The Dog Marketing Blog

Petfood Industry reported on another entrant in the dog beverage category. Dogdration is the brainchild of  Colorado State University student Brian Fate who felt his dog needed to replace electrolytes after vigorous exercise.  The Rocky Mountain Collegian recently featured  a story on Brian and his company. The product is available online and in a limited number of retail locations. At nearly $4 for a 20 oz bottle and $36 for a case of 12 this is clearly a premium product (I’d bet my dogs would drink Gatorade for a lot less!) Marketing efforts are well steeped in social media; Dogdration has Facebook , YouTube and Twitter accounts and Brian Fate’s Linkedin and MySpace profiles mention he is founder of the company.  Dogdration has even hired professional blog writers to help with marketing efforts.

I’m not certain that dogs need beverages more complicated than water, but this product appears better researched than most. Brian’s passion for exercise and concern for his dog is reflected in Dogdration, while some of the other entrants seem purely opportunistic. I will continue to watch this emerging product category with interest.

Walmart is expanding its partnership with the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (ASPCA.) In addition to a line of ASPCA branded products featured in the Walmart pet department in 2008, the companies recently launched a co-branded Facebook page titled Lend A Paw and are sponsoring a Pet Fair in Miami on May 1, 2010.

MediaPost writes about the ASPCA’s promotional efforts including the Facebook page and partnerships with multiple pet product companies to promote April as National Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Month.  Walmart’s move to associate itself with this well-known animal charity shows that the company takes the pet market seriously and is trying hard to position itself as a caring, pet-friendly company.  This reminds me a bit of Warren G Harding’s promotion of his Airedale, Laddie Boy, as the First Dog, which helped deflect public attention from some of the more colorful aspects of his family life.

MediaPost reported on DelMonte’s sponsorship of a pet blogger conference, BlogPaws,  April 9-10, 2010 in Columbus Ohio.  The conference is open to all people who blog about pets, whether personally or for a corporation. Del Monte’s Meow Mix cat food and Kibbles ‘n Bits dog food are the presenting  sponsors, and are joined by a host of other pet food, pet product, pet retailer, veterinary, and pet media sponsors.

BlogPaws conference sessions help attendees create successful blogs, covering  branding, search engine optimization, promotions, and  some of the most common pet blog topics, like product reviews and rescue.  You can follow the conference on Twitter and become a fan on Facebook.

It’s killing me that I entered dog shows on the same dates before I learned about this event – I would love to go!

I’ll admit being a sucker for marketing featuring photos of Bull Terriers! I found  Fetching Tags through their social media outreach on Twitter. The company sells premium custom dog tags, made of brushed aluminum. While lacking a bit in the amount of information they contain compared to other, more practical tags like those from Boomerang Pet Tags , Fetching tags offers tags of a whimsical, decorative nature that can be personalized with a pet’s name and owner’s phone number.  A premium product that allows dog owners to show their pet’s personality while also providing a practical reason to justify the purchase.

An alert on the Eurodogtraining blog led me to news of a new product announcement from Mattel: Puppy Tweets, a device that allows your dog to send tweets via a collar tag.  The tag responds to noise and motion and sends one of several tweets in response to your dog’s activity (or lack thereof.)   Details on how the device works were a little sparse, apparently the collar device sends data on sound and motion to a USB sensor mounted on your computer, and you leave your dog’s Twitter account signed in while you’re out.  I find it similar in concept to the  sensor-based TweetingBar account which reports on the beer keg’s status in the New York office of digital agency 360i.

Puppy Tweets allows your dog will join a number of other tweeting canines, most of whom have more than a few canned responses to share.  The only practical use I can see is to check on a dog with barking issues when left alone.  I don’t as a rule follow dog accounts that only tweet items of interest to dogs  and I don’t plan on signing up any of my canines when this product launches in the fall.  For $29.95 it might be an amusing novelty to some, but for I can’t see it catching on with anyone who is serious about either dogs or Twitter.

The Pioneer Press reports on TwinCities.com about Minneapolis-St.Paul area animal shelters use of social media to publicize and place rescued pets. They discuss the social media strategies of the Animal Ark, Animal Humane Society, and the Minnesota Valley Humane Society All three organizations have established both Twitter and Facebook accounts. The AHS also has a YouTube channel and a Flickr account but these accounts are dedicated to the organization’s activities,  not specific adoptable animals.

All the organizations profiled seem to think that the social media outreach has resulted in more traffic to their adoptable animals’ pages, and the AHS has seen its donations increase, in a year when many charitable organizations have seen them fall.  Animal Ark cited several stories of animals adopted shortly after adding the “Add This” link sharing service to their profiles.  The MVHS feels that potential adopters  like the social media outreach, but the staff time to keep these additional sites updated is a drain on resources, free isn’t always completely free!

The Snif Tag collar based RFID tracking system for pets was dropped as company founders re-purpose the technology into a product that tracks hand washing by health care workers.   The product, which originated in the MIT Media Lab’s Physical Language Workshop, launched in late 2005 and was profiled in high profile media including Wired and the New York Times.

Described as “social networking for dogs,”  SNIF was a product in search of  a market. The collar-leash combo provided information about a pet’s activity level while the owner was not present and its interaction with other dogs wearing the same tracking device.  I would  suspect that anyone willing to shell out almost $200 for the electronically enabled collar and lead set might not let their pet far out of their sight, rendering this second piece of data redundant. If the pet would get out of sight of the owner, there was no way for the owner to find a lost animal using the SNIF tag; a function that is available through some GPS enabled collars.

The SNIF website is still up with links to its news coverage, but the product ordering and retailer locator functions are no longer providing data on the discontinued product. The inventors mention they may re-introduce the product later with a more robust marketing budget, but I will be surprised if it fulfills the initial hopes for its success.

PetCentric Logo

I recently got my first email from Petcentric with a link to their site, which launched in 2006.  In a 2008 article in Promo Magazine the site is described as a social network, however most of the content is provided by the site’s owner, Purina and select partners, such as Yahoo! Answers (pet section.) There is content galore, including news about pets, pet blogs, pet games,  reviews, a pet service locator and pet photos and videos, which include user-generated content.  The site also has its own Twitter account @petcentric There is very little overt promotion of Purina products, although Purina sponsored events are a rich source of content for the site.  Just further evidence of Purina’s commitment to digital media with this engaging site that supports pet owners interests and in turn the Purina corporate brand identity.

Chihuahua enjoying Kwispelbier

Latest sighting in the humanization of dogs trend – my latest Dogs in Canada newsletter has arrived with an article about dog beers.   The article profiles three dog-targeted brews, Kwispelbier from the Netherlands, Australia’s Dog Beer created by an enterprising pet retailer, and the US entry,  Bowser Beer.  Bowser Beer even has its own Facebook page. Producers of these beverages claim they offer the product to raise awareness of the hazards of giving beer to dogs and allowing people who just can’t resist sharing a brew with their dog a safer option.  My opinion? Your dog (and your pocketbook) will be better off if he or she drinks fresh, clean water.

Nutro dog food logo

Petfood Industry reports that Nutro has partnered with Meetup.com to sponsor 60 Meetup groups. The sponsored groups include a variety of  existing dog Meetup groups across across North America, including specific breed groups, rescue groups and the Denver Yappy Hour all-dogs social group.  Nutro is hosting a kick-off Meetup on September 16, in New York City which features an appearance by celebrity veterinarian Dr Marty Becker. It’s not clear how the groups were selected for this promotion, although I do see that groups can signify that they are seeking sponsors and Meetup will facilitate the process for sponsors wishing to sponsor 50 or more Meetup groups.  On the promotional webpage for its Meetups, Nutro also mentions its Facebook fan page however, I see no mention of the Meetup there.