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!
