Social Media tips for the Pet Pro

by Nancy E. Hassel, American Pet Professionals
I get the social media question all the time from our members.  How do I?  What should I?  Why don’t I have more followers, and on and on.  So today, a few basic social media tips to help you have more engagement on your business and rescue pages!  
Did you know?

  • If you want more engagement on your Facebook Business/Rescue Page you should be asking a short question starting with: Where, When, Would or Should. For example:

– Where do your bring your dog to swim?
– Would you feed your cat this? (With a picture)

  • AND on Facebook – your posts should be 80 characters. Yep, that’s shorter than twitter! Supposedly studies show that FB posts/questions with 80 characters get more engagement.  I have tried this, it works! (And people don’t nessecarily want to click on ‘show more…’ you have to get their attention within 2 seconds!)
  • AND this is a biggie – when you post on facebook if your link is 1/2 through your post, studies show that more people engage (click on, share) that link. (Weird I know!) I already tried this and it seems to work.
  • Ok this is something many of you will NOT want to do – but it is important especially for your Branding.  Come up with your own unique, creative posts.  Have a great picture – YOU TOOK – you must own the picture to do this suggestion: put your logo on it and with a great caption share on your page.  It can be somthing you’re promoting, but a great picture can get your followers more engaged.
  • Post that great picture, maybe it is a theme or holiday and ask your fans to post THEIR own pet’s picture in the comment section below.  Let’s face it, we want to see our own pets in the limelight – same goes for our social media followers. It works – I do this often on my LIPetPlace.com page
  • Ask to share your info/post/promotion on someone else’s page.  This just goes to basic common courtesy.  If you have blog post or promo and you want to share it on a page that has a good amount of fans/followers – ask the admin of the page first! Especially in a Public Group Page.  Nothing worse than someone spamming a page with their shite – and most admins of group pages will delete your post and potentially ban you from the group!  Not a good way to build a relationship with someone!
  • Like each other’s business pages from your personal FB account and then click on the next to ‘Message’ on their pages and a drop down will appear and you can click ‘Like as my page’ it will notify them that your page liked theirs.  An easy way to notify them.

On Twitter?

  • You should be posting something at least 1 time an hour. Sheesh – now that seems like a lot – but you know you can schedule your tweets ahead of time right?
  • Personally I hate the connected FB/Twitter posts – people that do that are less likely to engage with their followers on Twitter and won’t have as much of an impact they want.
  • And be sure to engage people on twitter. Retweet them. Thank them for following you with the hashtag #follow within the tweet.
  • Also when tweeting, I find tweets with pictures of videos often get more RT’s (retweets), engagement. So be sure to leave character space for the picture too.
  • Speaking of character space – when tweeting don’t use up all 140 characters then it makes it harder for people to retweet you. I try to leave at least 16 – 20 characters that I don’t use. 
  • Participate in Twitter Parties specific to the pet industry.  #PetChat is a fun Monday night Twitter Pawty at 8pm EST!  You will meet others in the industry and gain followers by being geniune and not overly promoting your stuff.  
  • Follow back.  I see a lot of pet pros who don’t follow back the people who follow them, well la dee da! The entire point of social media is being social right? Networking and getting to know others in the industry!  I follow back. 🙂

Social media takes time and work – so be sure to schedule it – and not get overwhelmed by it.  Don’t take on too much you can’t handle.  If you can only do Facebook and Twitter that’s ok.  Personally I am on Twitter (since 2008), Facebook (since 2009), Linkedin (since 2008), Pinterest (since at least 2011), Instagram (since 2013) and Google +.  I focus on Linkedin, Twitter and Facebook daily = the rest is 1 time a week maybe.  I don’t let it overwhelm me – and am not on social media ALL day long – as I have work to do. 🙂 
Are you following me? @LIPetPros (Twitter, Instagram and Pinterest).  I follow back!
American Pet Professionals on Facebook
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  • Judy Tarasek April 16, 2015 at 6:20 am

    FB and Twitter are great platforms but I want to know what’s best for local engagement.