Why Choose Pet Sitting Over Boarding?

There are many situations that arise in a persons life to where we are placed in positions to temporarily be unable to care for our pets. This can be due to businesses trips, vacations, demanding schedules, or other circumstances. When this happens, we must find another option for someone to care for our four-legged, scaled, or feathers family members.

There are two primary options that pet owners have which is boarding a pet, or using pet sitting services. Both provide food, walks, and shelter to the animals. So why choose pet sitting?
Pet sitting allows the pet to not be contained withing a kennel and have more interaction with both other animals and people. It is one thing to be stuck in a kennel all day and only shown attention at dinner time and scheduled walks, and another to be receiving special attention and allowed a little freedom. It is bad enough that you are already gone, so why make the experience even more traumatic?

An added bonus to a pet sitter is the overall cost is typically cheaper. Think about the original boarding price, add in the extra walks and maybe some interaction time, then do not even think about adding a bath, and you will see it is not only healthier and more beneficial to your pet but also your pocket book.

What is Pet Sitter International?

Pet Sitters International is a a group in which has set standards, training, and affiliates that provides a type of credential for pet sitting services. While, nothing is required to run a pet sitting business other than the appropriate licenses and insurance per your state's laws, this is another option to consider when looking to build that well known and successful pet sitting business.

Some of the elements that this association instills and requires of its members are:

• The sitter exhibits courtesy and professionalism in all dealings with customers, staff and industry colleagues to positively represent the pet sitter and the pet-sitting industry
• The sitter visits the client’s home before the first pet-sitting assignment to meet the pets and get detailed information about their care.
• The sitter displays a positive attitude during the initial meeting and is comfortable and competent in dealing with the animals.
• The sitter is courteous, interested and well informed.
• The sitter wants to learn as much as possible about the animals in his or her care.
• The sitter has adequate knowledge and experience in caring for pets and is clearly mindful of their safety and well being.
• The sitter takes precautions to make sure a client’s absence from home is not detectable because of any careless actions or disclosures by the sitter.
• The sitter phones to confirm, or has the client phone to confirm, that the client has returned home.
• The sitter provides a service rating form for clients.
• The sitter conducts business with honesty and integrity and observes all federal, state and local laws pertaining to business operations and animal care.
• The sitter has a veterinarian on call for emergency service.
• The sitter has a contingency plan for pet care in case of inclement weather or personal illness.
• The sitter refrains from criticizing competitors.
• The sitting service screens applicants for employment carefully.
• The sitting service provides initial and ongoing training for its sitters.

These are only a few of the many listed items that the Pet Sitter International has to help increase business, guarantee well trained and courteous pet sitters, and provide each member with a seal of approval.

If you would like to look into Pet Sitter International further, simply click here.

Pet Sitting and Breed Restrictions

When it comes to pet sitting it is crucial that you think about the breeds you are mixing together at your home or facility. There are many breeds that have been deemed "aggressive" so you need to decide if you want to place breed restrictions on dogs in which you accept.

The pros and cons of placing breed restrictions is that you will lose some business due to the restrictions since there are many pet owners that choose these breeds to become apart of their families. On the other hand, there are many pet owners that will be particular about letting there beloved pet being around these particular breeds.

Aggressive breeds typically include pit bulls, german shepards, chows, and huskies, which also includes mixed breeds of these listed. If you choose to allow these breeds, it is recommended that you allow these breeds on a case by case scenario. It is important to meet any dog in which you are considering caring for depsite the breed.

You have to remember that you when you are caring for multiple animals, depending on the environment, that interaction will be taking place. For those businesses that can provide individual runs or individual care, these concerns are already handled. However, those businesses in which will be allowing the animals to interact, need to consider the safety of all the animals, including personalities, breeds, and needs.

Doggie Daycare

There are a number of places that do overnight boarding and extended care for vacationers or frequent business travelers, but the number of daytime doggie daycare services is limited. This is a great business that has a quick turn around for service to profit ratio. The overall responsibility is often less than overnight or extended stay pet sitting business.

Most of the responsibilities of a doggie daycare will involve a possible feeding of the dogs, depending on each dogs individual schedule, walks, play time, interaction with both their temporary care givers and other dogs.

You want to make sure you screen the dogs prior to accepting them into you daycare as you will be having a variety of dogs, which you may consider putting breed restrictions or size limits in place, and it is important that conflicts are kept to a minimum. You want to make sure that if for some reason two dogs cannot seem to get along and work out there differences that you have the proper plan in place to seperate the dogs into divided locations to prevent further interaction.

Additional services are great to offer at doggie daycare as people just simply do not have time to get to the basic tasks of nail clippings, baths, or grooming, so any of these that you can offer will definitely prove to be an incentive for your clients but also make your business more appealing.

It is quickly seen that doggie daycare can be a profitable business but does require patience, experience, good facilities, and staff. Know your limitations in regards to number of animals at one time and be able to ensure that the specific needs of each animal you are sitting that day can be meet.

If you can do these few tasks, offer good accommodations, and build regular client relationships, then it is highly likely that your doggie day care will prove to be successful.

How To Keep Your Pet Sitting Service Highly Rated

While there are many pet sitting services available in every city, you want to be the one that people come looking for. There are a view primary items that people look at when it comes to deciding which pet sitting service is right for them.

So what is it that clients look for in a quality pet sitting service?
1. References (previous client's testimonies are great here)
2. Proper housing and activity facilities
3. Business license and insurance are held by the company
4. The needs of their animal can be met.
5. No overcrowding of animals.
6. Safe environment.
7. Proper medical care plan is in place.
8. Proper ratio of pets to caregivers.

These are a few elements that are vital to a client choosing your pet sitting service. If their pet cannot be properly cared for, and shown as much love as if it were the workers own pet, then it is very unlikely they will choose you over the other pet sitting services.

It is almost guaranteed that there will be a visit from the pet owner to see the facilities, ask questions, and meet a few of the current animals that you are caring for. This inspection will say more than anything you can tell a potential customer or promote in any advertisement. You get one shot to make a good impression, so make sure you ALWAYS have your pet sitting business running in proper order.

Pet Sitting: Starting Up Your Own Business

When it comes to starting a business there is a little leg work that needs to be done before you can get that business up and running. The primary question you have to answer in the pet sitting industry is what types of pets are you looking to tend to. There are of course the usual cats and dogs, but are you interested in reptiles, birds, or larger animals. When making this decision you need to look at what type of accommodations you can offer these animals, such as yard size, amount of animals that can be tended to at one time, and amount of help you intend to have.

There are also two common types of pet sitting. One is where the pet is taken care of at your home or business location. The second is where you the pet sitter go to the pet owners home and tend to the animals. If you opt to take care of the animals at your place of business it is always good to consider additional services to your clients such as baths, nail clippings, and cage cleanings to name a few.

Now that you have decided what type of pets you are going to sit, determined some of the services you wish to offer ( which are always expandable), and the limits of your business, you want to make sure you get a business license. This is crucial as the penalties could be very large for not having a business license.

You got the license and made all the basic decisions that you need to get off the ground and accepting clients. The next step is marketing your business. Some cheap and easy ways are internet social networking, word of mouth, and flyers can often be placed at local vet offices and pet stores.

These quick and easy steps will open the doors to your business. It can be a hard job starting a new pet sitting business but this will at the very least get you pointed in the right direction.

How to Maintain a Successful Pet Sitting Service

While economic times are hard, the income being delved out on precious pets is still staying fairly constant. Those in the pet sitting business should still be able to hold strong as long as they take into account a few simple ideas and make a few adjustments.

1. Expand Your Services
Many of the pet sitters are often looking for long term boarding while owners are on vacation or off on work trips. This is less of a need for pet owners as the current economy is limiting travel of all kinds. This is where the idea of doing day to day sitting or even offering single or multiple overnight services could prove to be beneficial to your business.

2. Do Not Let Your Quality of Services Suffer
One of the first things that typically goes in regards to a stressed business is the idea of quantity over quality. It is important that you maintain your image as a quality pet sitting service. Word of mouth can offer a great way of giving you free marketing or it can be an even faster way to kill the business.

3. Consider New Marketing Ideas
With the world becoming a vast network of social networking sites, you should take advantage of the free marketing that can be achieved. It takes little to no time to set up and Myspace page and even less time for Facebook. These are great ways to get your name out there and build a new client list. Other methods are creating web pages, if you do not already have one, and making your business readily accessible to the public via internet. This is crucial as the phonebook is no longer how people find services but a simple internet search will give them the fast results they are looking for in locating local services.

These are only three things that can help keep your business afloat or make it into a more successful business. They are simple ideas that are easy to put into motion. Pet sitting can be as profitable or as painful as you make it.