The 4 Pillars Of Successful Pet Care
By Laura Laaman
Just like any other business, running a successful pet care facility requires you to perform effectively in four major areas. When each area is executed well, it synergistically propels a company’s success. However, when any area is lacking, it lessens the impact of the other three and your overall returns.
The four pillars that either propel or hold back a pet care business’ success are:
- Outstanding Care: pet & human.
- Client Acquisition Process: phone, tour, and forms.
- Marketing: ensure you’re getting the right quantity and quality of leads. Making the right decisions, measuring and evolving. Digital, guerilla, and cross-marketing.
- Pricing: Appropriate, proportionate and profitable.
Outstanding Care
Let’s begin with the first and most important area to your long–term success: it’s essential you and your team deliver outstanding care, both pet and human.
Most facility owners initially think they will be opening a pet care business and they will cater to the pets. True. However, they quickly discover it’s essential to also cater to humans; the pet’s parents and employees. Then business owners want a facility that practically runs itself. Providing outstanding pet care and customer service remains critical to operating a successful pet care facility.
As you grow, your operational systems and customer service will need to keep pace. It’s essential that you grow your team and culture in a fun, profitable, and sustainable way so your business can operate without you. When you do so, you’ll realize the lifestyle you always wanted or the top dollar when it’s time to sell.
If you’re weak in high quality pet and human care, here are some likely ramifications:
- You’ll have staffing challenges and struggle with customer service
- Poor reviews will follow so you won’t have a strong ROI on marketing
- Owner will get dragged into operations and lack time to work on important CEO initiatives
Client Acquisition Process
The next important pillar is the client acquisition process. Without a strong and well-run client acquisition process, your business won’t have a sufficient quantity and quality of new clients. Your marketing effort’s job is to bring you leads. Your staff who take those new client phone calls, contact applicants, and give tours are responsible for turning those inquiries into reservations.
If you don’t do a good job with client acquisition, the best marketing, pricing, and care will not get off the ground. Successful companies make sure they have a proven client acquisition process and verify it’s working daily.
How your business handles these inquiries is the difference between thriving and going out of business. Nearly all your facility’s revenue comes through the phone. Unfortunately, most businesses treat these incoming phone calls, tours and forms as a nuisance or interruption to their busy day—until they discover a single new customer call could be worth over $10,000!
It’s essential that your team handles these leads confidently and consistently, delivering concise, compelling, and competitively superior information so that prospective pet parents feel comfortable booking with you instead of your competition. Whether a new client inquiry calls you, stops in for a tour, or emails, you only get one shot to convert these precious opportunities. Make sure your team is doing it very well. If not, make the improvements to ensure they will in the future.
Marketing
Without effective marketing, you won’t get enough leads, and you’ll lose market share and occupancy that translates to profitability.
This means ensuring you’re getting the right quantity and quality of leads. How many leads is the right amount? You need enough to increase or maintain your ideal occupancy. Most businesses don’t know how many clients they lose each month and year. A great deal of client loss is likely through no fault of the company, but it’s important to confirm that. Each month, some pet care clients (the pet parents) unfortunately move, get sick, or die…the pets need to be in good health as well.
This industry has changed a great deal in recent years. Competition is at an all-time high. Making the right marketing decisions is more difficult than ever. To be effective at marketing, it’s essential pet care facilities measure and evolve. Updated digital marketing is important, but so is guerilla and cross-marketing (low-cost and proven).
Pricing
Appropriate pricing is possibly the most important yet dangerous decision pet care facility owners make. Price too low and you’ll leave money on the table—sapping your business of the resources needed to survive and thrive. Also, pricing your services too low sends a message of inferior quality or “same as” others. Price your services too high and you’ll price yourself out of existence. Most pet care facilities price inefficiently. This results in owners and managers wondering why they feel like they can never get ahead.
Along with the proper and profitable pricing, it’s essential that you inform your new and existing customers. Most importantly it’s important that you remind your clients of the wonderful value you and your team provides.
As the owner or manager of a business, take the time to objectively determine which of the four pillars need work in your business. It’s understandable and predictable that numerous areas will benefit from work (especially if you’re striving for high standards). Decide what area(s) need improvement, implement, measure and repeat.
Outstanding Pet Care assist the top pet care businesses in this industry achieve unprecedented results. If you’re interested in propelling your business, contact us for a Free Consultation at https://www.outstandingpetcare.com/contact/