pet store
marketing Strategy
At Pet Engine Marketing, our pet store marketing strategies come from years of combined experience spanning the gap between two industries: the pet industry and the digital marketing industry.
Our pet store marketing strategy focuses on two key elements: the first element is maximizing the in-store experience for local pet parents, and the second key component is creating and maintaining an active, branded, customer-centric digital presence. Ready to see what life is like for our partners? Contact us to set up an audit and get some initial ideas from a pet store marketing agency at no cost!
MAXIMIZING THE IN-STORE EXPERIENCE
When we say that we want to “maximize the in-store experience,” we mean that everything that happens inside the store is customer-centric, brand-centric, and community-centric. These aims are met, primarily, through three means that we help with at Pet Engine marketing:
Your pet store should routinely host fun, attractive, memorable community-based events with or without the partnership of local allies and organizations.
Every customer that comes into your pet store should receive the top-notch, best of the best, “I love going in there” customer service from staff and employees.
Your pet store should utilize available purchasing convenience tools and processes to provide wider, more attractive options to both current and new customers.
A VIBRANT, ENGAGED, EXPERT DIGITAL PRESENCE
Growing a digital brand that customers want to hear from takes a lot of focus, hard work, creativity, and personality. But growth on these platforms can be gamified, and building a following on these platforms and seeing growth online comes from executing on planned strategies and tracking the data from them. At Pet Engine Marketing, we utilize several areas of digital marketing activities to achieve our pet store marketing goals as part of our Full-Service Pet Store Marketing Partnership:
Pet Store Social Media: your pet store social media needs to be active and engaged on several platforms, including Google, Facebook, Instagram, or others (depends on the market and the store).
Pet Store SEO & SEM: your pet store still gets most of its revenue from in-store traffic, so we need to make sure that you’re beating your local competition. Local pet parents need to find you on search engines like Google and decide that you’re the local independent pet store they want to shop at for their pets.
Pet Store Websites: your pet store website needs to be up to scratch to provide better convenience options online, earn the trust of new customers, and maintain credibility as a modern pet store.
Pet Store Email Marketing: your pet store email marketing campaigns help enhance customer loyalty and drive revenue. These pet store email marketing items can come in various styles and for different types of people: newsletter, birthday card, sales emails, new products just for cat owners, etc.
Pet Store Event Marketing: the modern pet store should have several big events every year and strive to become an ingrained place in their local community if they aren’t already. These events are designed to bring customers in to the store for reasons other than retail, because the modern pet parent can buy anything online,
Pet Store eCommerce: let the effective, cheap tools of today’s digital marketing world work to make sales for your pet store. With our pet store eCommerce strategies, your pet store website can sell while you sleep and your pet store social media will work to drive sales.
When your pet store marketing strategy combines the high-quality in-store experience with a professional, positive, and pet-focused digital presence, your pet store sees growth. The lifeblood of any business is revenue, and you need to drive revenue with both old, existing customers and new, entering customers.
This partnership between in-store experience and digital marketing enhances your customer’s loyalty with your pet store and converts new pet parents into friends and buyers, increasing sales, revenue, and relationships for your local independent pet store.
On this page, our Pet Engine Marketing team will dig into how and why each of these aspects plays into the greater whole: a comprehensive pet store marketing strategy that drives profits, prosperity, and positivity.
We share this information with pet store owners freely, and you might ask “why are they giving away all of their trade secrets?” The answer is that we understand pet store owners, we understand pet stores, we have worked in them, we have run our own businesses, and we understand what it takes to do these tasks successfully. Read our story, and meet our team. The truth is, it takes several people to do all of those things, and it’s far too much to handle for one pet store owner. A comprehensive, successful pet store marketing strategy is a full-time job that should be undertaken by a professional pet store marketing agency or team, like Pet Engine Marketing. We are a People-as-a-Service (PaaS) agency and we are ready to be your pet store marketing partner!
As a pet store owner, you are already wearing every business hat imaginable: salesman, marketer, accountant, leader, customer service representative, human resources, trainer, recruiter, and so on. At Pet Engine Marketing, we manage all of the various tasks within pet store marketing so pet store owners don’t have to worry about it: pet store websites, pet store social media, pet store email marketing, pet store SEO, pet store event marketing, pet store eCommerce - you name it, and we can help you handle it.
LEAVE THE MARKETING AND GROWTH TO US,
SO YOU CAN FOCUS ON OTHER AREAS OF YOUR PET STORE THAT NEED YOU MORE.
Keep reading if you want to learn more about how we do it: how we get pet stores to grow. If you’re feeling ready to speak with a Pet Engine Marketing team member for a free 30-minute consultation and marketing audit, contact us today.
Everything starts with a meeting with one of the Pet Engine Marketing experts to perform a marketing audit on your current strategies, tools, tactics, and goals. From there, our representative can help set you in motion after designing your pet store’s unique pet store marketing roadmap. Regardless of whether we enter into a partnership or not, the Pet Store Marketing Roadmap that we create for you is yours to keep to help you if you wish to undergo the journey to growing your pet store without a professional pet store marketing agency at your side!
PET STORE
SOCIAL MEDIA
Do you have a professional managing your social media presence?
Social media is a key piece to our pet store marketing strategy, as it provides a primary avenue to attract and maintain your local customer base. When we manage a pet store social media platform, our goals go beyond simply posting content; we take the time to plan an effective strategy that engages new local audience members, brings in positive reviews, and informs of events and promotions, all while upholding your brand’s values.
We work to mold and morph our own skill sets so that when we take the management of your pet store social media posting and social media customer service (inbox management) off of your plate, your customers never even notice that it’s somebody else operating it. It really is that easy, that seamless, that pain-free.
WE GET THESE QUESTIONS FROM PET STORE OWNERS ALL THE TIME:
How do I know it’s working?
What about the return on investment (ROI)?
How can you learn what my pet store should sound and be like online?
How does it work if you’re not here?
We’ll know it’s working because we track everything we do on your own personal pet store social media reporting dashboard. You’ll know how many people you reached, how many conversations were started, how many posts were put out, what the most engaging posts were, how many new people reached and liked your pages, and beyond. Data tracking and analysis is a key component to any pet store social media campaign and any pet store marketing strategy in general.
You’ll understand your ROI when you begin to see how these different marketing levers and efforts affect the bottom line - and we track that too! And how do we make sure we sound like you? Because we dig deep with a brand analysis and consumer profile that lets us know who we’re talking to, what we want to sound like, what your pet store is like, and beyond. It’s a learning process and we continue to improve as the partnership goes forward, but it’s enough to get us going!
And last but not least, we are focused on partnership. That means that even if we aren’t at your store physically, we are available night and day when you need us. We build relationships with staff and employees at your pet store to help bring in content, execute on campaigns, improve through feedback, and so on.
For those of you that still want to do it yourselves, we encourage it! Check out the Insider zone of our website, where you’ll be able to search for and learn from dozens of free resources for pet store owners to improve their pet store marketing strategy. If you’re specifically interested in our pet store social media resources, you can navigate directly to our Insider resources for pet store social media. Finally, we absolutely encourage you to join our growing online free community of pet business owners that want to improve their marketing - it’s a Facebook group, so you know the deal!
Want to keep learning about pet store social media and how we do it here? Check out the Pet Store Social Media Hub.
PET STORE
SEO
How are local pet parents finding your pet store?
When is the last time you checked where your pet store ranked on popular search engines like Google and Bing for search terms like “local pet store” or “pet supplies near me?” Are you happy with the results? If you were a pet parent that lived within 5 or 10 miles of your pet store, would they find you if they searched for you on the Internet?
If your pet store isn’t on the first page, then you immediately just lost 33% of your potential customers. Yes, you read that right! If your pet store SEO is poor, then chances are high that pet parents and people that would buy from you would never know you exist. So the goal for a pet store search engine optimization strategy is to get your pet store within the top ranks of the first page for your local audience.
WANT TO GET YOUR PET STORE TO THE FIRST PAGE ON GOOGLE?
At Pet Engine Marketing, that’s our goal. Local pet store SEO is a key driver of new revenue and business into your pet store. There are several pet store SEO tactics that your marketing team should be engaged in:
Long-form content creation on a regular basis that is relevant for your audience and full of local search keywords (check out our free resource: 5 SEO tips for Pet Stores)
Ensuring that your pet store website is mobile-optimized and runs smoothly. This means the load time is fast, there are few or no broken links, the screen size is responsive, and the site is, in general, healthy
Reputation and review management on Google plays an important role in improving your pet store SEO rankings for certain search terms, as well as increasing your credibility in the eyes of consumers
An active and up-to-date Google My Business listing (a bit of overlap here with pet store social media strategy)
As a full-service professional pet store marketing agency, our pet store SEO team handles all of this for pet store owners. Our tactics drive your pet store to the top of the front page of Google, where pet parents that want your products and services can find you.
The results are clear to see with several key performance indicators (KPIs) that we measure, track, and analyze with our software to keep pet store owners informed on what’s happening with their pet store marketing strategy.
If you’re interested in more ways to improve your pet store SEO on your own, we invite you to browse our Insider area. We have a specific section designated for free resources for pet store owners on pet store SEO, where you’ll be able to search for and learn from dozens of free resources for pet store owners to improve their pet store marketing strategy. Feel free to take advantage of all dozens of free content articles there that have helped propel Pet Engine Marketing to the number 1 rank on Google for “Pet Store SEO.”
Take our pet store marketing quiz to get an easy, 2-minute assessment with actionable results on how your pet store marketing strategies (including pet store SEO) are performing.
Looking for more information on pet store SEO? Take a deeper look at our Pet Store SEO Hub.
PET STORE
WEBSITES
Does your pet store have a modern website?
Your pet store website is one of the most important online assets that a modern pet store can have. It is capable of much more than just being an online extension and expression of your pet store and brand. Your website can sell products while you sleep, convert visitors to subscribers, encourage people to call you or reach out to you for questions, help pet parents find you online, and beyond.
Having a professional, up-to-date pet store website is often step one on the Pet Store Marketing Roadmap because it ensures that any pet store marketing strategy has a strong foundation. We don’t want to drive pet parents to a website that turns them away, is not user-friendly, is antiquated, has the wrong information, or doesn’t look good or optimize for mobile devices. You also absolutely don’t want a website that won’t work for you from a pet store SEO standpoint (search engine optimization).
WHEN WE BUILD A PET STORE WEBSITE, WE HAVE SEVERAL GOALS IN MIND:
Your pet store has a website that is user friendly
It is easy to find the desirable and necessary information on your pet store’s website
Your pet store website is informative and has reliable, up-to-date business information
The website contains most or all of our “must-have pages for pet store websites”
Your pet store website should be optimized for search engines to increase pet store SEO rankings
The site is integrated with tracking tools to allow easy data collection and analysis to validate your pet store’s growth goals
The pet store website uses language, imagery, logos, and messaging that mirrors your pet store’s brand and creates trust, community, and credibility
Your pet store website pushes visitors to convert
The pet store website is integrated with other marketing platforms and tools that the pet store uses (pet store social media, pet store email marketing, or pet store eCommerce)
In the Insider portion of this website, you can find all sorts of free resources available for pet store owners and others interested in marketing and promoting their pet business. All of our Insider pet store marketing resources are divided into categories for easy navigation and learning opportunities. Check out our free Insider resources for pet store websites to learn more specifically about improving yours!
Want more ways to improve your pet store website? Check out the Pet Store Websites Hub.
PET STORE
EMAIL MARKETING
How do your customers know what’s happening in your pet store?
In our years of experience working in pet stores and with pet store customers, we have unearthed a core truth that we have built our business on: pet store customers feel loyalty to their pet store. They claim your pet store as theirs. The community-oriented and community-driven pet stores that go out of their way to help their customers with events, resources, advice, referrals, and supplies create strong loyalty in these customers.
But even with that loyalty, we know pet stores aren’t profitable if they’re just selling dog food. And if customers don’t know about what’s available in your store, how will they buy anything other than the necessities?
SELL MORE PRODUCTS THROUGH DIVERSE MESSAGING
The modern customer has a shorter attention span than any consumer ever, and this applies to pet parents as well. In order to compete with local and online competition, big or small, your pet store must engage your customers regularly through a variety of means (see: pet store social media, pet store website, pet store SEO, etc). Pet store email marketing is one of the most effective ways to convert good customers into great customers.
At Pet Engine Marketing, we use our pet store email marketing campaigns to inform local pet parents of sales and promotions, events, build brand loyalty, and, in general, bring customers into the store for reasons other than retail or necessity.
We understand that the lifetime value of a loyal customer is incredibly beneficial and profitable to a pet store. The cost of finding new customers can be expensive, but nurturing customers that already shop with you and have opted into your email marketing campaigns are a tremendous source of untapped ROI for many pet stores.
There are a lot of ways to improve your pet store email marketing strategies and campaigns! We’ve written and spoken about them a lot, and you can find a lot of those free resources for pet store owners in our Insider section. We even have a page that is designated solely for pet store email marketing resources, tips, tools, and advice. To see everything that we take on and manage for store owners from a pet store marketing perspective, check out our full services list.
Ready to get your pet store email marketing campaigns up and running? Check out the Pet Store Email Marketing Hub to learn more.
PET STORE
EVENT MARKETING
How do you get your customers in the store more frequently?
One of the biggest threats facing the retail landscape over the past 10 years has been online retail, or eCommerce. Online retailers have already sent thousands of businesses to their graveyards because they couldn’t adapt to the demands of the modern consumer.
But that doesn’t have to happen to pet stores. Pet stores have a unique loyalty with their customers, created primarily by the experience of bringing a pet into the store. It’s a shared, special, exciting, funny, positive experience shared between pet parents, pets, and pet store staff. These moments create connections and build that loyalty that consumers don’t have to other retailers.
BENEFITTING FROM WHAT DRIVES YOUR STORE: PETS
Let’s face it: pets are the best thing that happens to your store on a daily and weekly basis. They put smiles on faces, sell more products, create conversations, and they allow customers to feel truly welcome at their pet store. The best way to bring customers into your store more frequently for reasons beyond retail (because they can get anything online) is to provide them with experiences and memories that they can share and cherish with their pets forever.
Many pet stores host one or two events per year. What if your pet store event marketing strategy consisted of 12 well-promoted, well-managed, and well-planned events per year that resulted in a 5% increase in revenue every month? What would that do to your bottom line, to the attitude of your staff, to the culture of your store, and to the community aspect surrounding your business?
The answer? A lot. It would do a lot. There are dozens of creative events that can be planned and promoted to perfection with our pet store marketing strategies from Pet Engine Marketing. They don’t have to be expensive or massive commitments, either! Sometimes the small, simple pet store events are the most effective.
Want some inspiration and ideas to get your creative juices flowing? Well, we have just the place for you to check out: our Insider zone has a specific area for holiday marketing resources for pet store owners, and we highly recommend you check out one of our most popular pieces: Pet Store Events that Drive Sales.
Want more proof? Take a look at some of the testimonials or case studies that have resulted from our work with local, independent pet retailers.
Want to know more about pet store events? Find the best ones that drive sales on our Pet Store Event Marketing Hub.
PET STORE
ECOMMERCE MARKETING
How do you attract the modern, younger, convenience-driven consumer?
Let’s be realistic here: you probably can’t compete with Am*zon or Ch*wy. But, you can capitalize on the community you’ve already built! With modern pet store eCommerce platforms, workarounds, and processes, our team here at Pet Engine Marketing help you sell pet products to customers without having to ever see them!
Yes, this is a realistic possibility even for small, local, independent mom & pop pet retailers. Our pet store eCommerce marketing strategies are designed to reward and retain your loyal customers through a variety of tactics such as pet store social media, and pet store email marketing.
SELL PET PRODUCTS ONLINE WITHOUT ANY EFFORT
There are several ways that pet stores can offer more convenient purchasing paths and improve the customer journey by making it faster or simpler. These are easy ways to appeal to (typically) younger audiences. And you can’t discount younger audiences, because within that audience there are segments that want to shop locally and also want things easy and convenient.
So, how does our pet store marketing agency help your pet store eCommerce strategy thrive? First, we set it up! Second, we help you manage it. Third, you profit from improving customer loyalty, providing alternative convenience options to other shoppers, and increase the efficiency and effectiveness of your business.
Want to learn more about some of our pet store eCommerce strategies? We make all of our free resources available and easy-to-find in our Insider area. We highly encourage pet store owners to utilize the free resources out there (especially the Freesources!) to make the most of their pet store marketing strategy. With all of the options available to build some form of online retail option, there’s no reason not to modernize your pet store to attract new customers.
If you’ve made it all the way down here, we commend you on your diligence and commitment to learning! We hope that your experience on our website is, above all, valuable. Please subscribe to our newsletter and join our community, take advantage of our free resources, grow your pet store, and get to know the team behind the success of our clients.
Want to sell your products in your sleep? Get more information on our Pet Store eCommerce Hub.
Enough is enough. We’ve laid bare all of our pet store marketing strategies. There’s no more need to talk. Now is the time to take action. If you’re a pet store owner and you want to grow, what are you waiting for? Working with Pet Engine Marketing is the best way to fast-track your pet biz. See you at the top!