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Unlocking Success: Marketing Strategies for Pet Groomers in 2025
Episode • Bonus Episode • 3rd January 2025 • Dog Grooming Business Help & Support • Bill Betts
00:00:00 00:32:42

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Bill Betts dives deep into the essential strategies for marketing your pet grooming business, especially as we approach 2025 and seek to expand our client base. He emphasizes the importance of distinguishing between customers and clients, advocating for building lasting relationships that go beyond mere transactions. Throughout the episode, Bill highlights the necessity of effective branding and understanding your target audience, urging business owners to identify who they truly want to work with. He also discusses the significance of diversifying marketing efforts across various platforms to create multiple touchpoints with potential clients. With practical tips and insights, this episode is a must-listen for anyone looking to enhance their marketing approach and thrive in a competitive industry.

Takeaways:

  • Understanding your ideal clients is crucial for effective marketing in a crowded pet grooming market.
  • Branding encompasses more than just your logo; it's about your business's voice and message.
  • Build trust with clients through consistent engagement, focusing on the know, like, and trust factor.
  • Utilize multiple touchpoints like social media, email, and in-person interactions to attract new customers.
  • Regularly nurture existing clients with engaging content to maintain their loyalty and encourage repeat bookings.
  • Creating valuable content is essential; aim for seven hours of content across multiple platforms.

As always, I'd like to thank the podcast sponsor Lopay, the low-cost payment platform that helps you keep more of the money you earn! You can find out more and sign up for Lopay here: https://merchant.lopay.app/ref/PETPASSION2500, where listeners of this podcast get £2500 of fee-FREE transactions!

And of course, if you feel like you could benefit from Bill's business programs for the Pet Grooming industry, visit our website: https://petpassiontoprofit.com/

Transcripts

Bill Betts:

Welcome to the Pet Grooming Business Podcast with me, Bill Betts, where we give practical business advice to help you grow your pet grooming business.

Bill Betts:

This podcast is sponsored by Low Pay, the low rate payment app that gives you more.

Bill Betts:

So without further ado, let's get going.

Speaker B:

Wow.

Speaker B:

Welcome.

Speaker B:

I get a lot of questions around marketing our businesses, so I thought I'd come and do a little chat about it and you can catch up with this in your own time.

Speaker B:

But yeah, lots of people messaging DMing put in comments within the, within the Facebook group and I'm sure it's the same across a lot of the Facebook groups.

Speaker B:

The it's all around how do we get our message out there, how do we connect with customers, how do we get new customers in, but also how do we, how do we re engage or keep engagement with our existing customers as well?

Speaker B:

So, you know, it's a busy time being a pet groomer, a business owner.

Speaker B:

Not only have you got the pets to service every day, but nurturing your business and making sure that you've got the pets in each day is quite difficult.

Speaker B:

So I thought I'd give a little talker all around marketing because let's face it, we are currently in a very crowded market, aren't we?

Speaker B:

Probably in the uk you see it a lot with pet groomers saying how many other businesses are around us and I should think probably in America and other countries, it's probably just as saturated in certain places, certain cities.

Speaker B:

So we've got to try really hard to differentiate ourselves from, from the others because we want people to obviously use our services that enjoy using our services and that want to use our services.

Speaker B:

And we don't want to make it just about the price or the haircut.

Speaker B:

We want to build nice clients that we want to work with.

Speaker B:

And I often remember a book I read by Daniel Priestley called Oversubscribed.

Speaker B:

And it's about turning your customers into clients.

Speaker B:

And clients are the ones that are, you know, you get them from a puppy all the way through to the end of their end of their life sort of thing.

Speaker B:

They're the clients that stick with you.

Speaker B:

They're your biggest fans, they recommend you, they, they like your post, they comment on your post, they, they follow your, your professional guidance that you give them around how often they should be coming in for appointments.

Speaker B:

They ask you advice, you know, the other people that you really want to work with.

Speaker B:

Riz the book sort of describes customers as the people that may use your service once and then go elsewhere and then maybe come back when there's space or, or you just, or you just don't see them again.

Speaker B:

We, we all have those sort of customers, don't we, that we do our pet groom with them and then they just disappear off the face of the earth and you never hear from them again.

Speaker B:

So whatever we do within our business, we want to try and look for the client and try and find the client.

Speaker B:

They'll.

Speaker B:

There's quite a lot of work to do around this when you're, when you're a business owner.

Speaker B:

First of all, we need to be looking at and understanding who is our client.

Speaker B:

You know, who do we actually want to work with?

Speaker B:

Have you got an idea?

Speaker B:

And a mentor of mine put it in, quite, put this in quite a nice way, I thought.

Speaker B:

And he sort of said, take your, your favorite client, the person that you really love to work with.

Speaker B:

You enjoy seeing the owner.

Speaker B:

So when you see them in the diary, you think, oh, that's nice.

Speaker B:

So and so is coming in today, I'll get to have a nice chat with them.

Speaker B:

Say who you might have a client that you'd just be like, if you bumped into them the street, you'd be like, oh, should we go for coffee?

Speaker B:

And, and you're happy to spend like half an hour to an hour with them chatting away sort of thing.

Speaker B:

So think about that client and visualize that client and just sort of think, why do you like them as a person?

Speaker B:

Think about, maybe you, you want to write some notes down.

Speaker B:

Why, why do you like that particular person as a person?

Speaker B:

Not because of like they're coming to your business, but why do you like them, how do you connect with them?

Speaker B:

As I suppose is what I'm looking at, how do you connect them or a person to person level?

Speaker B:

And then write down and think about why do you like them as a client?

Speaker B:

So they're, they're two actual different things.

Speaker B:

Why do you like them as a person?

Speaker B:

And then why do you like them as a client?

Speaker B:

And I, I went over a few things there, didn't I, about why you might like them as a client.

Speaker B:

They understand us, they, they take our opinions and our professional information on board.

Speaker B:

You know, they book in regularly.

Speaker B:

They, they see us as the professional, they see us as the expert, and they take that and take that forward.

Speaker B:

So that's why we'd like them as a client, but also why they like them as a person.

Speaker B:

And if you think about why you like them as a person, you know, what's their sort of demographic, where do they hang out, what do they like what do they don't like, you know, would you find them on Facebook or maybe are they a professional you find on LinkedIn?

Speaker B:

You know, do they read, they read magazines, all this sort of thing.

Speaker B:

And this whole picture starts to form how you're going to market your business because you want to be thinking about where you're going to be engaging with them out there in the busy world.

Speaker B:

So that's the first thing is sort of identifying who.

Speaker B:

And in, in business speech, that's identifying your target customer, isn't it?

Speaker B:

But that's quite a good way of looking at, at your target customer and who you want to work with.

Speaker B:

So have a look, have a thing like if you're a well established business, just have a think about these people that you have and why you like them and why you like seeing their pets and why you enjoy them coming to your business to think about them.

Speaker B:

Next thing around marketing and standing out.

Speaker B:

We've got to really look at our branding, haven't we?

Speaker B:

Now, branding is a massive topic.

Speaker B:

Again, the branding links in with your ideal customer, like who you want to attract and the demographic that you want to attract.

Speaker B:

So it's a, it's a really big topic.

Speaker B:

And I'm, I'm certainly not a branding expert, but some people might say, well, branding your logo, isn't it?

Speaker B:

And it's like, no, Brian, your logo, believe it or not, like your logo is a very small part of your branding.

Speaker B:

Your branding is about your.

Speaker B:

I don't know if you understand or if you thought of this before, but everyone's business has a voice of its own.

Speaker B:

So branding is about that message, the voice, the tone that you use with your, on your social media, the voice that your business has when you're writing posts, writing blogs, writing your website.

Speaker B:

Your business has a tone about it and you've got to develop that tone and also match it to the people that you are trying to communicate with so that again, you're getting out to your target customer.

Speaker B:

Branding is about your colors that you use within your business.

Speaker B:

You know, who do they appeal to?

Speaker B:

What do those colors mean to your customers?

Speaker B:

You know, gold colors might mean rich and vibrant, green might mean trusting.

Speaker B:

You know, you can look this stuff up on the Internet or obviously go to a branding expert to talk about this.

Speaker B:

But your colors, your type, the fonts that you use on your, on your content, the fonts that you use on your Facebook posts and your Canva posts and stuff like that, how it flows.

Speaker B:

I really struggle as a, as a consumer, I really struggle Reading italics.

Speaker B:

And also, I wonder whether we should be sort of thinking about people with dyslexia.

Speaker B:

Sometimes they really struggle with reading particular colors.

Speaker B:

So do we put out.

Speaker B:

Do we consider that when we're putting out our posts and putting out our colors and our fonts and stuff like that.

Speaker B:

So branding really encompasses your, your business.

Speaker B:

And when we get that branding message right, it can give us as business owners real, real confidence in, in what we're doing.

Speaker B:

And it could also.

Speaker B:

That confidence obviously goes out to our customers as well.

Speaker B:

And for those that are starting out in business, that are just starting out and, or looking to start very soon, branding is, like, so important to look at.

Speaker B:

Because if you get your branding right and you only have to sort of look at the talk I did with Helen, um, the other day, the Facebook Live I did with Helen the other day, who would love to pause.

Speaker B:

When you get your branding right, you can really elevate the confidence that your customers have in your business.

Speaker B:

And you can also go out to the market and make yourself look as though you've got years in the market rather than a few months, if that makes sense.

Speaker B:

Which, again, helps you with your confidence as well.

Speaker B:

So branding's not something, you know, when we're doing our checklist, when we're opening up our business and we're like, right, we've got the Facebook page, got the Instagram, Instagram page, sort out my Google, my business, you know, got a logo.

Speaker B:

It's just like, we have this, like, little tick box and logos on there, but our pen should really hover along that tick box and go, it's not just a logo.

Speaker B:

We need to go out there and we need to look at our colors, our logo, our typeface, our fonts, the voice that we're giving our business, you know, and then match that with the people that we want to.

Speaker B:

We want to connect with.

Speaker B:

So, you know, I'm very fortunate to work with a branding expert, Lauren from Untangle Creative.

Speaker B:

And I've seen her work and I've seen her.

Speaker B:

I've seen her method of work.

Speaker B:

And it might be that you.

Speaker B:

You contact someone for a logo and they just say, what do you like?

Speaker B:

I'll send you four or five drafts, like, of what you like, and that's fine.

Speaker B:

You know, there obviously are budget considerations here as well, but when you contact someone, a graphic designer, a branding expert, you know, if you contacted someone like Lauren, she's taking you on a journey, and that is a very long journey.

Speaker B:

You know, she's really diving into what you like the brands that you like, your ideal customer, you know, the feel that you want for your business.

Speaker B:

So it's not a very quick process to sort out your brand.

Speaker B:

It is a real intricate detail and there's a real journey that you get taken on and this is really important.

Speaker B:

And you might think, well, that could be quite costly and is an investment, I'm not going to lie.

Speaker B:

But when you think about it, how long do you want your business to last for?

Speaker B:

How long do you want your business to open for?

Speaker B:

If you imagine your business is going to be open for 15, 20 years, that brand, that brand is probably going to be with you for a very, very long time.

Speaker B:

So it's a well worth worthy investment to make in your business.

Bill Betts:

So this podcast is sponsored by Low Pay.

Bill Betts:

Low Pay is half the price of sum up and Zettle.

Bill Betts:

So you keep more of the money that you earn.

Bill Betts:

Rates start at 0.79%.

Speaker B:

Going back to the original question about marketing, you can see when people say to me, you know, have you got any marketing ideas?

Speaker B:

How can I, what can I do to improve my marketing?

Speaker B:

Or how can I get more customers in?

Speaker B:

There is just no simple, straightforward answer.

Speaker B:

Because you can see already I've just done probably like 10 minutes.

Speaker B:

I've not even mentioned the Facebook post or an advert.

Speaker B:

You know, I've not even touched on what we should look at when it comes to marketing our services.

Speaker B:

This is building the foundations of your business.

Speaker B:

And for some people, and I've certainly had customers, so I've certainly had clients come and join me who have been 10 years in the business, they've been grooming for 10 years and they've invested in that branding.

Speaker B:

They've gone back, they've gone back and started again and rebuilt their foundations and gone out there, rebranded and made themselves feel so much more confident and, you know, getting new customers in and helping them with their, with their prices and their price increases.

Speaker B:

So branding actually like covers marketing but also feeds into, into prices.

Speaker B:

But we're not going to talk about prices too much here.

Speaker B:

So as you can see there, when, when people say, you know, I need help with, with getting out there and getting more customers, it's a, it's a big journey is, you know, you've got to start our basics, we've got to start at our foundation level.

Speaker B:

Now that does take some time.

Speaker B:

So what I'll also talk about is, you know, some bit later in this, like some of the things that we need to be looking at when we're, when we're trying to attract customers and bring customers to our business.

Speaker B:

But I just wanted to touch on that because I think that's really a really important foundation level to your business is looking at that, that branding side of things, because we are, we are working in a very crowded market.

Speaker B:

And my personal opinion, you know, Covid, coming out of COVID was a boom, boom time for the pet industry.

Speaker B:

You know, there was a.

Speaker B:

There was a large amount of people that went out and got puppies and went out and got dogs to enjoy the time they had at home.

Speaker B:

There was a lot of money left in people's pockets because they weren't commuting, etc, and, you know, there was a big boom in, in pet ownership and pet groomers.

Speaker B:

You know, we, we did really well.

Speaker B:

Coming out of COVID I think you could potentially trip over business.

Speaker B:

It was very easy to get business.

Speaker B:

But as you, as our, you know, four years later, coming into five years later, the.

Speaker B:

I try really hard not to watch the news, but I do and things look a bit rubbish at the moment.

Speaker B:

And I think if you're looking at Facebook groups around the grooming industry, September, October, November, they've been hard months.

Speaker B:

You having to start to fight for, for, well, to.

Speaker B:

Sometimes some people are having to fight to get their existing customers to come in more often and some people are having to fight hard to get a customer or to get the phone to ring and stuff like that.

Speaker B:

So we are operating in a crowded market, but also there's other factors at play.

Speaker B:

We might be, and I'm no economist, but we might be in the downward sort of cycle of our country's economy.

Speaker B:

We're based in the UK and we know that our economy in the UK is cyclical and there's been a lot of things that are going on which might cause it to start going, going down.

Speaker B:

We know it will come back up again.

Speaker B:

That's the way our economy works.

Speaker B:

But when things start to get tough and the market starts to get crowded, this is where we need to start looking at getting that slight edge amongst the, among the noise.

Speaker B:

So we need to be looking at how we're going to stand out as a business.

Speaker B:

How are we going to stand out within that crowded market?

Speaker B:

Now, I have a mentor, Robin Waite, and I always had these, these words in my, in my head, you know, he's not a great fan of Facebook at times and he's like, are we going out all the time saying, buy our shit, buy our shit, buy our shit.

Speaker B:

You know, when you're going out and putting your stuff out there, your Facebook posts, is it just like, me, me, me, bye, bye, bye.

Speaker B:

Please, please, like book your dog in, put your dog in.

Speaker B:

Here's a dog, Here's a dog.

Speaker B:

Put your dog in.

Speaker B:

Put your dog in.

Speaker B:

Put your dog in.

Speaker B:

You know, how repetitive.

Speaker B:

And I, I hands up.

Speaker B:

You know, we all do it.

Speaker B:

I certainly do it.

Speaker B:

It's easy, isn't it?

Speaker B:

You know, here's a picture of a dog.

Speaker B:

Put your dog in.

Speaker B:

Here's a picture of dog's teeth.

Speaker B:

Get your dog's teeth cleaned.

Speaker B:

Here's a picture of a cat, put your cat.

Speaker B:

And you know, when we send out the same repetitive message all the time, which, first of all, you know, we're probably not even helping the Facebook algorithms and we're probably not getting our posts seen by our followers on our page.

Speaker B:

A good example of this, I think was on Sunday when we put a post out on our pet grooming page saying appointments available.

Speaker B:

It was a canva created post and they had appointments available.

Speaker B:

So it was a nice picture, listed the appointments that were available.

Speaker B:

It was a cancellation on Tuesday.

Speaker B:

And when I look at the insights on that, it's like 200 people.

Speaker B:

And that's probably all like pet groomers, probably that follow the page that saw it.

Speaker B:

And then in the afternoon we went out for a team lunch and we took a team photo and I posted that onto the Facebook page saying, you know, Christmas is busy, we've gone out for our Christmas lunch early.

Speaker B:

Wasn't it nice?

Speaker B:

Etc.

Speaker B:

And when I got home and did that, probably an hour or so later, There was like 2,000 people impressions.

Speaker B:

You know, 2,000 people had seen it.

Speaker B:

So, you know, that's really frustrating because I want everyone to see the appointments available post, not so much the, the team photo post because we had appointments available this week to fill.

Speaker B:

So, you know, it's really interesting when we start looking at the algorithms and, and this is really important when we're starting to looking at our, our marketing.

Speaker B:

So, you know, are we constantly putting the same stuff out?

Speaker B:

Are we constantly asking for sales think, start thinking about marketing for signals rather than sales.

Speaker B:

So, you know, drive some engagement, ask some questions, you know, get some people interacting with your page.

Speaker B:

It would be really helpful for your, for your algorithms in the, in the background.

Speaker B:

And people might be like listening to this going, yeah, but how, how, how do we do this?

Speaker B:

And sometimes it's as simple as asking the question and asking people to comment, you know, prompting them, engaging with them, talking about, you know, how to, how, how they're going to Treat their, their dog at Christmas, what presents are they buying for their dogs?

Speaker B:

Tell us in the comments below, sort of thing, that kind of stuff.

Speaker B:

And people start engaging.

Speaker B:

And if you're getting people commenting on your posts, Facebook likes that and it starts pushing those posts out further.

Speaker B:

Because Facebook, and we've got to remember this, Facebook is all about them.

Speaker B:

Facebook want you.

Speaker B:

You are there.

Speaker B:

You are there, like customer.

Speaker B:

Facebook want you to bring more people into their platform.

Speaker B:

They don't want you pushing people out to X.

Speaker B:

They don't want you pushing people out to Instagram or to TikTok or, you know, all their competitors.

Speaker B:

They want you grabbing those people and saying, come into Facebook and look at my posts and comment on my posts.

Speaker B:

So if you can bring people in to engage in your posts, then Facebook will give you more weight, Facebook will give you more screen time, if that makes sense, so that people consistently look at your posts because you're doing what they want you to do, which is bringing people into their platform.

Speaker B:

So just think about that, Think about mixing your posts up and think about mixing your pictures up as well.

Speaker B:

Let's get some of you out there, let's get some of you out there and we'll, we'll go into that in a, in a second.

Speaker B:

You know, I think a lot of people, a lot of us hide behind logos.

Speaker B:

They hide behind pictures of dogs and stuff like that.

Speaker B:

Some of my sort of really successful clients, when you look at their, their social media, they're on the videos, they're on the reels, they're talking to the camera.

Speaker B:

They're, you know, they're, they're talking to the customers.

Speaker B:

They're actually, it's their face that's on the, on the, on the posts.

Speaker B:

So get your face out there.

Speaker B:

And I know, I'm standing here doing it myself.

Speaker B:

I know how hard it is getting yourself out there and talking on camera and having your picture out there and your, your video.

Speaker B:

You know, if I didn't do that myself, I'd get nowhere within the industry because you wouldn't just buy from a logo.

Speaker B:

I know you wouldn't.

Speaker B:

You know, it's about making that connection.

Speaker B:

So that connection is what we call know, like, and trust.

Speaker B:

And this is like my, my go to words if I'm struggling around what to post or what to think about.

Speaker B:

This is like the core values of some of our marketing is know, like, and trust.

Speaker B:

We want those people to get to know us.

Speaker B:

We want those people to get to like us, and we want those people to get to trust us.

Speaker B:

And I can't think of many more industries where this is so important to have that trust with potential clients.

Speaker B:

When you're like dealing with their, their beloved pets, their, dare I say it, fur babies, you know, why would you expect them to take their, their pet to someone where they don't know who they are?

Speaker B:

They, they hide behind the logo, they don't answer the phone, you know, they just text out messages.

Speaker B:

Why, why would.

Speaker B:

I don't understand it.

Speaker B:

I don't understand why people would take their, their pets to a completely unknown entity.

Speaker B:

But obviously people do.

Speaker B:

But the more know, like and trust we can build with our customers and our potential customers, the easier those transactions are and the easier it is to get those sales through the door and get that, get those people into your business.

Speaker B:

So we're going to look at another, some numbers as well that we, we always want to have in the back of our mind and something that is not an overnight achievement, but it's something that, when you thought, when you asked the question, what more can I do with my marketing to get more customers.

Speaker B:

Well, here's the number that you need to start thinking about.

Speaker B:

And this number comes from a, some research that Google did around online marketing and stuff.

Speaker B:

And that's 7, 11, 4.

Speaker B:

So something to, so the words to have in the back of your head is know, like and trust when you're putting out your, your marketing.

Speaker B:

And then the, the numbers to think about is 7, 11, 4.

Speaker B:

So the 7 stands for 7 hours of content.

Speaker B:

Okay?

Speaker B:

So we need to be putting out enough content for someone to go and watch, listen, see, read seven hours worth of it.

Speaker B:

Now you might like, think, jesus, that's a lot of content to put out.

Speaker B:

They're not gonna, they're not taking a day out just to like hoover up your Facebook page or anything like that.

Speaker B:

But you just sort of think about seven hours worth and that could be in lots of different touch points as well.

Speaker B:

So seven hours of content.

Speaker B:

Now if you are an avid listen to listener to this podcast, to my podcast, then you know, each episode is about an hour long and I've got over a hundred episodes.

Speaker B:

So I've, I've ticked the, the seven hours worth of content there, haven't I?

Speaker B:

And that's quite easy to do on a podcast.

Speaker B:

So podcasts can be quite an easy place to go.

Speaker B:

But let's talk about the 11.

Speaker B:

Now the 11 is like touch points.

Speaker B:

So a touch point might be where they see you.

Speaker B:

So again, you might think as a pet groomer, many pet groomers build up More than one touch point.

Speaker B:

So it could be your Facebook page, your Instagram page, your TikTok page, email marketing, your website, your Google.

Speaker B:

You might drive past them in assignment and van.

Speaker B:

They might see a sign on the side of the road which points to your salon.

Speaker B:

You might see signage above your salon with some information.

Speaker B:

You might give them a leaflet inside the salon, talking to them on the phone about what you do, meet and greets.

Speaker B:

These are all touch points where they get to learn about you and your business and you're building that know like and trust up.

Speaker B:

So it 7 11, 4 is feels quite overwhelming.

Speaker B:

7 hours of content over 11 touch points.

Speaker B:

But actually when you start putting some context around it, you're probably not too far off or there's things that you can be doing just to improve that.

Speaker B:

Four means like location.

Speaker B:

So in the, in the pet grooming world, we're quite lucky because you've got a digital kind of location with all your social presence and online presence, but you've also got a physical presence as well with your shop and, and where people take their pets to you to groom.

Speaker B:

So the 4 isn't such an issue.

Speaker B:

But what I find with talking to pet groomers is, you know, we're putting all of our eggs in one basket.

Speaker B:

And in a very busy world, that's not enough.

Speaker B:

That's not, that's not good enough.

Speaker B:

You know, we can't rely on, on Facebook.

Speaker B:

You know, we can't rely just on Google.

Speaker B:

We can't just rely on TikTok.

Speaker B:

All these social media platforms are controlled by someone who one day might just decide they can't be, be bothered anymore.

Speaker B:

You know, they might, there might be some switch somewhere where you can just turn Facebook off when he's had enough, when Zuckerberg's just like, well, I've done, I've had enough.

Speaker B:

I'm turning Facebook off, bored of it now I'm going to move on to something else.

Speaker B:

Or look at like X, like Twitter, like Elon Musk has gone and purchased Twitter.

Speaker B:

Now there's quite a lot of people leaving X because of the way the platform's gone, how he's sort of driven the culture within it.

Speaker B:

So you gotta, you gotta be thinking about diversification of your, of your marketing.

Speaker B:

So email lists, websites and so many people sort of go against the website idea.

Speaker B:

It's another marketing asset.

Speaker B:

It's another touch point for people to learn about you.

Speaker B:

They might go Facebook phone call booking or they might go Google Facebook website booking or they might go Google Facebook website sign up to newsletter, read five newsletters, then booking.

Speaker B:

Or they might see you in the, in the road.

Speaker B:

You give them a card, they go to your website, they then check, they hang out on your Facebook page, watch a few TikToks, then get in contact to book with you.

Speaker B:

Okay, there's no silver bullet to this.

Speaker B:

You've got to go out there and you've got to build what we call marketing assets that are out there working hard for you so that when times are tough, you got stuff out there putting you in front of people all the time.

Speaker B:

And I, my sort of personal motto is everywhere for everyone.

Speaker B:

So I'm a, I'm a big Facebook user.

Speaker B:

I don't really use Instagram that much, whereas you might be listening to this on the podcast.

Speaker B:

And you love TikTok, but you don't really go on Facebook much.

Speaker B:

You know, you can't just pigeonhole your customers into one place.

Speaker B:

You've got to start thinking about that customer journey where, where are they seeing you for the first time, then where they're going to see you for the next time, then where they're going to find out more information.

Speaker B:

And as I just demonstrated, some will go from first sort of seeing you to booking and that's fine.

Speaker B:

And some will want a more complex journey where they want to find out more and you build more know, like and trust.

Speaker B:

So just start thinking to yourself, you know, if you're struggling to get traction, if you're struggling to get people phoning you or customers coming in, then start thinking about what marketing assets you've got.

Speaker B:

And I'll drop a link in the, in the chat and in the, in the, in the bio, which links to.

Speaker B:

I've got a little workbook, a PDF that you can download to start looking at those marketing checklists.

Speaker B:

That's for new customers.

Speaker B:

Okay, so what we've kind of discussed is all about new customers and getting new business into your, into your pep, groom business.

Speaker B:

So the branding, the skin out there, the marketing, you've also got to consider your existing customers because I think existing customers get neglected quite a lot as well.

Speaker B:

And we've all probably had it where we go to a business and we've enjoyed the service, we've enjoyed the business of.

Speaker B:

What really annoys me is like you enjoy the business and then a week later you see a coupon saying, 10 off our services.

Speaker B:

New customers only.

Speaker B:

I'm like, it doesn't look after us, does it?

Speaker B:

It doesn't look after us loyal customers or the people that have been.

Speaker B:

Been using the service.

Speaker B:

For quite some time.

Speaker B:

So that kind of annoys me a bit.

Speaker B:

So we've also got to understand, like, if we've got a big client base or if we've got enough clients, and that's down to you to work out what is enough when it comes to your, your goals and your pricing and how much you need to earn.

Speaker B:

But when you've got enough clients, you've probably got enough there to make your business work.

Speaker B:

And the issue here is, how do you nurture your clients?

Speaker B:

How do you keep your, your existing clients engaged with your services?

Speaker B:

Very often I'll see pet groomers, they might have a few spaces in their diary and they put out a little post saying, appointments available on this day, that day, this day, that day.

Speaker B:

And that nudges quite a lot of clients into booking existing clients.

Speaker B:

So it kind of tells me that we're probably not doing enough to nurture our existing cl.

Speaker B:

Now, if you're probably all screaming at me, I don't have time for all this, Bill.

Speaker B:

I don't have time to do all this.

Speaker B:

But, you know, years ago, the industry was, wasn't so saturated and it was easy to pick up customers and it was easy to retain customers, but it's getting harder.

Speaker B:

You know, times are, times are getting harder.

Speaker B:

So these are the things that if we want to survive going forwards, these are the things that we need to start thinking about.

Speaker B:

So are we nurturing our customers?

Speaker B:

And, you know, one way to nurture that is by using your, you know, Facebook page and engaging with your existing customers and attracting new customers.

Speaker B:

So that's an easy one that you could be doing.

Speaker B:

But another way is perhaps writing newsletters, writing blogs, email marketing, you know, text message marketing.

Speaker B:

There's so much more you can do on there.

Speaker B:

And this is potentially something that we all have to do to make sure that our, we're keeping our current customers engaged.

Speaker B:

Because it's really noisy out there, you know, life's really busy for some people and we often sit here thinking, oh, no one's booking in.

Speaker B:

Why am I getting the repeat?

Speaker B:

Why I'm getting the repeat customers that I do?

Speaker B:

They're there, they're sitting there, they're waiting, they're sitting on their sofa at night watching Netflix.

Speaker B:

What are you doing to interrupt their life?

Speaker B:

To say, have you put your next dog room in?

Speaker B:

That's the question that you've got to be asking yourselves.

Speaker B:

What am I doing to nurture that customer?

Speaker B:

What am I doing to compete with all that noise of, you know, schools and Netflix and cinemas and you know, Christmas shopping and stuff like that.

Speaker B:

What are you doing to interrupt all of that noise in their head?

Speaker B:

So make sure that they give you a little bit of priority and get their dog sorted for Christmas and then going forward into the new year.

Speaker B:

So lots to think about.

Speaker B:

So when I get the question, have you got any tips on marketing?

Speaker B:

I hope you're prepared for the answer because there's a lot, there's a lot we can be doing and hand on heart, you know, we don't do everything that we should be doing or we could be doing.

Speaker B:

I don't.

Speaker B:

I think hand on heart, there's a lot of people who say that, you know, they just scratch the surface.

Speaker B:

Hand on heart.

Speaker B:

Are we really busy?

Speaker B:

Yes, we are really busy.

Speaker B:

Do we have time for this?

Speaker B:

Potentially.

Speaker B:

We struggle to find that time.

Speaker B:

Does it link into our prices?

Speaker B:

Unfortunately, it does.

Speaker B:

You know, if we're charging higher prices, then we have more time to work on our marketing assets and our marketing in general, which then produces more customers, which we can then potentially test higher prices on.

Speaker B:

That's an upward spiral, B.

Speaker B:

Whereas if we're just in the trenches, firefighting with low prices, you know, having to do loads and loads of dogs a day to.

Speaker B:

To keep our head above the water, that's a downward spiral, unfortunately.

Speaker B:

But use this podcast as a bit of a kick up the bum.

Speaker B:

Use this podcast and this live to sort of trigger some action.

Speaker B:

Think about what you need to do for your business.

Speaker B:

Go and download our marketing checklist so that you can print that off and, and tick them off as you do them and think about them.

Speaker B:

There's no overnight silver bullets.

Speaker B:

There's nothing.

Speaker B:

You know, don't expect putting a few posts out on Facebook and you're instantly going to be fully booked.

Speaker B:

It's not.

Speaker B:

That's not what it's about.

Speaker B:

This is about building that know like and trust, putting marketing assets out there so that you can have a long, sustainable business with your existing clients and hopefully getting a nice flow of new clients as well.

Speaker B:

If you need any help, if you want any help and advice, then get in touch.

Speaker B:

You can send us a message on the Pet Passion to Profit page or send me a personal message on on Facebook.

Speaker B:

I try and reply to them as soon as I possibly can.

Speaker B:

Take care and see you all soon.

Bill Betts:

I hope you've enjoyed this podcast.

Bill Betts:

Please make sure you give us a like or a review to help people find it.

Bill Betts:

The podcast is sponsored by Low Pay.

Bill Betts:

Head over to www.lopay.com to find out more about their payment solution.

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