How to create and use Flyers to attract new customers in your area.
Targeting potential clients where they live, work, and play is one of the simplest ways to grow your business. Consider this scenario: a potential client is walking to the dog park, feeling a little guilty that Fido didn’t get any exercise the day before. As they walk past the community board, they come across dog walking flyers for a fantastic local dog walking service. They take one of the tear-offs, give you a ring, and you become a regular, repeat customer.
One of the most effective ways to grow your business is to use pet sitting flyers! There are three steps to take when considering using flyers as a marketing channel.
Designing Your Flyer
Planning Where To Put Your Flyers
Printing/Preparing Your Flyers
Designing Your Flyer
It’s critical that your flyer is both professional and appealing to potential new clients. Many flyers also include a “tear-off” section at the bottom where your contact information can be ripped off. There are numerous excellent tools available to assist you in creating effective dog walking flyers. These can be as simple as Microsoft Word or Google Docs — there’s no need to go overboard, but you do want something that appears professional. If you’re looking for a tool with more design capabilities, check out PhotoADKing.
PhotoADKing also provides a bunch of templates and inspiration. It may take a few tries to get the perfect flyer, but remember that your flyers should accurately represent your company. Take your time here to ensure that you get it right.
If you’re making dog walking flyers, then make sure to have a big image of a dog on it. If you’re making pet sitting flyers, then you’re fine to have images of all types of animals that you may care for.
The key is simply to have pictures of animals somewhere on the flyer. Further, have the picture be in color if you can. Images will attract attention and help cement what you do in the prospect’s brain.
What should your Pet Sitting and Dog Walking Flyer include?
It’s usually best to keep it simple, as with many aspects of starting a business. Make sure all of the information on your flyer is easy to read and make it clear how to contact you to book services.
All you really need are a few fundamentals:
- Your company’s name and logo
- What services do you offer?
- What geographic areas do you serve?
- How to reach you: phone number, email address, website
- An eye-catching graphic or illustration — this is simple to incorporate using a site like PhotoADKing.
- What Is Your Special Offer?Dog walking flyers should promote something specific if you really want to attract attention (the same goes for pet sitting flyers). So, you’ll want to highlight an attractive offer to get people motivated to take action.The offer should be extremely easy to see. Don’t bury it in a paragraph of text. Make it plainly obvious in your flyer design.
In the example above, you can see that I added the offer right in the middle of the page. It’s in the black text to contrast with the white title above it. The offer also needs to be something that is going to be worthwhile to someone. A simple “take 10% off” or something like that is probably only worth a dollar or two. That’s not enough to get someone to take action.
Have fun with the design because it should reflect your personality and business.
Planning Where To Put Your Flyers
The first step in designing your flyer is to decide where it will be displayed. The main consideration is twofold. Where are the best places to place your flyers? Second, do you need permission to place your flyers there?
Let’s tackle the first question. You should place your flyers where your customers live, work, and play. You want as many actual pet owners to see your flyers as possible. What happened to these people?
A great place to start is the dog park, as we mentioned earlier. A community board is usually available at dog parks where announcements and flyers can be posted. It is a good idea to put up flyers on walking trails that have designated spots for flyers in your area.
There might be a business in your area that lets local businesses post flyers (like a coffee shop or a pet supplies store)? Consider calling around to find out if you can post flyers. Is a neighborhood center or apartments a good idea? You can post your flyers at these places. Apartment buildings have big bulletin boards. Putting a business card on the bulletin board also helps promote your business. When you come across an opportunity to advertise locally but do not have any flyers with you, a few business cards come in handy.
Make sure you have permission to put your dog walking flyers up at all of the places where you can put your flyers. The majority of “community boards” allow anyone to post a flyer. There is often a requirement to obtain approval to put up flyers in a business or community. When in doubt, it’s better to ask rather than risk being in trouble. A local business that provides excellent service to its customers and residents is more than welcome by most businesses and communities.
Handing out leaflets should not be your only source of new dog walking jobs, you need other pet professionals to think about you when one of their own clients is in need of a dog walker. Keep in mind that you will need to buy lots of flyers to distribute but because you are doing it the smart way, it will be money well spent.
Printing/Preparing Your Flyers
Having created awesome flyers and planned where you’re going to post them around town – all that’s left is printing and preparing them. Your home color printer is definitely a viable option. The UPS Store, Staples, Office Depot, and even the library offer flyer printing services.
Create tear-off flyers if you can, but be sure to cut the sections so clients can easily take your contact information.
Lastly, be sure to check in on your flyers regularly. If they are weather-worn or don’t have any tear-offs left, be sure to replace them.
