie Hydrants made with stones

Dog Racetracks

Odor Neutralizing Mulch

Cobbling beds with stone to deter digging

Raised beds to deter trampling of plants

Prickly planting to deter chewing of plants

Latice structures above fences to deter jumping over fences

You don’t have to live in Colorado to take advantage of their design service. You can send them plans and photos of your yard, and descriptions of your pets habits and they will custom design a landscape for you and you can take their plans to local contractors to quote the construction.

If you are good in the garden and want to start a pet related business but don’t want to work hands on with pets this could be the business for you. Make your own designs or use their service to get the design work done and then provide the construction service to clients.

For more business tips subscribe to my free weekly ezine Pet Business Power Tips.

Tags :dog friendly landscaping, pawfriendly landscapes, pet friendly landscaping, Unusual Pet Careers

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How To Leverage A Team To Grow Your Pet Business

Filed Under Pet Business Tips, My Pet Business | April 21, 2008

Dog Team It is very difficult to grow any business working as a one man (or one woman) show. To start and run your own business by yourself you will need to be the customer service department, human resources department, finance department, and marketing department. Doing all these tasks yourself is possible - especially if you start your business small - but never easy.

As you grow your pet business it becomes harder and harder to find the time and energy to get all of these tasks done and do them well. You will probably find that the amount of customers that you can take on is limited to the number of hours that you have in a day - and unfortunatly we only have 24 to work with!

To continue to grow every business will eventually need to bring on help. Today this can take the form of employees, contractors, virtual assistants, or outsourcing of tasks to others. If you have been in business by yourself for some time this sudden reliance on others can be scary at first.

An article that I found this week “Getting Beyond The “Gulp Factor” When Growing Your Business” on Melanie Benson Strick’s blog struck a real chord with me, I felt all of the trepidation that the article describes when I realized that I would need a team of contract pet sitters to grow my pet business to the place where I wanted to be. I had all the doubts that the article describes running through my head - my major blocks were:

No one will do it the way I want it done

I don’t know how to find the right person

In the end finding help became unavoidable as with my work committments I couldn’t keep up with pet sitting demand during peak holiday seasons for my existing cusotmers. I eventually jumped in and hired my first contract pet sitters with some advice from other pet sitting business owners.

In the beginning some of my fears came true. I had many problems with pet sitters not performing their jobs to my desired standards, and had problems with sitter reliability. Looking back now most of these problems I created myself - both because of my own mindset and also because I lacked business systems.

After several years of experience I now know what personality traits to look for in sitters and have a hiring process that ensures they know what to expect when they work with my company, and they know what I expect from them.

I now have several great sitters that I can rely on, and all my initial worrying about relying on others almost seems silly. The reason why growing my team is now such a smooth process is that I have let go of these misconceptions and put in place systems to manage and streamline the hiring and contractor management processes.

Here are a few of the systems that I now have in place:

1) An “express your interest” sign up form at my website for people who are interested in pet sitting in my local area. Having this form allows people who are good candidates for my team to contact me and has meant that I never spend time and money having to place job ads.

2) A contractor contract and set of guidelines. The contract and guidelines spell out what I expect from sitters and how pet sitting visits should be conducted so that we create satisfied customers.

3) A contractor reward and incentive plan. This plan gives my pet sitters control over how much work they have and how much they earn. It lets them know exactly how my pay plan works and what they can do to help promote the business if they want to work and earn more.

4) A system for performing background checks. Having a way to make sure that the people that I send into clients homes have no past criminal records gives me and my customers peace of mind.

5) A system for assigning jobs to sitters. This process means that as jobs are booked I spend less time contacting pet sitters and gives the sitters more control over which jobs they accept.

Having a team to help me build my pet business has meant that I have been able to increase my income and also have more free time to work on business building activities. As an additional bonus I have been able to give my sitters an additional source of income and work that they find very rewarding.
Don’t let fear hold you back from building a team and growing your business to it’s full potential. With the right processes in place you can find the right people for the right jobs and having a team to support you will mean that your business will be able to function even if you or a family member become ill and cannot work in your business every day.
In next weeks Pet Business Circle Expert Call my guest is Sam Brown who is the owner of a pet boarding facility in Qld, Australia. Sam teaches others the Red Day processes that she employed to create the systems that she has used to take her business from rock bottom in 2005 to one that today affords her great financial and time freedom. I am still offering the introductory price of $19.95 for your first months membership. You can check out all the details of the program at http://www.PetBusinessSuccessCircle.com.