Pet Sitters | APSE Association of Pet Sitting Excellence

Facebook LIKE Button Gets A Sibling – Introducing The SEND Button
Posted April 26, 2011 By in Pet Sitters, SEO and Marketing With | No Comments

Facebook has just announced a nifty new social plugin tool that makes it easier for people to share your website content with their friends and connections.

It’s called the Send button and you’ll soon see it located right next to the Like button at the top of webpages or blog posts.

It’s similar to the Like button that we’ve all become used to seeing on blog posts and web pages. The Like button has allowed you to share web content with your friends by posting the link to the web content page on your Facebook wall as a public broadcast.

So what’s different about the Send button?

The new Send button allows private sharing of web content. It will allow you (and your readers) to share web content directly with your friends and online connections via email. Or you can also share web content with any of your Facebook groups.

This means that instead of relying on your friends to check their Facebook wall feed or your Facebook page – you can now send the web content directly to their inbox (either Facebook inbox or email inbox) where it is more likely to be seen!
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Is Juggling a Full Time Job and Growing a Successful Pet Sitting Business Really Possible?
Posted April 2, 2011 By in Pet Sitters, SEO and Marketing With | 6 Comments

Recently I’ve had a couple of pet sitters ask me how I was able to work a full time job and grow my pet sitting business at the same time.

I’m not going to kid you, some days it was tough going.

But if you are passionate about your business, have the right attitude, and get the right systems in place, growing a successful pet sitting business and being in the ranks of the full time employed is certainly far from impossible!

For the first 7 years of owning my business Protecting Max I worked as an oilfield engineer and reported to the office 5 days a week for the daily grind.

My job sometimes involved international travel, meetings where it was impossible to answer the phone, and I also commuted 30 minutes to work beyond my pet sitting service area (so I couldn’t pop out for midday visits during lunch hour!). If you find full time work that is flexible, does not require you to travel, and is within your service area it will make life much easier for you. But none of these challenges prevented me from growing my pet sitting business to an operation with six contract pet sitters and over 150 clients.

Many of you may be in pet sitting start up and still need your job to pay the bills while your business grows.

That was my story.

I’ve also spoken to one sitter that has owned and run her sitting business full time for several years and is now planning to return to the workforce. Whichever situation you are in my advice to you is the same. Here are some tips from my juggling experience.
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How To Safely Add Links To Your Pet Sitting Website
Posted March 30, 2011 By Joshua in Pet Sitters, SEO and Marketing With | 2 Comments

What was the last link you added to your pet sitting website?

Some pet sitters will exchange links with non-competing pet sitters to help visitors find appropriate resources.

Others may partner with a veterinarian office, animal hospital or groomer and place a link to their website.

The decision to place a link from your website to another website should be considered carefully.

Without a complete and full understanding of how Google and the other search engines determine the relevancy of your links, you could be doing more harm than good.

You also don’t want to lose sight of the main purpose of your website: to educate your visitor with enough information that she can’t wait to get the ball rolling with you.

Every link on your website to an outside website is another opportunity for your visitor to leave. But that is not even the worst possible scenario that could happen.

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Adding White Paint to Your Morning Coffee Rarely Works As A Cream Substitute
Posted March 29, 2011 By Joshua in Pet Sitters With | 6 Comments

I love my morning coffee. Without it, I can’t guarantee I’d resemble anything close to a human being.

I need my two cups of coffee to get me going that I imagine I’d go to any lengths to assure that perfect cup – even if it meant substituting white paint for cream if I ever ran out.

Now, it’s obvious that adding white paint to your coffee as a substitute for cream will not solve any problems.

But it’s equally as obvious that in order to succeed in business (and life) one must take action.

As Pablo Picasso puts it: Action is the foundational key to all success.

But c’mon, let’s be real here… you’re not dumb. You know that taking action and setting goals works.

Why then do we have such a hard time doing it? One word…
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Ads for Hiring Pet Sitting Staff
Posted March 26, 2011 By Joshua in Pet Sitters With | 3 Comments

The topic of hiring in the pet sitting industry is nothing new.

We all have our own thoughts on IC vs. employee, pay percentage vs. flat rate, the best application and hiring process, and the list goes on.

There are many angles and approaches that are acceptable and work perfectly for each individual.

But what happens if you don’t get the first step in the process right?

Venturing into the waters of the hiring process is no easy feat.

It requires many big decisions to be made along the way, and it means that you are experiencing growth, which can conjure up many emotions in any business owner (fear, concern, excitement, anticipation to name a random few).

And it’s not usually a two-day process either, but rather a bit longer one with unplanned twists and turns.

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How Not To Become The Next Yahoo!
Posted March 24, 2011 By Joshua in Pet Sitters, SEO and Marketing With | 2 Comments

Who knew there was so much to be learned from Yahoo’s struggling past?

I just came across an article that lists 3 reasons why Yahoo is loosing the search game, and couldn’t help but see a similar lesson for pet sitters.

Whether you have plenty of clients, some clients, or no clients, you must constantly find ways to remain visible and ‘in the game.’

There are so many competing messages, services and options thrown at your potential clients that it helps to find ways to get your target market to take notice (possible, but not an easy task).

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Prevent the Pet Sitting Industry from Disappearing
Posted March 21, 2011 By in Pet Sitters With | No Comments

Just how important do you think it is to be innovative in your pet sitting business?

The word innovative simply means a new way of doing something’ or ‘the creation of new ideas or things.

Dog training, for example, may not be a part of the dog walker’s job. Yet.

Many companies are starting to offer multiple services. Yes, bad personal economy usually pushes for greater innovation.

In the spirit of innovation, companies are offering a multitude of niche services: dog running, errands, dog training, waste removal, product delivery, and the list goes on.

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Saving Lives: Just A Small Part of a Professional Pet Sitter’s Day
Posted March 20, 2011 By Joshua in APSE News and Events, Pet Owners, Pet Sitters With | No Comments

In celebration of Professional Pet Sitters Week, APSE was thrilled to spotlight and honor six of our members that define the role of professional pet sitter.

Before getting a chance to hear each story, I couldn’t anticipate the variety of incredible lengths pet sitters will take to assure a safe, happy and healthy pet.

My biggest goal for this series was simply to debunk the myth that just anybody with a love for animals could successfully become a pet sitter.

Can’t Anybody Watch A Pet?

Sure, anyone could be asked to stop into a neighbor’s home once a day to change the water and fill the food bowl, but as evident in each of the six stories, there is plenty more that could go desperately wrong.

And without a professionally trained and educated pet sitter at the reigns, it’s safe to say that some of the pets featured in their stories might not be around today.

It’s also heart-warming to learn that while bonding with each pet is a given, many professional pet sitters find themselves welcomed in as part of the (human) family.

This can only be achieved by being a loving, caring and respected individual.
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Here’s How Pet Sitters Can Help Dogs Rescue People in Japan
Posted March 19, 2011 By in APSE News and Events, Pet Sitters With | 1 Comment

Our hearts go out to the many thousands of people and pets in Japan this week affected by last week’s earthquakes, and tsunami.

At the APSE we felt the need to contribute to the relief effort and have chosen to offer our support by encouraging pet sitters to donate to the National Disaster Search Dog Foundation (SDF).

The National Disaster Search Dog Foundation, a non-profit founded in 1996, was formed to partner rescued dogs with firefighters and first responders.

Their mission is to find people buried alive in the wreckage of disasters. They provide trained canines to fire departments at no cost, and provide lifetime care for each dog. The SDF currently has 74 trained search teams in the US that have been part of 75 deployments including the World Trade center attacks, Hurricane Katrina, the Haiti disaster, and now the Japan earthquake disaster.

Six SDF Canine Disaster Search Teams were deployed to Japan on March 12^th and will be traveling to the devastated Ofunatio City area on the North East coast of Japan where the skills of the canines are critically needed to use find people trapped in the rubble.
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Super Hero Sitters: Jason Hoffman
Posted March 11, 2011 By Joshua in APSE News and Events, Pet Owners, Pet Sitters With | No Comments

Jason has an aura and energy that puts even the ‘meanest’ of dogs at ease.

As noted on his website About Me page:

“My mother tells a story where I am about three years old and I wandered into the neighbor’s back yard where the “mean dog” lived. Much to her and the “mean dog’s” owner’s astonishment they found us frolicking without a care behind the shed.”

Jason brings a suitable and varied background to the table, where one specific volunteer job he held in high school helped him turn what could have been a tragic day into a close call.

He lives simply by the philosophy, “If you do what you love, you will be successful and truly happy” and it’s clear Jason is both.

In this episode of Super Hero Sitters, Jason shows the importance of observing every little detail while on a job, and taking appropriate action when necessary. In this case, three dogs’ lives depended on it (image below).

Hear Jason’s Story
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