Advertising that will work when you start a pet sitting business

I have been in pet sitting for nearly 20 years.  During that time, I have used many different forms of advertising for different reasons.  In my opinion, the best form of advertising for your pet sitting business startup is useful advertising.

One of my favorites are the high quality magnetic business cards – I don’t mean the type where you stick a printed business card to cheap magnet stock which looks bad right after you make them and absolutely horrid a few weeks later on someone’s refrigerator. So of course it goes in the trash and your pet sitting business is immediately out of sight and mind. Get online and shop!   You can buy really decent all-vinyl magnetic cards that will stay shiny and new for years for about 23 cents each.  Know anyplace else you can buy years of in-your-face customer advertising for your pet sitting business at 23¢ a pop?  Me neither!  And they can use your business cards to hang up kid’s drawings on the fridge, again your pet sitting in the customers sight all the time.

My all time favorites are laminated place mats for food dishes and water bowls, your customer see your pet sitting service every time they water and feed the pet.  With my pet sitting business startup, I used to have 11 X 17 inch paper place mats printed; they were very cute with a dog or cat in the sitting position with crown, a cape and a caption that said “My Pet sitter Treated Me Royally while You Were Away.”  Right below this was the logo and phone number of my pet sitting business.  Customers loved these and my pet sitting startup got more business.

Unfortunately, the mats were paper, so they got messy pretty quickly and then my pet sitting business was out of sight. (again, out of sight, out of mind).   I decided to look into having them laminated, which of course would extend their lifespan for years and keep my pet sitting business name in front of customers every time they gave their pet’s food or water.  Unfortunately the cost was prohibitive to have someone else do this and when I decided to start a pet sitting business, I certainly wasn’t rolling in the dough (18 years ago it was 1.89 each – today, it’s relatively cheap to buy a 50 pack of self-laminating sheets at any office supply store).

Never let a great idea go away without a complete investigation. I went looking for a laminating machine and supplies. After some searching I bought a machine that would accommodate 11 X 17 for 169.00 and I still use the same machine for my pet sitting business today.  Supplies are readily available online at good prices, and this is a dead easy item to make. My only other suggestion is to place two of them back to back and laminate them as one. That way, no matter which side is used, the customer will see your pet sitting dog walking business and the mat has a quality thicker feel to it.

 

You will not believe how these simple ideas will help boost your pet sitting business; useful advertising can be extremely low cost yet provide your pet sitting startup with tremendous long-term benefits.

John A. Corey created his own highly successful pet-sitting business, Critters Choice and is the author of pet sitting Success: The Critters Choice Way. His goal is to share the hands-on knowledge he has gained over the last 19 years, which makes it possible for others to avoid many of the common pitfalls all pet sitting startups experience and quickly move on to achieving success.