How does your shelter advertise/market their animals successfully?

[Foon]

I find a debate that comes up is people say not to list animals on craigslist-- not even for a nominal fee or for the cost of shots (to discourage bunchers/fighters/freebie people). I don't find that unreasonable and am inclined to agree with this. However, a shelter here has been posting their dogs and it's working! I'm impressed and it has changed my mind. Do you think it's a good idea for shelters to post their dogs? Does your shelter? What is the outcome?

Also, what other sites / methods have they used? My friend lives in an area they do basically no marketing of the dogs and consiquently whether it be indirectly or directly related their adoptions are very poor.

Does pages like myspace/twitter/facebook really help any?

Thanks.
Lol Aussie, DS seems to have a lot.
Chetco: That really sounds like a great idea about the mall.

Aussie: Ours do the pictures, but they rarely write anything interesting. It's usually "so cute. so perfect. female. spayed." Lol ours could use some good writers!
Chetco: Do you think if I offered to post animals on Craigslist for some local shelters (besides the one that does) do you think they would be ok with it?
Lorraine: Darn, that's a shame to not have any great people come through the sites. The thing about the shelter dogs is that my friends and most that I know don't do any sort of home check, follow up, or even spend much much effort in matching the "right" dog to the "right" owner. So... I wouldn't want to encourage bad owners to adopt, as we wouldn't have the screening power that a rescue would.
Thanks Aussie. that was a good listing. it seemed honest and informative.

[Carl Stevens]

sure do i breed pits and have sold a bunch on facebook 4 sure

[Chetco]

I've posted several rescues on craigslist, with 100% success. The homes are still carefully screened, including home visits and references.

The ones I've placed have all gone to wonderful homes.

Shelters in 3 communities that I have lived, have a weekly column in the paper, highlighting a cat and dog of the week. The papers provide the space as a public service. This usually results in the profiled pets being adopted, as well as several others. It also generates donations.

Three of the local rescues have weekly pet adoption days at Petsmart and Petco. This always has good results. An old pet shop closed down in the main mall. ( because they weren't able to sell puppies and kittens anymore!!! hurray!) Now, a rescue is using the shop to showcase their cats, with good success.. Petsmart always has a few cats showcased for the SPCA. Those cats live in Foster homes, go home at night with their foster families, and are constantly being rotated.

The local rescues, with several cats and dogs, are present at all community festivals, and Farmer's market.
The two big shelters are way out of town, and people just don't go way out there. So, they are always seeking ways to show them in town. The other rescues are a network of foster homes, so also need a central place to show their pets.

All of the rescues utilize petfinder.com.

The town I recently moved from, has their shelter in midtown, and they don't have to work as hard to get people to come and see the pets. It made it much easier for volunteers, too.

ADDED..Well, there should be no reason for them to refuse posting on craiglist. In the ad, you could tell the reader to contact the shelter to apply for adoption. Just be sure to post 4 nice pictures..You could even post two pets per ad, and post 2 pictures of each. Craigslist won't let you post very many similar ads at one time, so all of the headings have to be enough different that they will accept them.
(I have 4 craigslist accounts, just so I can place more adoptable pet ads. .Shhhh ) .

[Aussie]

There are a lot of Trolls about this afternoon! School next Monday kiddies!

My shelter has photographs together with a little blurb. They tend to rehome smaller dogs easily, but large dogs, unless purebred are hard to find homes for, sadly.
EDIT:
Here is a nice advert from my local pound. The writer is quite good, perhaps you can show it to your rescue centre for inspiration? The paper also runs 'Pet of the Week'. It could be a cat, or a dog.

http://www.wagga.nsw.gov.au/www/html/222...e-week.asp

[Lorraine]

We now only stick to our own website and people wishing to rescue will find us.

However, before the days of internet then we used to use only free ad papers as there was no other alternative.

I have also tried the free-ads in recent years and had a couple of good homes from people who just didn't have internet access.

We have also tried putting rescue dogs on Preloved, Gum Tree, Viva St, and Ad trader sites online, but truly just gave up when we didn't have one home suitable that converted.

It is also a little different for a rescue to advertise on them as their people are well and truly used to sifting through suitable homes for the dogs. So I say YES - as the procedure for selecting suitable homes will be no different.

As for selling dogs on facebook !!!! Don't think we'd try that with rotties however we do have a facebook page with a lot of friends so they see the dogs activities weekly, but none have converted to homes. Kaiser Therot if you wish to look.

[scrutsmom]

We at American Cocker Spaniel Rescue post our adoptable dogs on our own website: http://acsrwa.webs.com/, as well as petfinder.com and adoptapet.com. Craigslist is definitely hunting grounds for all sorts of weirdos who prey on free, or even cheap pets. No matter how the pets are "marketed", the biggest, most important step in the adoption process is screening the adopters. Also, requiring an adoption contract to be signed by the adopter, doing a home visit before approving the adoption, plus following up with the adopter after the adoption is finalized. If you'd like more info, you can contact me through our website -- I'd be glad to email you a sample adoption contract, application, etc.

[sickbxy]

The rescues I've been with do the typical pet finder, have their own web site and I had my personal foster site with newsletter which I had several people checking for new dogs on a weekly basis [ http://www.adoptapet.com/ ] which cross-posts to about 5 other sites. My fosters would be out on a daily basis with their adopt me bandanas which never worked but suceded in building a donation relationship with a major pet product distributer. Really, it was rare for me to have a foster for longer than 2 months. I never used craigslist because I honestly did not want locals adopting my dogs, I only found one local that passed the phone interview and homecheck.

[Frecks26]

My local animal shelter does not advertise any of there dogs on craigslist,facebook etc.although I think if they did they wouldn't have such an overcrowding.They do however have a "pet of the day" on our local news station,which it seems that the dogs who appear on the news get adopted immediately,also they do adoption drives at our local petsmart and petco.In answering your question yes I think if our local animal shelter did more advertising on Craigslist or facebook,that our shelter wouldn't be so crowded and our euthanasia rate would be down.

ADD:As Chetco said,the busiest mall in our city just opened a ASPCA,but even that doesnt seem to be helping.

[Annie]

Mine doesn't, and it is frustrating.

They try, but the management is far from creative. Photos in the newspapers, that's about it.

They don't open holidays, sundays, and are only open evenings one day per week. They miss so many, many possible homes by not making it easy to come by.

They don't post a "bio" on the kennel.

They don't let you take a dog out and walk or play with him. Who in their right mind would adopt a dog by only touching a nose through chain link?

Dogs are not evaluated in any way -- its simply take your chances. But if a dog is returned -- for any reason -- they are put down.

The kicker is they have plenty of volunteers who would love to do things, but stand around helping with administrative paperwork. These volunteers could be put to good use marketing the dogs, taking photos, writing up bios, getting to know the dogs, doing basic training, doing simple grooming. But no, they stand around in the front office. Not by choice I'm sure.

It's in the dark ages. And they wonder why they kill a high percentage of dogs surrendered....

[Cookie]

Our shelter runs ads with pictures, and has spots on our television stations, and lists all the dogs in the shelter on petfinder.
Purebreds are almost always in rescue groups, not in a shelter.