In this episode of The Whisker Report, co-host Alexane Ricard flies solo (thanks to a little unexpected lockout drama!) while producer Mark Winter of Pet Life Radio joins the fun to kick things off. While Mary Tan braves Minnesota’s five-degree weather from the wrong side of her front door, Alexane welcomes special guest Isabel Alvarez Arata—pet entrepreneur, content marketing pro, and host of the lively podcast Covered in Pet Hair. Isabel shares her journey through pet business, her passion for different cultures, her work in TNR (trap-neuter-return) in Texas, and her insights into building a brand through storytelling. Whether you're in animal welfare or the pet industry, you’ll find something to wag your tail about in this inspiring and delightfully unpredictable episode.
EPISODE NOTES: PR, Podcasts & Pet Hair: A Conversation with Isabel Alvarez Arata
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/whisker-report-pet-pr-publicity-pet-life-radio-original--6669416/support.
EPISODE NOTES: PR, Podcasts & Pet Hair: A Conversation with Isabel Alvarez Arata
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/whisker-report-pet-pr-publicity-pet-life-radio-original--6669416/support.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Live.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
This is pet Life Radio. Let's Talk pets.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Welcome to the Whisky Report. We're a new podcast dedicated
to helping anyone in the pet industry, whether you're an
animal welfare or for profit pet company, get some PR
and bus for your nonprofit or business. I am alex
Hean Ricardo, one of the hosts of the show, and
I'm usually joined with Mary Tan but today we have
a little technical issue. She's locked out of her house,
(00:37):
so I'm just doing the intro. Hi, everybody, and we're
here with our producer, Mark Winter of Pet Life Radio. Mark,
how are you you're not locked out of your house.
Speaker 4 (00:48):
I'm not locked out of my house. And if I was,
it's only like, you know, seventy degrees outside, So it's okay.
It's not fine where Mary is.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Mary is in Minnesota and it's currently five degrees fair night,
and we haven't heard from her in a few minutes, and.
Speaker 4 (01:05):
She's like just like an icicle and she's like standing there.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Oh, poor Mary. We're thinking of you. And so we're
so honored to be part of the pet Life Radio
Network and we're here to show you that you can
do pr for yourself.
Speaker 5 (01:22):
And we're going to help you each and every week.
And today we have.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
A fellow podcast host who Marx knows very well as
he's also producing her show, Isabelle Alvarez Arata wears so
many hat that he was so hard to choose which
one to tell you about. But she's a pet entrepreneur
with a passion for content writing and marketing. She's the
host of Covered in Pet Hair, a fun, boozy podcast
(01:47):
show for pet lovers. I met Isabelle back at super
Zoo in twenty twenty three, and I remember bounding with
her through a love of living abroad, different cultures, and
also the fact that she does in are in Texas.
Hi is Bill, Welcome on our show. We're so happy
that you're here.
Speaker 6 (02:05):
I am thrilled to be here. Thank you for inviting me,
and I too am thrilled that I am not locked out.
I'm sending Mary all my love and warm vibes for
a quick resolution here.
Speaker 5 (02:16):
Yeah, we hope she figures it out. Isa.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Can you give a little introduction of yourself and maybe
how you started to work in the pet industry because
that was not your background at the beginning, was it.
Speaker 6 (02:28):
No, it was not. It's been a long and Winding Road.
I started a professional pet sitting dog walking business in
the Northern Virginia area, so the DC suburbs in two
thousand and eight, and I grew that business to multiple
six figures with over twenty employees about five hundred active clients.
And then the pandemic hit, and obviously the DC area
(02:52):
with all the government workers in military and government contractors,
our business was most sle mid day doog walking while
people were at work, and it just came to a
screeching halt. And I had been running that business for
five years remotely, so there was really no way for
me to rebuild that business once that happened. Knowing that
(03:14):
the DC area even to this day is kind of
at fifty percent work from home still. So I just
had the, I think, the forethought to say, like, this
is not a viable business anymore, not only because of
our business focus on midday dog walks, but also because
of my geographic location having changed and not being very
(03:38):
conducive to rebuilding the business. So I shut that down
and I pivoted to writing, which was something that I
didn't even have on my radar. A friend of mine
from the pet sitting industry recommended me for some magazines
because I had written a pet column in my area
while I was running my business just for fun, and
(04:00):
I guess she thought of me when they were thinking
of freelance writers. She approached me. I didn't have anything
else going on, so I took it. I took the opportunity,
and now I write full time. I write for pet
businesses specifically. I also write for magazines still, but that's
the journalism work is a lot less of what I do,
and it's kind of becoming something that I do on
(04:23):
occasion because I've so much demand for my content creation
and content writing and search engine optimized content that I
put out for pet businesses. So I work specifically with
pet businesses to promote themselves online, whether it be through
their blogs, through their website copy, or through their social
(04:44):
media presence. So that is where I am, I guess
specializing now. It's like I said, it's been a long
and windy road, but writing really is my passion. I
could do it twenty four to seven and never get
tired of it, so it is. I am very grateful
for the changes. While they were pretty traumatic when it happened, right,
I'm very happy and very grateful and I have wonderful
(05:07):
clients and I really enjoy writing about pets.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
But it's inspiring to see that you took something, you know,
like a big challenge, which was to change completely your business,
to actually find you true passion.
Speaker 5 (05:18):
So I'm actually really happy for you.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
I think COVID was a bit bittersweet for you because
it closes your business down, but it opens so many
new doors.
Speaker 6 (05:27):
Absolutely absolutely, and for I'm a mom of young children,
so professional pet sitting is a very time intensive, very
logistically challenging business. I know that because I did it
for twelve years, and for a person who's building a
family simultaneously to a business, it's very challenging. So this
(05:48):
really does fit my lifestyle a lot better, and it
allows me to work from anywhere. And like you said,
I love to travel. I family in Spain. I had
family in South Florida for a long long time, and
I would go and spend the summers there with my kids,
or I would go go help my sister with her
new baby for a few weeks in Spain. And I
can work from anywhere, So that is really a positive
(06:10):
of the change that came from COVID.
Speaker 5 (06:13):
I'm so happy for you.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
Think we're so excited to hear more about what you do,
But first we need to take a little quick break.
Speaker 7 (06:23):
Take a bite out of your competition. Advertise your business
with an ad in pet Life Radio podcasts and radio shows.
There is no other pet related media that is as
large and reaches more pet parents and pet lovers than
pet Life Radio with over seven million monthly listeners. Pet
Life Radio podcasts are available on all major podcasts platforms,
(06:45):
and our live radio stream goes out to over two
hundred and fifty million subscribers on iHeartRadio, Odyssey, tune In,
and other streaming apps. For more information on how you
can advertise on the number one pet podcast and radio network,
is it Petlife Radio dot com. Slash advertised Today.
Speaker 8 (07:05):
Let's talk pets on Petlife Radio dot com.
Speaker 5 (07:18):
And we're back with Isabelle.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
So, Isabelle, you were just talking about your pet sitting
business in Virginia. That was quite successful, and.
Speaker 5 (07:28):
I want to ask you what was the bigger challenge?
How did you make it so successful?
Speaker 3 (07:33):
You said you had five hundred clients.
Speaker 5 (07:35):
That's a lot.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
What happened like that's a huge success.
Speaker 6 (07:39):
Yes, it was very successful. I think that the area,
the demand was obviously there. I'd like to tell this
story because I think it's a really great way to
highlight entrepreneurship. I actually did not set out to start
a professional pet sitting business. I was looking for a
dog walker for my dog, and the businesses that existed
were so busy that they never called me back. I
(08:02):
would joke that like, here I am, you know, I
don't know, sixteen years later, still waiting for a return
call from all of those pet sitting companies that I
reached out to. They were so busy. And I had
done pet sitting, you know, during college, just to help
my family's friends or my neighbors, and so I said,
I can do this, like this is not a challenge.
And I was working in the hospitality industry and it
(08:24):
was very demanding. It was very the commute was getting
really old. I felt like I wasn't really happy. So
it was either leave that hotel chain and go to
another one or try something new. And I decided to,
you know, try something new. My parents are entrepreneurs, so
it kind of felt comfortable for me. I know that's
a big step for a lot of people, and I
(08:46):
just started doing the dog walks myself, building territories and
little by little, hiring people to take over the established territories,
starting new territories, and little by little I was creating
this clientele, you know, having to hire assistant managers, having
to hire more staff. I had dog walkers, I had
pet sitters, and I will tell you this, I had
(09:07):
amazing staff members. That was really the key. I think
that one of my talents is recognizing talent in others,
and so I was a really good recruiter and I
was a really good delegator. I trusted my team, so
I let them do what they did best. And I
would also joke with my peers who were scared to hire,
(09:29):
you know, like some pet sitters just want to do
the work themselves. And I would say, I think some
of my pet sitters are actually better at it than
I am. They you know, they're not worried about the
business side of it. They're just worried about the love
of the pet and making sure their needs are met.
And so I always liked to delegate those responsibilities so
that I could manage the business. And eventually, after seven
years of being in the field full time and running
(09:52):
my business, I transitioned out of the business and I
started just managing, and it really allowed me to train people,
elevate the standards, make sure that you know, we had
a comprehensive training program so that everybody, no matter what
territory they were in, they were providing the same quality
of care. So it was it was really grassroots, like
it was little by little, just learning what I needed
(10:13):
and rising to the occasion and getting out of my
comfort zone like most entrepreneurs have to do, and learning
as you go. Right, I think you don't really know
what's coming, but you have to have kind of like
that desire to just roll with the punches. And thankfully
we never had any pets injured, loss, no dog bite incidents.
(10:34):
You know, a lot of people think, oh my gosh,
I would never want to go into a business with animals,
just because of the risks. We did it right, We
did it well, We had the right people. We qualified
our clients well so we knew they were a good
match for us. So we really had a twelve year
run where we set standards for even our industry. I
won an award the National Association of Professional Pet Sitters
(10:57):
awarded my business the two thousand the twenty twelve Business
of the Year Awards. So like it was just it
was really a labor of love, as most small businesses are,
and just in finding the right people to expand the
vision and mission of the business.
Speaker 5 (11:14):
Good for you.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
But I just wonder, so to have that many clients
to grow so much, did you focus on marketing or
was it more like community outrich mouthed mouth like?
Speaker 5 (11:25):
How was it?
Speaker 6 (11:26):
Well? Interestingly, I think that I came into it in
two thousand and eight when most businesses were just starting
to get their websites. So having a website was always
on my radar, always doing it right. I'm a writer, naturally,
I always have loved to write, so my copy was good,
so that digital marketing aspect was always part of my business.
(11:49):
I was young compared to a lot of my peers
in the industry. A lot of the peers in the
industry were retirees who started a small business in pet care,
and so I was more comfortable with social media and
online marketing. And absolutely most of my clients came from
just Google searches, organic search results where my business showed
(12:10):
up on top. And we did that for a very
long time. Eventually Obviously, there was a little bit of
like paid ads online. We did some AdWords kind of campaigns.
We did a lot of social media where we showcased
what we were doing, told our story. We did a
lot of internal marketing to our existing clientele, always massaging
(12:33):
the relationships that we already had. What I think people
forget to do. We did a lot of that, and
we also just created kind of like a buzz, like
you said the word you used when you introduced the show.
We created a buzz because we were more present than
maybe the businesses that came before us, who had instant success,
(12:54):
because they didn't have much in the way of competitors, right,
So we did a lot of new things that maybe
other people weren't doing that now are just considered basic.
Now it's just you have to have social media presence,
you have to have a website. When I started, it's
it was kind of optional, and we we did all
of it. I did all of it, and I think
(13:16):
I'm naturally good at marketing because I like to tell
stories and I like to talk to people. I think
that's harder for people who are introverted to share their
story and they struggle with what am I going to say,
I never have a problem knowing what to say, whether
it's right or wrong, I say it. So I think
that really helped. And even to this day, I help
(13:36):
a lot of professional pet sitting businesses. And these are businesses.
My clients are businesses that have been around for twenty
thirty years and they still have a hard time telling
their stories. So what I do is I tell it
for them.
Speaker 3 (13:48):
I love that, and so yeah, I was going to
ask you, actually, so how different it is now like
nowadays that everybody's on social media and has a website,
So you still have your own business, it's just a
bit different now you focus on marketing and content writing.
Do you find the way you have to promote your
business different? Do you do you still fit people find
(14:10):
you on Google Search?
Speaker 5 (14:11):
Or is it different?
Speaker 6 (14:12):
It's totally different, because really B two B and B
two C are different, right, business to business is mostly referral,
Like for me, it's really mostly referral. I'm sure you
see that, you know at Whisker Media. So I see
that more because I worked with these people. They were
my peers, they were my colleagues. We would go to
conferences together. We were in the same kind of trenches
(14:34):
for a long time, and now they reach out to
me because they know I understand their business and they
know I understand what they do and what their clients
are looking for and what their challenges are. So it
just works. But when obviously, when you're advertising to consumers,
you have to use every means possible. And one of
the things that helped me and that you know you
(14:54):
will obviously resonate with this, is that I started to
write a local pet column while I ran my pet
care business, and I got so many clients for that,
and I remember I think I made twenty five dollars
for each column, which honestly, I would have done it
for free, but they offered me twenty five, so I
took it.
Speaker 5 (15:11):
Yeah, take what you get exactly.
Speaker 6 (15:13):
But the only thing was that I would say, like
my Byeline said Isabelle Alvarez, at the time, owner of
the wag Pack Professional Pet Care, pet sitting, dog walking.
So I know I got clients from that, and it
was worth it because even though I was a new
writer and I was nervous and I would edit for
like three hours for that twenty five dollars, it was
(15:36):
presence and it was credibility, and so now I talk
to my clients about getting in the media for that credibility,
but also creating your own media channels on your platforms,
whether it's your website or social media or whatever it is,
because then maybe the media will take notice if yeah,
you are putting yourself out there as an expert in
(15:56):
your field exactly.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
That's exactly what we tell our clients is that you
should put yourself out there. You should promote yourself as
the expert in that field. And Mary had me write
my first article for pet Age a couple of weeks
ago about gen Z workers, and I was, yeah, it
was my first article, so I was like redoing it,
rewriting it, deleting everything, rewriting it took me like a.
Speaker 5 (16:18):
Week, and I was like so stressed about it.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
But May was like, Alex, you're a you're a gen
Z expert now, and I was like, you say exactly.
Speaker 6 (16:26):
And this is the thing. I think a lot of people,
especially in the pet industry, they like the industry because
of the pets and the you know, the connection that
they share with the pets, and a lot of them
are very humble. A lot of them have so much
knowledge but they feel like, well, I don't have a
mon like a professional dog trainer through whatever, you know,
expensive program, so I don't know. And I'm like, you've
(16:47):
been working face to face with dogs or cats or
both for twenty years. You've cared for thousands of pets
in that time, so you are an expert. And it's
it's funny to see that their reactions like, I don't know,
I'm not convinced I'm an expert, and I'm like, I
am telling you that you know more than you think
(17:08):
you do, and that people want to hear about it
because they think that's really what it comes down to
is that a lot of pet people want to just
put their head down and work right. They just want
to care for the pets. They just want to fix
the problem with the dog behaviors. Their clients are coming
with them, shoot them with They want to, you know,
plan the holiday pet care so that everybody you know
has a wonderful trip and the pets are taken care of,
(17:31):
and all the services that they offer. They just want
to focus on those. But you can't in this day
and age where competitors pop up at any moment, you
can't just do that because then when those clients move
away or that pet pass is away, you don't have
anybody to replace someone, right, So, like it's really the
challenge now is to think about the clients you have,
(17:52):
the clients you need to replace those clients, the growth
that you want to see, all of that has to
come into play. And when you're putting your head down
and us focusing on the pets, like, it's really hard
for people to take notice, especially with so much noise
and potential competitors out there. Gen Z is the perfect
example of who's gonna come in, you know, and say,
I want to start my own pet care business. I
(18:14):
can walk dogs, you know, I can I can take
care of cats, And they'll come in and you know,
the person who's been in business for twenty years will
all of a sudden say, why am I not getting
so many leads anymore? And it's because they were kind
of resting on their laurels, right Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
And I think gen Z is also really good at
storytelling because we grew up with social media.
Speaker 5 (18:35):
We correct like invented the vlogs.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Right when you're just like talking to your phone about
your day and everything, so we are we're like doing
storytelling all day every day to even our friends the
older generation are not doing. I mean, I've never seen
my mom doing a vlog about her day.
Speaker 6 (18:51):
Right my mother would My mother would rather go you know,
to the doctor for like a painful for a painful procedure.
Ever vlog her day like if you would say, and
it's it's the same idea of why would I do that?
Nobody cares? Like who wants to know about my day?
And as a professional pet sitter, who I think has
(19:13):
an amazing job because professional petsitters and dog walkers and
dog trainers and dog trainers some specialize in very difficult things.
But there are dog trainers that specialize in puppies, right Loo.
They are working with pets under the best of circumstances,
whereas veterinarians vet texts, they're working with them when there
are challenges and there are there is bad news. So
(19:35):
for me, when I was a pet sitter, I would say,
my clients always love me because like when I walked
in I was like, you know, j Loo, walking into
like I don't know where to like a fancy restaurant
New York. For like the pet in my care, I
was everything and so you always have like, sure you
have sick pets sometimes, sure things happen, but ninety percent
(19:56):
of the time the job is amazing and so other
people want to hear about it. Other people want to
be like you, how many cocks did you care for today,
how many homes did you drive to, how many dogs
did you walk at one time? How many puppies were
at this dog training class? And how many times did
you have to stop to pick up an accident? You
know those things people want to know.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
It's like, it's like this curiosity that we have, especially people, yeah,
especially those people who were sitting at a nine to
five desk, you know, they want to know what the
petsitter was up to today while they were, you know,
crunching numbers in the accounting department exactly.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
So, yeah, we cannot stress enough how important storytelling is
for your business. So focus on that for sure. Promote
yourself in a way. Isabelle do that is you are
a keynote speaker, right, Yes, so you do public speaking.
I do.
Speaker 6 (20:49):
I started doing that when I was in the industry
and it was one of those things where they wanted
a member of the association to like do a little
you know, ten things I learned about pet sitting in
my first year or something, and I was like, I'll
do it right, Like I'm always I've always been one
of those people who I don't want I don't need
to be perfect. I don't have a lot of like,
(21:10):
you know, concerns about being in public. I know some
people don't like to be the center of attention. I
love it, So I just I was like, I'll do it,
you know. And I've always been a big volunteer, Like
when there's nobody else to take a job, I'll do it.
You know, I'll knock it out.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
I feel like you're you're a very yes person.
Speaker 6 (21:28):
I am. I am, and you know what, I do
believe that the more we say yes, the more the
universe says yes to us. So I'm like always like,
let's do it, let's collaborate, let's team up. And so
I would start saying, sure, I'll do that for a
webinar where maybe three people showed up, and then they
started to see that I enjoyed it and that the
participants enjoyed it, so they asked me maybe to do
(21:51):
something a little bit bigger. And this year, you know,
sixteen years seventeen years, almost into my career in the
pet industry, I was keynote speaker at the National Association
of Professional Pet Sitters conference in Georgia. And I've spoken
that the Texas Petsitters Conference, I'm their annual MC for
(22:12):
their conference. So I am the one who like keeps
track of scheduling and make sure everything goes off well.
And I was also invited to other you know, other
things that maybe have happened online. I always say yes,
I always, you know, as long as my schedule allows
me to properly prepare for it. I love to cooperate,
(22:35):
and I love the industry I'm in. I really do
feel like pet sitting and dog walking is like the
ugly stepsister of the pet industry. Nobody thinks of the
pet sitters or dog walkers until they need them, you know,
the dog food makers or like everybody you know. Of
course we use that twice three times a day, maybe,
so like we think about them. But the professional petsitter
(22:55):
that you use, maybe when you go away for the holidays,
you don't think about them until you need them. But
I get the industry, and I consider myself a pet
sitting industry advocate. Trying to get people to understand the
benefits of in home pet care versus like a boarding situation,
the benefits of midday dog walking for people who are
so busy, families who are so overwhelmed, the ease of
(23:16):
delegating something that's so crucial for our pets happiness and health.
I love to promote that so they see that passion
in me and they say, hey, come back, and you know, keynote.
I did the closing address this year at NAPS as well,
you know, encouraging my keynote this year was actually about
storytelling and telling them that I think people don't know
enough about what pet sitting entails because we're not telling them.
Speaker 5 (23:41):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
And there's no one better to promote your own business
than yourself, So you should tell the people what your
business looks like, what are your daily life. But do
you feel like your public speaking events, whether it's a webinar,
whether it's a conference, do you find that it helped
promote your business? Did you make any connection there?
Speaker 2 (24:00):
Oh?
Speaker 6 (24:00):
Absolutely? I mean you, as a keynote speaker, you're established
by the organization that brings you in as an industry expert,
right exactly. You are the person that of all the
people they could have chosen, they invited you to be
a keynote speaker. And what's interesting is one of my
competitors was the person who former competitors in the pet
(24:23):
sitting industry, was the one who recommended me for that
keynote because she says that she always enjoys my speeches
and she used to hire me to speak to her
staff when we were competitors because she and I had
a very similar outlook on business and qualifying clients. And
she said, you know what, I'm going to bring you
(24:43):
in and say, see, this is the industry standard. We
are industry experts. Let's elevate together, even though we're competitors.
And that is why she asked me so many years
later to come back, and the association invited me to
come back, and they could have chosen anybody. So of
course it's speaks to me as somebody who stands out
as an industry expert and if nothing else, an industry advocate,
(25:06):
right because I am passionate about this industry.
Speaker 5 (25:09):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
So instead of seeing your competitors as the enemy, see
them as an inspiration.
Speaker 6 (25:15):
Oh for sure, I don't believe in competitors. I in
my business for content creation, I only work with one
person in each market, just because I want the voice
to be really unique and stand out in the crowd.
I will do copy writing for like a website, but
I the blogging. I only take one client in each market.
(25:36):
But I always tell my clients, tell me about your
other like your colleagues in your industry, because we're going
to write about what we can do. But maybe there's
somebody who services a city nearby that we can also
talk about. Maybe there's somebody that specializes in medicating you know,
very ill pets or sub Q or insulin shots and
(26:00):
you don't do that. Somebody that was a former vet tech.
We can talk about them, and it still helps our platform.
It helps our blog and our credibility and that eea
T for Google, right. It boosts that while also contributing
to the pet parent community in your area giving them resources,
(26:20):
because that's really what content it is. It's education and
resources that makes you stand out as the industry expert.
So networking, I never see client like competing businesses from
the owner perspective as a competitor, because everybody has a specialty,
everybody has a niche. Some people are great with puppies.
(26:42):
Some companies I only trust with my old geriatric senior
special needs dogs. You know, some people are going to
be focused on budget. Some people are going to be
focused on you know, availability of schedule, some people are
everybody's got different problems to solve, so and not every
(27:02):
business is for every client. So partnering within your local
community means that you can say, I'm sorry, mister client,
I'm not the best pet sitter for you, but this
person is a great resource, and you never know that
person might turn around and give you a great Google review.
I couldn't work with them, but I called them and
they gave me great resources. I really think they're a
(27:23):
great company. You never know what you're gonna get, so
always giving right in the hopes of it all working
out in the end.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
I absolutely love that, and I think people should do
that more often instead of seeing people as the enemy.
So I really like that advice. So talking about those
public speaking events, you also are a big networker because
that's how I met you at like a networking event,
and I want you to tell people how important it
is that you put yourself out there into those networking events.
(27:53):
That can be a bit uncomfortable because sometimes you don't
know anyone and you actually have to mingle with people,
and I hate being the center of attention.
Speaker 5 (28:00):
So I'm the opposite of you in that way, and.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
I know that sometimes I find it really hard. I
remember when I met you. I was with Mary and
I was like, I think that's covered in pet Hey,
I think that's covered in pat Hair. Mary was like,
you need to go talk to her and I was like,
oh God, okay, okok. And it was so hard for
me to just go to you and be like, Hi,
are you the podcast covered.
Speaker 6 (28:20):
In I Am honored that you like takes me out
of a crowd. I love that so much, and I
do think that it's easier for people like me who
are extroverted to go in and be like hey, But
the reality is you're offering a service. You want your
community to know about that service, Like what good is
(28:40):
that service if nobody knows about it? It's like if
a tree falls in the forest, right can and nobody's
there to hear it, does it make a sound? Same question,
If you're providing a service and nobody knows that it exists,
then what are you doing?
Speaker 2 (28:54):
Why?
Speaker 6 (28:54):
Are you providing this? So the reality is you are
a resource for pet parents in your area, and there
are you know, realtors or resources for home buyers or sellers,
and veterinarians are resources in their own way, and doctors
or resources in their own way. And when you go
with the mentality of sharing what you do and contributing
(29:16):
to your community, I feel like it takes that pressure off. No,
you're not going to sell anything. Yeah, No, You're not
going to connect and meet people in like a cheesy
salesy way, which is I think what holds people back.
It's like I have to go with my business card
and I have to have like a field to share.
Just go and say, hey, hi, I Isabelle, how are
(29:37):
you what brings you here today? And start a conversation
and let things happen organically. And the case in point.
I went to a Chamber of Commerce event when I
was running my pet sitting business, and that's how I
met the publisher of the local newspaper that then brought
me on as a writer with zero experience. All I
(29:59):
had to show her was my newsletters that went out
to clients. That's all the writing I had really done.
And they liked that enough to give me the position.
And I was very bold. I was thirty years old,
so like really still quite young. When I look back
and I said, do you all have a pet column?
She said no, we've been thinking about it. I was like,
I'll write it. Nida, zero experience, zero, anything, I'll write it.
(30:24):
And I really was saying I didn't say for free,
but what I meant was give me the opportunity. I'll
do it for free, right, just because again it's I
have this knowledge, I have this service, let me contribute
and see what happens. And so when you go with
that kind of idea that you're just sharing and you're
just learning about what other resources are there. Maybe you're
(30:46):
a pet sitter and you want to meet realtors, right
because those realtors know where the pet friendly living areas are.
Maybe you can refer to them. Maybe you go thinking, hey,
I want to write blogs about people in my area
that are pet friends. Let me go meet some realtors,
let me go meet some you know, cleaning companies, let
me go meet some flooring companies. And just hi, you're
(31:09):
a flooring company. I'd love to write about you, and
can I interview you? And give me three reasons why
vinyl plank is a great thing for pet owners.
Speaker 5 (31:18):
Right, Think outside of the books.
Speaker 6 (31:19):
Think about ways that you can connect with people without
a sales pitch, Like what can I do for you?
Can I write about your business? Can you give me
some of your expertise about flooring, carpeting, cleaning, you know,
buying a home with pets? What should I be thinking about?
What neighborhoods are most pet friendly? Can I interview you
(31:40):
and feature you in my blog? And then now you
have a connection. Now you have something for your social
media and for because I reuse everything. So we start
on the blog and then now we're gonna tag them
on social media. We're gonna make a meme. Maybe we're
gonna make a graphic. We're gonna maybe do a real
about that conversation I had with somebody. So my husband
always teases me, everything is content, Everything is content, And
(32:03):
it's true because everything is content these days, Like you said,
we want stories. We want to hear what people are doing.
We want to see those partnerships in the community. If
you're working solo, you're on an island. There are so
many people out there who want your services or products,
and the only way to reach them is to get
to know those people who are in the same world,
(32:26):
your pet parents, your pet lovers.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
You know.
Speaker 6 (32:29):
I have a realtor friend here who I know through
the military, and I had him on my show and
we talked about the challenges of finding pet friendly rentals
and that was a really great show because there are
people out there who really are struggling to find a
place to live because they have pets. And did it
do anything for him? Not really, I mean he was
(32:50):
able to share it. He's like a top producer, so
like it didn't get him any clients, but now he is,
you know, forever on the internet as an expert in
helping people homes when there are challenges, whether they're pet
or something else. So thinking about how things are not sales,
like there's not an immediate sale coming, but everything is
(33:10):
a seed you plant makes it a lot more palatable
to attend these events and kind of just like not
put so much pressure on yourself, like you are the
representative of your business. All you have to say is hi,
if ever you know you have a client who needs
a pet sitter, if anybody you know as a realtor,
for example, the solution you offer is you can walk
(33:31):
dogs while they're showing houses. Right, let's put up like
ye walk the dogs while you show the house. And
that's a solution the realtor has probably been looking for
for a long time, because nobody likes to show a
house when a dog is barking from their crate. It's massing, right.
Speaker 5 (33:46):
Yeah, they think about.
Speaker 6 (33:48):
The ways that you offer solutions and think about the
ways that you can contribute to your community and take
the sales out of it.
Speaker 5 (33:55):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (33:56):
And I have a little quick question before we end
the show. It's about your rescue part of it. So
I know you do TNR in Texas and you're also
a big rescue advocate. Remember about all conversation, how do
you use the rescue world to promote your business as well?
And how important it is for you to do rescue
(34:18):
even for your personal branding. I know we're not doing
rescue too, you know, for ourselves.
Speaker 6 (34:22):
I know that, but I think that it kind of
it's part of my passion, right, Like I am such
a rescue advocate. I am constantly educating about the myths
of your You know, all rescues have issues or all
rescues have behavior trauma, and I'm like, you know, every
every animal is an individual. I like to forget where
(34:44):
they came from and look at them at face value
right now, and can I work with this animal? Can
I help them from where we are and what I
have to give. So I'm always educating whether I'm you know,
writing for my clients and we talk about for example,
a couple weeks ago was you know, celebrate Shelter Week,
and we I wrote for all of my clients highlighting
(35:07):
shelters in their areas that stand out as really doing
what I call the Lord's work right helping They help
the community. They keep our houses in our neighborhoods safe
by doing T and R, by picking up strays, by
making sure that there are no you know, rabid dogs
running rampant in our areas, right like. They do so
much that I think people forget. So it's important for
(35:32):
me to educate and remind people of how important rescue,
rescues and shelters are for our communities. And I also
feel like it is our responsibility as pet lovers. If
we can't support by doing tn R, we can't support
by fostering, then maybe we support by donating, but those
things if we really truly care about not only the
(35:53):
animals but our communities, getting involved is really an important
part of being an active member of your community, of
your city, of your state. Texas is a very big state.
I can only help and I'll pass so and I
support New Mexico too because I'm ten minutes from Las
Crusi's so I adopted my cat from a you know,
(36:17):
shelter or rescue in Las Crisis, and I support them
every month with a donation on his behalf. And I
try to remember that these rescues and shelters are doing
such important work for our quality of life, not just
the pets, quality like the animals and questions quality of
life that I want to include it. And so I'm
a Mission Now partner, which is a really wonderful organization
(36:41):
that you know, kind of funds big projects for rescues
and shelters, and so that comes straight out of my
business budget every month, that goes straight to them, because
I believe in what they're doing. I believe in the
importance of the work that they're doing, and that's at
a national level, and I also believe in helping locally,
and so once my kids are older, I want them
(37:02):
to join in T and R. I think it's really
important to teach future generations about contributing to our community.
And I am passionate about pets, but there are people
who are passionate about special needs children, or the elderly,
or the disability community and whatever you're passionate about. And
in our case, we're on a pet podcast, so we
can all assume we're passionate about pets. That's where we
(37:22):
kind of give what we can. And nobody's expecting everybody
to give all their time, all their money to this,
but find a way to contribute because to me, that's
part of my vision and mission for my business and
for my life.
Speaker 3 (37:35):
And I was at a networking pet event a few
days ago and a lot of people were like, I
really want to help rescues, but my business is not
doing amazing, so I.
Speaker 5 (37:44):
Just don't have the money for it. And I said,
just donate a bit of your time.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
So if you're an expert, if you're a pet sitter
for example, or dog walker, and your business might not
be doing amazing so you don't have enough money to donate,
just donate some of your time. Just go walk some
dogs or bring the community together. Ask all of your clients, hey,
let's do a day where we all walk the dogs
at the shelter. So something to keep in mind that
you don't always have to donate money. Sometimes it's just
(38:12):
also liking on social media, sharing sharing animals for adoption,
I know, having a rescue that's very important.
Speaker 5 (38:20):
So yeah, just a little reminder.
Speaker 6 (38:22):
Write a blog. I when I when I adopted my cat,
I wrote a blog about it and I tagged the
I obviously I linked back to the rescue that I
got it from, that I got him from, I shared
on social media. I tagged them on it. And you
know how valuable that is for the shelters in like
a search engine optimization, you know, in that in that realm,
(38:45):
any link that you give them is love and it's
it grows their credibility, it grows their following. So that
doesn't cost you anything. Then maybe an hour to write
the blog. And honestly, if you don't have an hour
to write the blog, just post a picture and tag
them on social media that they maybe should reshare and
then now you're helping each other because they shared it
and now their followers see you. So it's really thinking
(39:08):
about everything symbiotically. Like everything we all Nothing occurs in
a vacuum, nobody lives on an island. We're all together.
So by using your resources and just opening up your
opening up your heart and your mind a little bit,
maybe getting a little bit uncomfortable because a lot of
people this, the thought of tagging a rescue on their
(39:29):
social media is like, why would I tag them? I'm
not cool enough or big enough to tag? Yes you
are to do it, Yes, yes you are. You are
cool enough, you are big enough to tag anybody tag
me all day long. Please link back to my website
so I can get bigger and bigger on Google. It's
everybody wants that love, so don't feel bad about.
Speaker 3 (39:49):
It talking about that, Isabelle. Where can people find you?
Can you give us your socials or your website?
Speaker 6 (39:55):
Yes, I'm covered in pet hair everywhere, in online and
in real life. I am covered in pet hair. I
have a website covered in pethair dot com, I'm on
pet Life Radio as covered in pet hair. All of
my socials are covered in pet hair. And what you'll
see a lot of is mostly clips from my show,
pictures of my cat pictures, of my kids, pictures of
(40:16):
my life that I just share. And in all of
the things that I try to share, I try to
promote rescue, I try to promote education. I try to
promote kind and gentle pet parenting, positive dog training techniques,
cat training techniques. I especialize in cats and dogs. So
if you're looking for something about exotics or birds, I'm
(40:37):
not your girl. But if you want to look at
cats and dogs all day, I have two dogs and
a cat, two kids, and you know, it's a lot,
and I'm a busy lady and I travel a lot,
so I share a lot. And the goal of sharing
is to connect with people because like really, at the
end of the day, we're all humans, all on the
same mission to help animals, right, So those are the
(40:57):
people that I'm looking to connect with online. You're one
of those people. Please find me online.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
Yeah, and everything is connected and we know Zackly you
are so thank you so much for joining us today.
Speaker 5 (41:08):
And this is a rap for this show.
Speaker 3 (41:11):
So we're so excited to be doing this for all
of you out there who are making life better for
the animals.
Speaker 5 (41:16):
You have a question you want.
Speaker 3 (41:17):
Us to answer, you just reach out to us on
Instagram or Facebook under Wistern Media and we'll try to
answer it in a future podcast episode. And as we
always say, bar cloud and per smart.
Speaker 4 (41:31):
Bye, guys, Let's
Speaker 8 (41:32):
Talk best every week on demand only on petlife Radios
dot com
Live.
Speaker 2 (00:02):
This is pet Life Radio. Let's Talk pets.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Welcome to the Whisky Report. We're a new podcast dedicated
to helping anyone in the pet industry, whether you're an
animal welfare or for profit pet company, get some PR
and bus for your nonprofit or business. I am alex
Hean Ricardo, one of the hosts of the show, and
I'm usually joined with Mary Tan but today we have
a little technical issue. She's locked out of her house,
(00:37):
so I'm just doing the intro. Hi, everybody, and we're
here with our producer, Mark Winter of Pet Life Radio. Mark,
how are you you're not locked out of your house.
Speaker 4 (00:48):
I'm not locked out of my house. And if I was,
it's only like, you know, seventy degrees outside, So it's okay.
It's not fine where Mary is.
Speaker 1 (00:57):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (00:58):
Mary is in Minnesota and it's currently five degrees fair night,
and we haven't heard from her in a few minutes, and.
Speaker 4 (01:05):
She's like just like an icicle and she's like standing there.
Speaker 3 (01:11):
Oh, poor Mary. We're thinking of you. And so we're
so honored to be part of the pet Life Radio
Network and we're here to show you that you can
do pr for yourself.
Speaker 5 (01:22):
And we're going to help you each and every week.
And today we have.
Speaker 3 (01:25):
A fellow podcast host who Marx knows very well as
he's also producing her show, Isabelle Alvarez Arata wears so
many hat that he was so hard to choose which
one to tell you about. But she's a pet entrepreneur
with a passion for content writing and marketing. She's the
host of Covered in Pet Hair, a fun, boozy podcast
(01:47):
show for pet lovers. I met Isabelle back at super
Zoo in twenty twenty three, and I remember bounding with
her through a love of living abroad, different cultures, and
also the fact that she does in are in Texas.
Hi is Bill, Welcome on our show. We're so happy
that you're here.
Speaker 6 (02:05):
I am thrilled to be here. Thank you for inviting me,
and I too am thrilled that I am not locked out.
I'm sending Mary all my love and warm vibes for
a quick resolution here.
Speaker 5 (02:16):
Yeah, we hope she figures it out. Isa.
Speaker 3 (02:19):
Can you give a little introduction of yourself and maybe
how you started to work in the pet industry because
that was not your background at the beginning, was it.
Speaker 6 (02:28):
No, it was not. It's been a long and Winding Road.
I started a professional pet sitting dog walking business in
the Northern Virginia area, so the DC suburbs in two
thousand and eight, and I grew that business to multiple
six figures with over twenty employees about five hundred active clients.
And then the pandemic hit, and obviously the DC area
(02:52):
with all the government workers in military and government contractors,
our business was most sle mid day doog walking while
people were at work, and it just came to a
screeching halt. And I had been running that business for
five years remotely, so there was really no way for
me to rebuild that business once that happened. Knowing that
(03:14):
the DC area even to this day is kind of
at fifty percent work from home still. So I just
had the, I think, the forethought to say, like, this
is not a viable business anymore, not only because of
our business focus on midday dog walks, but also because
of my geographic location having changed and not being very
(03:38):
conducive to rebuilding the business. So I shut that down
and I pivoted to writing, which was something that I
didn't even have on my radar. A friend of mine
from the pet sitting industry recommended me for some magazines
because I had written a pet column in my area
while I was running my business just for fun, and
(04:00):
I guess she thought of me when they were thinking
of freelance writers. She approached me. I didn't have anything
else going on, so I took it. I took the opportunity,
and now I write full time. I write for pet
businesses specifically. I also write for magazines still, but that's
the journalism work is a lot less of what I do,
and it's kind of becoming something that I do on
(04:23):
occasion because I've so much demand for my content creation
and content writing and search engine optimized content that I
put out for pet businesses. So I work specifically with
pet businesses to promote themselves online, whether it be through
their blogs, through their website copy, or through their social
(04:44):
media presence. So that is where I am, I guess
specializing now. It's like I said, it's been a long
and windy road, but writing really is my passion. I
could do it twenty four to seven and never get
tired of it, so it is. I am very grateful
for the changes. While they were pretty traumatic when it happened, right,
I'm very happy and very grateful and I have wonderful
(05:07):
clients and I really enjoy writing about pets.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
But it's inspiring to see that you took something, you know,
like a big challenge, which was to change completely your business,
to actually find you true passion.
Speaker 5 (05:18):
So I'm actually really happy for you.
Speaker 3 (05:20):
I think COVID was a bit bittersweet for you because
it closes your business down, but it opens so many
new doors.
Speaker 6 (05:27):
Absolutely absolutely, and for I'm a mom of young children,
so professional pet sitting is a very time intensive, very
logistically challenging business. I know that because I did it
for twelve years, and for a person who's building a
family simultaneously to a business, it's very challenging. So this
(05:48):
really does fit my lifestyle a lot better, and it
allows me to work from anywhere. And like you said,
I love to travel. I family in Spain. I had
family in South Florida for a long long time, and
I would go and spend the summers there with my kids,
or I would go go help my sister with her
new baby for a few weeks in Spain. And I
can work from anywhere, So that is really a positive
(06:10):
of the change that came from COVID.
Speaker 5 (06:13):
I'm so happy for you.
Speaker 3 (06:14):
Think we're so excited to hear more about what you do,
But first we need to take a little quick break.
Speaker 7 (06:23):
Take a bite out of your competition. Advertise your business
with an ad in pet Life Radio podcasts and radio shows.
There is no other pet related media that is as
large and reaches more pet parents and pet lovers than
pet Life Radio with over seven million monthly listeners. Pet
Life Radio podcasts are available on all major podcasts platforms,
(06:45):
and our live radio stream goes out to over two
hundred and fifty million subscribers on iHeartRadio, Odyssey, tune In,
and other streaming apps. For more information on how you
can advertise on the number one pet podcast and radio network,
is it Petlife Radio dot com. Slash advertised Today.
Speaker 8 (07:05):
Let's talk pets on Petlife Radio dot com.
Speaker 5 (07:18):
And we're back with Isabelle.
Speaker 3 (07:20):
So, Isabelle, you were just talking about your pet sitting
business in Virginia. That was quite successful, and.
Speaker 5 (07:28):
I want to ask you what was the bigger challenge?
How did you make it so successful?
Speaker 3 (07:33):
You said you had five hundred clients.
Speaker 5 (07:35):
That's a lot.
Speaker 3 (07:36):
What happened like that's a huge success.
Speaker 6 (07:39):
Yes, it was very successful. I think that the area,
the demand was obviously there. I'd like to tell this
story because I think it's a really great way to
highlight entrepreneurship. I actually did not set out to start
a professional pet sitting business. I was looking for a
dog walker for my dog, and the businesses that existed
were so busy that they never called me back. I
(08:02):
would joke that like, here I am, you know, I
don't know, sixteen years later, still waiting for a return
call from all of those pet sitting companies that I
reached out to. They were so busy. And I had
done pet sitting, you know, during college, just to help
my family's friends or my neighbors, and so I said,
I can do this, like this is not a challenge.
And I was working in the hospitality industry and it
(08:24):
was very demanding. It was very the commute was getting
really old. I felt like I wasn't really happy. So
it was either leave that hotel chain and go to
another one or try something new. And I decided to,
you know, try something new. My parents are entrepreneurs, so
it kind of felt comfortable for me. I know that's
a big step for a lot of people, and I
(08:46):
just started doing the dog walks myself, building territories and
little by little, hiring people to take over the established territories,
starting new territories, and little by little I was creating
this clientele, you know, having to hire assistant managers, having
to hire more staff. I had dog walkers, I had
pet sitters, and I will tell you this, I had
(09:07):
amazing staff members. That was really the key. I think
that one of my talents is recognizing talent in others,
and so I was a really good recruiter and I
was a really good delegator. I trusted my team, so
I let them do what they did best. And I
would also joke with my peers who were scared to hire,
(09:29):
you know, like some pet sitters just want to do
the work themselves. And I would say, I think some
of my pet sitters are actually better at it than
I am. They you know, they're not worried about the
business side of it. They're just worried about the love
of the pet and making sure their needs are met.
And so I always liked to delegate those responsibilities so
that I could manage the business. And eventually, after seven
years of being in the field full time and running
(09:52):
my business, I transitioned out of the business and I
started just managing, and it really allowed me to train people,
elevate the standards, make sure that you know, we had
a comprehensive training program so that everybody, no matter what
territory they were in, they were providing the same quality
of care. So it was it was really grassroots, like
it was little by little, just learning what I needed
(10:13):
and rising to the occasion and getting out of my
comfort zone like most entrepreneurs have to do, and learning
as you go. Right, I think you don't really know
what's coming, but you have to have kind of like
that desire to just roll with the punches. And thankfully
we never had any pets injured, loss, no dog bite incidents.
(10:34):
You know, a lot of people think, oh my gosh,
I would never want to go into a business with animals,
just because of the risks. We did it right, We
did it well, We had the right people. We qualified
our clients well so we knew they were a good
match for us. So we really had a twelve year
run where we set standards for even our industry. I
won an award the National Association of Professional Pet Sitters
(10:57):
awarded my business the two thousand the twenty twelve Business
of the Year Awards. So like it was just it
was really a labor of love, as most small businesses are,
and just in finding the right people to expand the
vision and mission of the business.
Speaker 5 (11:14):
Good for you.
Speaker 3 (11:15):
But I just wonder, so to have that many clients
to grow so much, did you focus on marketing or
was it more like community outrich mouthed mouth like?
Speaker 5 (11:25):
How was it?
Speaker 6 (11:26):
Well? Interestingly, I think that I came into it in
two thousand and eight when most businesses were just starting
to get their websites. So having a website was always
on my radar, always doing it right. I'm a writer, naturally,
I always have loved to write, so my copy was good,
so that digital marketing aspect was always part of my business.
(11:49):
I was young compared to a lot of my peers
in the industry. A lot of the peers in the
industry were retirees who started a small business in pet care,
and so I was more comfortable with social media and
online marketing. And absolutely most of my clients came from
just Google searches, organic search results where my business showed
(12:10):
up on top. And we did that for a very
long time. Eventually Obviously, there was a little bit of
like paid ads online. We did some AdWords kind of campaigns.
We did a lot of social media where we showcased
what we were doing, told our story. We did a
lot of internal marketing to our existing clientele, always massaging
(12:33):
the relationships that we already had. What I think people
forget to do. We did a lot of that, and
we also just created kind of like a buzz, like
you said the word you used when you introduced the show.
We created a buzz because we were more present than
maybe the businesses that came before us, who had instant success,
(12:54):
because they didn't have much in the way of competitors, right,
So we did a lot of new things that maybe
other people weren't doing that now are just considered basic.
Now it's just you have to have social media presence,
you have to have a website. When I started, it's
it was kind of optional, and we we did all
of it. I did all of it, and I think
(13:16):
I'm naturally good at marketing because I like to tell
stories and I like to talk to people. I think
that's harder for people who are introverted to share their
story and they struggle with what am I going to say,
I never have a problem knowing what to say, whether
it's right or wrong, I say it. So I think
that really helped. And even to this day, I help
(13:36):
a lot of professional pet sitting businesses. And these are businesses.
My clients are businesses that have been around for twenty
thirty years and they still have a hard time telling
their stories. So what I do is I tell it
for them.
Speaker 3 (13:48):
I love that, and so yeah, I was going to
ask you, actually, so how different it is now like
nowadays that everybody's on social media and has a website,
So you still have your own business, it's just a
bit different now you focus on marketing and content writing.
Do you find the way you have to promote your
business different? Do you do you still fit people find
(14:10):
you on Google Search?
Speaker 5 (14:11):
Or is it different?
Speaker 6 (14:12):
It's totally different, because really B two B and B
two C are different, right, business to business is mostly referral,
Like for me, it's really mostly referral. I'm sure you
see that, you know at Whisker Media. So I see
that more because I worked with these people. They were
my peers, they were my colleagues. We would go to
conferences together. We were in the same kind of trenches
(14:34):
for a long time, and now they reach out to
me because they know I understand their business and they
know I understand what they do and what their clients
are looking for and what their challenges are. So it
just works. But when obviously, when you're advertising to consumers,
you have to use every means possible. And one of
the things that helped me and that you know you
(14:54):
will obviously resonate with this, is that I started to
write a local pet column while I ran my pet
care business, and I got so many clients for that,
and I remember I think I made twenty five dollars
for each column, which honestly, I would have done it
for free, but they offered me twenty five, so I
took it.
Speaker 5 (15:11):
Yeah, take what you get exactly.
Speaker 6 (15:13):
But the only thing was that I would say, like
my Byeline said Isabelle Alvarez, at the time, owner of
the wag Pack Professional Pet Care, pet sitting, dog walking.
So I know I got clients from that, and it
was worth it because even though I was a new
writer and I was nervous and I would edit for
like three hours for that twenty five dollars, it was
(15:36):
presence and it was credibility, and so now I talk
to my clients about getting in the media for that credibility,
but also creating your own media channels on your platforms,
whether it's your website or social media or whatever it is,
because then maybe the media will take notice if yeah,
you are putting yourself out there as an expert in
(15:56):
your field exactly.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
That's exactly what we tell our clients is that you
should put yourself out there. You should promote yourself as
the expert in that field. And Mary had me write
my first article for pet Age a couple of weeks
ago about gen Z workers, and I was, yeah, it
was my first article, so I was like redoing it,
rewriting it, deleting everything, rewriting it took me like a.
Speaker 5 (16:18):
Week, and I was like so stressed about it.
Speaker 3 (16:20):
But May was like, Alex, you're a you're a gen
Z expert now, and I was like, you say exactly.
Speaker 6 (16:26):
And this is the thing. I think a lot of people,
especially in the pet industry, they like the industry because
of the pets and the you know, the connection that
they share with the pets, and a lot of them
are very humble. A lot of them have so much
knowledge but they feel like, well, I don't have a
mon like a professional dog trainer through whatever, you know,
expensive program, so I don't know. And I'm like, you've
(16:47):
been working face to face with dogs or cats or
both for twenty years. You've cared for thousands of pets
in that time, so you are an expert. And it's
it's funny to see that their reactions like, I don't know,
I'm not convinced I'm an expert, and I'm like, I
am telling you that you know more than you think
(17:08):
you do, and that people want to hear about it
because they think that's really what it comes down to
is that a lot of pet people want to just
put their head down and work right. They just want
to care for the pets. They just want to fix
the problem with the dog behaviors. Their clients are coming
with them, shoot them with They want to, you know,
plan the holiday pet care so that everybody you know
has a wonderful trip and the pets are taken care of,
(17:31):
and all the services that they offer. They just want
to focus on those. But you can't in this day
and age where competitors pop up at any moment, you
can't just do that because then when those clients move
away or that pet pass is away, you don't have
anybody to replace someone, right, So, like it's really the
challenge now is to think about the clients you have,
(17:52):
the clients you need to replace those clients, the growth
that you want to see, all of that has to
come into play. And when you're putting your head down
and us focusing on the pets, like, it's really hard
for people to take notice, especially with so much noise
and potential competitors out there. Gen Z is the perfect
example of who's gonna come in, you know, and say,
I want to start my own pet care business. I
(18:14):
can walk dogs, you know, I can I can take
care of cats, And they'll come in and you know,
the person who's been in business for twenty years will
all of a sudden say, why am I not getting
so many leads anymore? And it's because they were kind
of resting on their laurels, right Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:30):
And I think gen Z is also really good at
storytelling because we grew up with social media.
Speaker 5 (18:35):
We correct like invented the vlogs.
Speaker 3 (18:38):
Right when you're just like talking to your phone about
your day and everything, so we are we're like doing
storytelling all day every day to even our friends the
older generation are not doing. I mean, I've never seen
my mom doing a vlog about her day.
Speaker 6 (18:51):
Right my mother would My mother would rather go you know,
to the doctor for like a painful for a painful procedure.
Ever vlog her day like if you would say, and
it's it's the same idea of why would I do that?
Nobody cares? Like who wants to know about my day?
And as a professional pet sitter, who I think has
(19:13):
an amazing job because professional petsitters and dog walkers and
dog trainers and dog trainers some specialize in very difficult things.
But there are dog trainers that specialize in puppies, right Loo.
They are working with pets under the best of circumstances,
whereas veterinarians vet texts, they're working with them when there
are challenges and there are there is bad news. So
(19:35):
for me, when I was a pet sitter, I would say,
my clients always love me because like when I walked
in I was like, you know, j Loo, walking into
like I don't know where to like a fancy restaurant
New York. For like the pet in my care, I
was everything and so you always have like, sure you
have sick pets sometimes, sure things happen, but ninety percent
(19:56):
of the time the job is amazing and so other
people want to hear about it. Other people want to
be like you, how many cocks did you care for today,
how many homes did you drive to, how many dogs
did you walk at one time? How many puppies were
at this dog training class? And how many times did
you have to stop to pick up an accident? You
know those things people want to know.
Speaker 1 (20:17):
It's like, it's like this curiosity that we have, especially people, yeah,
especially those people who were sitting at a nine to
five desk, you know, they want to know what the
petsitter was up to today while they were, you know,
crunching numbers in the accounting department exactly.
Speaker 3 (20:31):
So, yeah, we cannot stress enough how important storytelling is
for your business. So focus on that for sure. Promote
yourself in a way. Isabelle do that is you are
a keynote speaker, right, Yes, so you do public speaking.
I do.
Speaker 6 (20:49):
I started doing that when I was in the industry
and it was one of those things where they wanted
a member of the association to like do a little
you know, ten things I learned about pet sitting in
my first year or something, and I was like, I'll
do it right, Like I'm always I've always been one
of those people who I don't want I don't need
to be perfect. I don't have a lot of like,
(21:10):
you know, concerns about being in public. I know some
people don't like to be the center of attention. I
love it, So I just I was like, I'll do it,
you know. And I've always been a big volunteer, Like
when there's nobody else to take a job, I'll do it.
You know, I'll knock it out.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
I feel like you're you're a very yes person.
Speaker 6 (21:28):
I am. I am, and you know what, I do
believe that the more we say yes, the more the
universe says yes to us. So I'm like always like,
let's do it, let's collaborate, let's team up. And so
I would start saying, sure, I'll do that for a
webinar where maybe three people showed up, and then they
started to see that I enjoyed it and that the
participants enjoyed it, so they asked me maybe to do
(21:51):
something a little bit bigger. And this year, you know,
sixteen years seventeen years, almost into my career in the
pet industry, I was keynote speaker at the National Association
of Professional Pet Sitters conference in Georgia. And I've spoken
that the Texas Petsitters Conference, I'm their annual MC for
(22:12):
their conference. So I am the one who like keeps
track of scheduling and make sure everything goes off well.
And I was also invited to other you know, other
things that maybe have happened online. I always say yes,
I always, you know, as long as my schedule allows
me to properly prepare for it. I love to cooperate,
(22:35):
and I love the industry I'm in. I really do
feel like pet sitting and dog walking is like the
ugly stepsister of the pet industry. Nobody thinks of the
pet sitters or dog walkers until they need them, you know,
the dog food makers or like everybody you know. Of
course we use that twice three times a day, maybe,
so like we think about them. But the professional petsitter
(22:55):
that you use, maybe when you go away for the holidays,
you don't think about them until you need them. But
I get the industry, and I consider myself a pet
sitting industry advocate. Trying to get people to understand the
benefits of in home pet care versus like a boarding situation,
the benefits of midday dog walking for people who are
so busy, families who are so overwhelmed, the ease of
(23:16):
delegating something that's so crucial for our pets happiness and health.
I love to promote that so they see that passion
in me and they say, hey, come back, and you know, keynote.
I did the closing address this year at NAPS as well,
you know, encouraging my keynote this year was actually about
storytelling and telling them that I think people don't know
enough about what pet sitting entails because we're not telling them.
Speaker 5 (23:41):
Yeah, exactly.
Speaker 3 (23:42):
And there's no one better to promote your own business
than yourself, So you should tell the people what your
business looks like, what are your daily life. But do
you feel like your public speaking events, whether it's a webinar,
whether it's a conference, do you find that it helped
promote your business? Did you make any connection there?
Speaker 2 (24:00):
Oh?
Speaker 6 (24:00):
Absolutely? I mean you, as a keynote speaker, you're established
by the organization that brings you in as an industry expert,
right exactly. You are the person that of all the
people they could have chosen, they invited you to be
a keynote speaker. And what's interesting is one of my
competitors was the person who former competitors in the pet
(24:23):
sitting industry, was the one who recommended me for that
keynote because she says that she always enjoys my speeches
and she used to hire me to speak to her
staff when we were competitors because she and I had
a very similar outlook on business and qualifying clients. And
she said, you know what, I'm going to bring you
(24:43):
in and say, see, this is the industry standard. We
are industry experts. Let's elevate together, even though we're competitors.
And that is why she asked me so many years
later to come back, and the association invited me to
come back, and they could have chosen anybody. So of
course it's speaks to me as somebody who stands out
as an industry expert and if nothing else, an industry advocate,
(25:06):
right because I am passionate about this industry.
Speaker 5 (25:09):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
So instead of seeing your competitors as the enemy, see
them as an inspiration.
Speaker 6 (25:15):
Oh for sure, I don't believe in competitors. I in
my business for content creation, I only work with one
person in each market, just because I want the voice
to be really unique and stand out in the crowd.
I will do copy writing for like a website, but
I the blogging. I only take one client in each market.
(25:36):
But I always tell my clients, tell me about your
other like your colleagues in your industry, because we're going
to write about what we can do. But maybe there's
somebody who services a city nearby that we can also
talk about. Maybe there's somebody that specializes in medicating you know,
very ill pets or sub Q or insulin shots and
(26:00):
you don't do that. Somebody that was a former vet tech.
We can talk about them, and it still helps our platform.
It helps our blog and our credibility and that eea
T for Google, right. It boosts that while also contributing
to the pet parent community in your area giving them resources,
(26:20):
because that's really what content it is. It's education and
resources that makes you stand out as the industry expert.
So networking, I never see client like competing businesses from
the owner perspective as a competitor, because everybody has a specialty,
everybody has a niche. Some people are great with puppies.
(26:42):
Some companies I only trust with my old geriatric senior
special needs dogs. You know, some people are going to
be focused on budget. Some people are going to be
focused on you know, availability of schedule, some people are
everybody's got different problems to solve, so and not every
(27:02):
business is for every client. So partnering within your local
community means that you can say, I'm sorry, mister client,
I'm not the best pet sitter for you, but this
person is a great resource, and you never know that
person might turn around and give you a great Google review.
I couldn't work with them, but I called them and
they gave me great resources. I really think they're a
(27:23):
great company. You never know what you're gonna get, so
always giving right in the hopes of it all working
out in the end.
Speaker 3 (27:31):
I absolutely love that, and I think people should do
that more often instead of seeing people as the enemy.
So I really like that advice. So talking about those
public speaking events, you also are a big networker because
that's how I met you at like a networking event,
and I want you to tell people how important it
is that you put yourself out there into those networking events.
(27:53):
That can be a bit uncomfortable because sometimes you don't
know anyone and you actually have to mingle with people,
and I hate being the center of attention.
Speaker 5 (28:00):
So I'm the opposite of you in that way, and.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
I know that sometimes I find it really hard. I
remember when I met you. I was with Mary and
I was like, I think that's covered in pet Hey,
I think that's covered in pat Hair. Mary was like,
you need to go talk to her and I was like,
oh God, okay, okok. And it was so hard for
me to just go to you and be like, Hi,
are you the podcast covered.
Speaker 6 (28:20):
In I Am honored that you like takes me out
of a crowd. I love that so much, and I
do think that it's easier for people like me who
are extroverted to go in and be like hey, But
the reality is you're offering a service. You want your
community to know about that service, Like what good is
(28:40):
that service if nobody knows about it? It's like if
a tree falls in the forest, right can and nobody's
there to hear it, does it make a sound? Same question,
If you're providing a service and nobody knows that it exists,
then what are you doing?
Speaker 2 (28:54):
Why?
Speaker 6 (28:54):
Are you providing this? So the reality is you are
a resource for pet parents in your area, and there
are you know, realtors or resources for home buyers or sellers,
and veterinarians are resources in their own way, and doctors
or resources in their own way. And when you go
with the mentality of sharing what you do and contributing
(29:16):
to your community, I feel like it takes that pressure off. No,
you're not going to sell anything. Yeah, No, You're not
going to connect and meet people in like a cheesy
salesy way, which is I think what holds people back.
It's like I have to go with my business card
and I have to have like a field to share.
Just go and say, hey, hi, I Isabelle, how are
(29:37):
you what brings you here today? And start a conversation
and let things happen organically. And the case in point.
I went to a Chamber of Commerce event when I
was running my pet sitting business, and that's how I
met the publisher of the local newspaper that then brought
me on as a writer with zero experience. All I
(29:59):
had to show her was my newsletters that went out
to clients. That's all the writing I had really done.
And they liked that enough to give me the position.
And I was very bold. I was thirty years old,
so like really still quite young. When I look back
and I said, do you all have a pet column?
She said no, we've been thinking about it. I was like,
I'll write it. Nida, zero experience, zero, anything, I'll write it.
(30:24):
And I really was saying I didn't say for free,
but what I meant was give me the opportunity. I'll
do it for free, right, just because again it's I
have this knowledge, I have this service, let me contribute
and see what happens. And so when you go with
that kind of idea that you're just sharing and you're
just learning about what other resources are there. Maybe you're
(30:46):
a pet sitter and you want to meet realtors, right
because those realtors know where the pet friendly living areas are.
Maybe you can refer to them. Maybe you go thinking, hey,
I want to write blogs about people in my area
that are pet friends. Let me go meet some realtors,
let me go meet some you know, cleaning companies, let
me go meet some flooring companies. And just hi, you're
(31:09):
a flooring company. I'd love to write about you, and
can I interview you? And give me three reasons why
vinyl plank is a great thing for pet owners.
Speaker 5 (31:18):
Right, Think outside of the books.
Speaker 6 (31:19):
Think about ways that you can connect with people without
a sales pitch, Like what can I do for you?
Can I write about your business? Can you give me
some of your expertise about flooring, carpeting, cleaning, you know,
buying a home with pets? What should I be thinking about?
What neighborhoods are most pet friendly? Can I interview you
(31:40):
and feature you in my blog? And then now you
have a connection. Now you have something for your social
media and for because I reuse everything. So we start
on the blog and then now we're gonna tag them
on social media. We're gonna make a meme. Maybe we're
gonna make a graphic. We're gonna maybe do a real
about that conversation I had with somebody. So my husband
always teases me, everything is content, Everything is content, And
(32:03):
it's true because everything is content these days, Like you said,
we want stories. We want to hear what people are doing.
We want to see those partnerships in the community. If
you're working solo, you're on an island. There are so
many people out there who want your services or products,
and the only way to reach them is to get
to know those people who are in the same world,
(32:26):
your pet parents, your pet lovers.
Speaker 1 (32:28):
You know.
Speaker 6 (32:29):
I have a realtor friend here who I know through
the military, and I had him on my show and
we talked about the challenges of finding pet friendly rentals
and that was a really great show because there are
people out there who really are struggling to find a
place to live because they have pets. And did it
do anything for him? Not really, I mean he was
(32:50):
able to share it. He's like a top producer, so
like it didn't get him any clients, but now he is,
you know, forever on the internet as an expert in
helping people homes when there are challenges, whether they're pet
or something else. So thinking about how things are not sales,
like there's not an immediate sale coming, but everything is
(33:10):
a seed you plant makes it a lot more palatable
to attend these events and kind of just like not
put so much pressure on yourself, like you are the
representative of your business. All you have to say is hi,
if ever you know you have a client who needs
a pet sitter, if anybody you know as a realtor,
for example, the solution you offer is you can walk
(33:31):
dogs while they're showing houses. Right, let's put up like
ye walk the dogs while you show the house. And
that's a solution the realtor has probably been looking for
for a long time, because nobody likes to show a
house when a dog is barking from their crate. It's massing, right.
Speaker 5 (33:46):
Yeah, they think about.
Speaker 6 (33:48):
The ways that you offer solutions and think about the
ways that you can contribute to your community and take
the sales out of it.
Speaker 5 (33:55):
I love that.
Speaker 3 (33:56):
And I have a little quick question before we end
the show. It's about your rescue part of it. So
I know you do TNR in Texas and you're also
a big rescue advocate. Remember about all conversation, how do
you use the rescue world to promote your business as well?
And how important it is for you to do rescue
(34:18):
even for your personal branding. I know we're not doing
rescue too, you know, for ourselves.
Speaker 6 (34:22):
I know that, but I think that it kind of
it's part of my passion, right, Like I am such
a rescue advocate. I am constantly educating about the myths
of your You know, all rescues have issues or all
rescues have behavior trauma, and I'm like, you know, every
every animal is an individual. I like to forget where
(34:44):
they came from and look at them at face value
right now, and can I work with this animal? Can
I help them from where we are and what I
have to give. So I'm always educating whether I'm you know,
writing for my clients and we talk about for example,
a couple weeks ago was you know, celebrate Shelter Week,
and we I wrote for all of my clients highlighting
(35:07):
shelters in their areas that stand out as really doing
what I call the Lord's work right helping They help
the community. They keep our houses in our neighborhoods safe
by doing T and R, by picking up strays, by
making sure that there are no you know, rabid dogs
running rampant in our areas, right like. They do so
much that I think people forget. So it's important for
(35:32):
me to educate and remind people of how important rescue,
rescues and shelters are for our communities. And I also
feel like it is our responsibility as pet lovers. If
we can't support by doing tn R, we can't support
by fostering, then maybe we support by donating, but those
things if we really truly care about not only the
(35:53):
animals but our communities, getting involved is really an important
part of being an active member of your community, of
your city, of your state. Texas is a very big state.
I can only help and I'll pass so and I
support New Mexico too because I'm ten minutes from Las
Crusi's so I adopted my cat from a you know,
(36:17):
shelter or rescue in Las Crisis, and I support them
every month with a donation on his behalf. And I
try to remember that these rescues and shelters are doing
such important work for our quality of life, not just
the pets, quality like the animals and questions quality of
life that I want to include it. And so I'm
a Mission Now partner, which is a really wonderful organization
(36:41):
that you know, kind of funds big projects for rescues
and shelters, and so that comes straight out of my
business budget every month, that goes straight to them, because
I believe in what they're doing. I believe in the
importance of the work that they're doing, and that's at
a national level, and I also believe in helping locally,
and so once my kids are older, I want them
(37:02):
to join in T and R. I think it's really
important to teach future generations about contributing to our community.
And I am passionate about pets, but there are people
who are passionate about special needs children, or the elderly,
or the disability community and whatever you're passionate about. And
in our case, we're on a pet podcast, so we
can all assume we're passionate about pets. That's where we
(37:22):
kind of give what we can. And nobody's expecting everybody
to give all their time, all their money to this,
but find a way to contribute because to me, that's
part of my vision and mission for my business and
for my life.
Speaker 3 (37:35):
And I was at a networking pet event a few
days ago and a lot of people were like, I
really want to help rescues, but my business is not
doing amazing, so I.
Speaker 5 (37:44):
Just don't have the money for it. And I said,
just donate a bit of your time.
Speaker 3 (37:49):
So if you're an expert, if you're a pet sitter
for example, or dog walker, and your business might not
be doing amazing so you don't have enough money to donate,
just donate some of your time. Just go walk some
dogs or bring the community together. Ask all of your clients, hey,
let's do a day where we all walk the dogs
at the shelter. So something to keep in mind that
you don't always have to donate money. Sometimes it's just
(38:12):
also liking on social media, sharing sharing animals for adoption,
I know, having a rescue that's very important.
Speaker 5 (38:20):
So yeah, just a little reminder.
Speaker 6 (38:22):
Write a blog. I when I when I adopted my cat,
I wrote a blog about it and I tagged the
I obviously I linked back to the rescue that I
got it from, that I got him from, I shared
on social media. I tagged them on it. And you
know how valuable that is for the shelters in like
a search engine optimization, you know, in that in that realm,
(38:45):
any link that you give them is love and it's
it grows their credibility, it grows their following. So that
doesn't cost you anything. Then maybe an hour to write
the blog. And honestly, if you don't have an hour
to write the blog, just post a picture and tag
them on social media that they maybe should reshare and
then now you're helping each other because they shared it
and now their followers see you. So it's really thinking
(39:08):
about everything symbiotically. Like everything we all Nothing occurs in
a vacuum, nobody lives on an island. We're all together.
So by using your resources and just opening up your
opening up your heart and your mind a little bit,
maybe getting a little bit uncomfortable because a lot of
people this, the thought of tagging a rescue on their
(39:29):
social media is like, why would I tag them? I'm
not cool enough or big enough to tag? Yes you
are to do it, Yes, yes you are. You are
cool enough, you are big enough to tag anybody tag
me all day long. Please link back to my website
so I can get bigger and bigger on Google. It's
everybody wants that love, so don't feel bad about.
Speaker 3 (39:49):
It talking about that, Isabelle. Where can people find you?
Can you give us your socials or your website?
Speaker 6 (39:55):
Yes, I'm covered in pet hair everywhere, in online and
in real life. I am covered in pet hair. I
have a website covered in pethair dot com, I'm on
pet Life Radio as covered in pet hair. All of
my socials are covered in pet hair. And what you'll
see a lot of is mostly clips from my show,
pictures of my cat pictures, of my kids, pictures of
(40:16):
my life that I just share. And in all of
the things that I try to share, I try to
promote rescue, I try to promote education. I try to
promote kind and gentle pet parenting, positive dog training techniques,
cat training techniques. I especialize in cats and dogs. So
if you're looking for something about exotics or birds, I'm
(40:37):
not your girl. But if you want to look at
cats and dogs all day, I have two dogs and
a cat, two kids, and you know, it's a lot,
and I'm a busy lady and I travel a lot,
so I share a lot. And the goal of sharing
is to connect with people because like really, at the
end of the day, we're all humans, all on the
same mission to help animals, right, So those are the
(40:57):
people that I'm looking to connect with online. You're one
of those people. Please find me online.
Speaker 3 (41:02):
Yeah, and everything is connected and we know Zackly you
are so thank you so much for joining us today.
Speaker 5 (41:08):
And this is a rap for this show.
Speaker 3 (41:11):
So we're so excited to be doing this for all
of you out there who are making life better for
the animals.
Speaker 5 (41:16):
You have a question you want.
Speaker 3 (41:17):
Us to answer, you just reach out to us on
Instagram or Facebook under Wistern Media and we'll try to
answer it in a future podcast episode. And as we
always say, bar cloud and per smart.
Speaker 4 (41:31):
Bye, guys, Let's
Speaker 8 (41:32):
Talk best every week on demand only on petlife Radios
dot com
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