Community Relations Strategies
Here are some strategies we have found very helpful over the years…
Three Things, Three More Things & Balanced Training Talk Track
The main things you need to know to pitch Wonder Dog is three things and you’ll be saying them over and over, so it makes sense to remember them really well!
First Three Things: “We’re In-Home trainers and do three things. We train the dog. We train the humans (the most important part) and we train the dog in their home where he will spend 95% of his life. Around his couch, yard, neighbors, guests, etc. Optional: Then once the dog is good we train the dog at our Games and events around other dogs people and distractions.”
Second Three Things: “In terms of what we teach, we teach the dog what we want them to know. This is all the basic commands and manners like sit, down, bed, stay, come, heel, leave it and password. Then we get rid of the bad behaviors the owners don’t like like jumping, pulling, running off, counter surfing, etc. And then we teach the dogs to be good around other dogs, people and distractions by taking them out in public and coming to our Games, classes and events which we do 1-2x a week!”
Balanced Training Talk Track: “We’re what’s known as balanced trainers. That means we use positive stimuli to teach your dog what TO do and corrections to teach the dog what NOT to do. The long term goal is a fully-trained dog that doesn’t need you to shake a bag of snacks to get it to obey NOR a dog that always needs corrections in order to listen.”
Put Fliers on the counter when you can
When you’re bringing the brochures and holders into the businesses, put them in the prime real estate when you can! You’ve just made your pitch, they agree to getting some brochures and you bring them in from the car… When you show them off, hand them one out of the holder and then set the brochure holder on the counter.
This is going to get the brochures the most eyeballs. So if you’re at the vet, set it by the other brochures on the counter for various drugs or the Care Credit card brochures. If you’re at a food supply place, set it by the terminal. Same goes for groomers and doggy daycare/boarding places. Put it on the counter when you can or in the place it’ll get the most eyeballs.
Pro Tip: Make it a positive for them by doing this. Example: You set them on the counter and they say something to you about it, etc. Reply by letting them know you wanted to put it there so they get the most eyeballs possible because if their folks take them and buy training, they get lunch, breakfast, etc. Make it a positive for them for our marketing materials to be in a prime location!
Name the food place
You’ve just given your big talk to the team and given them some brochures. They are excited to pass them out and at some point you let them know that if they do pass them out, then you will bring them lunch or breakfast for the team. When you tell them about lunch/breakfast, make sure you mention some of the brands we all love.
“Yeah, like I mentioned earlier, if you pass these out and we get a client from it, we will bring in lunch or breakfast to the whole team! So if you guys want Gibsons donuts and coffee for breakfast or Chic-Fil-A or Domino’s for lunch, we’d be happy to bring that in!”
The reason we do this is because people LOVE it. When you say breakfast or lunch, the reaction is “Meh. Okay.” But when you say CFA or Gibsons or whatever everyone knows, they get REALLY excited. It also makes it real for them too. When you pair the activity of giving brochures out with actual food from X place, it helps make a stronger connection and they want to pass our stuff out.
Less Brochures > More Brochures
It’s better to give places LESS brochures rather than more in most cases, this way you can swing by continually to refill them.
The idea behind this is that if we can swing by over and over, we will continue to build the relationship with them and dig deeper each time. This way when they think dog training, over time they only think about Wonder Dog.
If you give someone 30 brochures the first time you go in, it’ll take them MONTHS to get rid of them and you’ll have no real excuse to stop by. There are certain high volume businesses when it makes sense to give them more than 5-10 per visit.
Example: There’s a vets office that has 20 people including techs and vets and they all love us and pass out brochures all the time. In this case, it would make sense to give them a sufficient amount, but overall, less is going to give you more opportunity to follow up.