Pet Franchise

Pet Boarding- Know Before You Buy These Pet Franchises

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If you are considering pet franchises, then you may think that a pet boarding business is perfect, especially since the pet industry is booming. The idea of playing with animals all day long seems like a dream come true. There are many additional services these companies tend to offer which can help to bring in extra income. However, this does not mean that it will automatically make money. Here are a few of the things you should  think about with these pet franchises.

 

The Difference Between Pet Boarding and Doggie Daycare

1.4.15-Inspiring-Stories-of-Dogs-making-it-Through-Tall-OddsFEATOne of the biggest misconceptions in the pet industry is that pet boarding and doggie daycare are the same thing. Doggie daycare is intended to watch the pet during the day while the pet parents are at work, much like day care facilities care for children. At the end of the day, the pet parent picks up the dog. Pet boarding on the other hand is designed for long term stays, such as when people go on vacation. This could be one night, a week or even longer.

 

What This Means to Owners of These Pet Franchises

There are many differences between pet boarding and other pet franchises right off the bat. For instance, there is a significant amount of equipment needed for pet boarding, which increases the amount of the startup fees. It also increases the maintenance costs as you will either have to maintain the equipment or replace it regularly. While the average amount of money spent per customer is significantly higher than with other franchise opportunities, the costs and the amount of competition can make it difficult to see a good return on investment with these pet franchises.

 

The High Cost of Ownershiplow cost franchise opportunities

With pet boarding the costs are significantly higher than other pet businesses. You will need to have more staff to cover a greater amount of the day. The staff you hire will need to be more specialized, such as trainers or those with training experience to work with the dogs in your care. You will also have to be on call all the time in case there is an overnight issue with the pets in your kennels. You will also need to keep additional insurance and, depending on where the pet franchises are located, licenses to protect you as well as your customers.

 

Final Verdict on Pet Boarding

One of the biggest competitors in this industry is veterinarians. Most offer pet boarding in their facility and the majority of pet parents prefer to have their vet board their pets because they feel safer. This creates an added layer of difficulty to pet boarding as a viable pet franchise. This does not mean that it cannot be successful, just that it does not have the same chance to be successful as something like Splash and Dash pet store franchises.

Mistakes Pet Franchises Make with Social Media

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Social media seems to be the new hot ticket in business marketing. Many companies are joining social media sites and fighting for a presence as a way to help drive traffic and sales. This can be a successful marketing outlet for a pet franchise when done correctly. There are several mistakes pet franchises can make that hinder this success. Knowing these mistakes can help you to avoid them.

 

Buying Likes or Followers

stop-wasting-moneyThere are many pet franchises out there that think you can simply buy the followers you are looking for and this will give you the results you are looking for. Unfortunately this is not going to help your business at all. Sure you may look better by having more followers but what will this matter for your marketing efforts? Generally the likes you buy are from people in other countries or at minimum you cannot control whether the people are in close proximity to your pet food franchise or even interested. This means you are paying for nothing as the message you put out there will go to unqualified leads on social media.

 

Promoting Products and Services Constantly

Sure the ultimate goal of social media for pet franchises is to let people know about the services and products they offer. However, you are not going to build a fanbase if all you do is market to people. You need to use subtle marketing tactics with social media. This means posting information about dogs, such as blogs, images, and videos. Then sporadically work in the promotions you are running. If you are doing this all the time, your pet store franchise will lose credibility and you will lose followers in droves.

 

Not Taking the Right Approach to Negative Feedback

No matter how amazing pet franchises are at some point there will be negative feedback. While this may seem like the end of the world for the franchise, it is really just an opportunity to show people what your company really stands for. There are a few things you should never do:

 

  • Never delete the negative feedback- it looks like you are hiding something
  • Never ignore- it shows you don’t care
  • Never use inflammatory comments- This is wrong for many reasons

 

The best thing you can do is take a few minutes and come up with a thoughtful response to show you not only care about customer service but about how your customers feel.  This does not have to be super extensive but rather show the customer you have heard them and tell them how you plan to fix the situation, even if it is just getting them on the phone to discuss the situation further.

 

Being Inconsistent

This is a huge issue for many companies out there, including pet franchises. If you want to stay relevant to your customers then you need to be posting on a regular basis. You should have some sort of schedule that addresses the frequency of your posts on all the social media platforms you utilize. When you combine this with a consistent message to your audience you will find you have a greater success with your social media efforts.

If you want to make sure you have the most success with your social media and want to avoid as many mistakes as possible, the best thing pet franchises can do is to go with a professional to handle this for them. This is a person who specializes in social media and knows how to handle the campaign and give you the results you are looking for. Not only will you get better results than handling social media on your own, but you not have to waste the time or effort on this yourself.