Pet Marketing Unleashed Podcast

18: How to Stop Wasting Time on Marketing That Doesn’t Work

• Mikaela Vargas of Pet Marketing Unleashed • Episode 18

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Have you ever spent hours crafting Instagram posts, tweaking your website, or trying to get more engagement, only to feel like nothing is actually working? It seems like it's working for everyone else, but for some reason, you're not seeing the big ROI you were promised.

In this value-packed episode, I break down exactly how to stop wasting time on marketing that isn't working for your pet business. Marketing can make you feel like a deer in headlights or like it’s a complete waste of time and money, especially when you're not clear what's actually driving results.

If you're struggling with pushing traffic to a website that isn't converting, don't miss our free Seamless Onboarding Masterclass mentioned at the end—because all the marketing in the world won't help if your website isn't built to attract and convert!


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[00:00:00] Let's get real with this one. Have you ever set hours cracking Instagram posts, tweaking your website or trying to get more engagement only to feel like nothing is actually working? It seems like it's working for everyone else, but for some reason you are not seeing the big ROI that you were promised, or that you see others achieve, and I really feel you there.

[00:00:20] Marketing can make you feel like a deer in headlights or perhaps a waste of time or money, especially when you're not clear what's actually driving results. So how do you stop wasting time on marketing that's not working. In today's episode, I'm going to break down exactly how to track your marketing efforts, what to cut out, and how to focus on the strategies that actually move the needle for your pet business.

[00:00:42] Plus, stick around until the end as I'll be answering some common questions. You may be wondering as we wrap up the topic. Alright, let's get into the intro music and we'll get started.

[00:00:56] Welcome petpreneurs to the Pet Marketing Unleashed Podcast. I'm your host, Mikayla Vargas, founder, designer, and educator buying pet marketing Unleashed. This podcast is all about growing your pet business without the stress. Here you'll find episodes packed with actionable tips and advice for streamlining your online presence.

[00:01:15] Avoiding burnout and onboarding new clients while you're away from your desk or out with the dogs. So pop in those earbuds and learn stress-free marketing and website strategies with me while you head out on your next dog walk. Pet sitting visit, drive to your next session or just wherever your pet business takes you.

[00:01:31] Next, let's dive in. Marketing can straight up feel like a serious time suck like super. Honestly, I have been there more of the times than I can count, especially on social media and Instagram. And it seems like things are changing all the time and you just can't catch up. Like engagement's down and the algorithm's gone crazy and now there's new grid dimensions and it's just like, it's a lot.

[00:01:55] And not all marketing is created equal. It's so easy to get caught up in trends, posting on social media daily, running random boosted posts or stressing over hashtags, which are those even a thing anymore? Like I don't think they really are without knowing if it's actually helping. So the key to stopping this cycle of uncertainty is tracking, testing, focusing on what works.

[00:02:16] So let's dive into how to do just that. Here are three strategies or things that you should be tracking to know if your marketing is working. Number one, where clients are coming from. Two Google Analytics and website data, and three social media insights. So let's go through each of these. Number one, where clients are from, from.

[00:02:36] If you are not already asking clients how they found you start doing that. Now you could add a, how did you hear about this question to your contract wharf or do your booking process. Or you can even ask them like if you hop on curls or go to meet and greet or ask them where they found you and start tracking that data so you know where your clients are actually coming from so you know where you can focus more of your efforts.

[00:02:55] And don't just take their answers at face value. You need to cross check this with data. If they say, Google, can you confirm in your analytics that you're getting traffic from search engines? Like is that something that's like. Is that just the one client or is that something that they repeated? And now let's go do some investigative work to see in your analytics is are they coming from Google?

[00:03:15] Right? So speaking of that, number two, Google Analytics and website data. If you don't already have a Google Analytics account, um, definitely recommend creating one. Sometimes your website, like your website platform, will have this for you as well. Like Wix has this, so you can actually see some of your data being pulled in.

[00:03:31] So you can just, you know, once you're making website edits, you can also check your website data as well and check your analytics regardless. You wanna make sure that you are tracking your website analytics, and some of the things that you wanna look for are the traffic sources. So this is where your website traffic is actually coming from.

[00:03:47] So you can see are people coming from Google? Are they coming from referrals? Are they coming from social media? Like where is your traffic coming from? Because you wanna do more of that if that also where your clients are coming from. It's also worth it to check out your bounce rates and your conversions.

[00:04:02] So the bounce rate is like essentially the percentage rate of how quickly somebody just like leaves for leads on that page. So if you're, if your homepage has like a 70% bounce rate, that means 70 p 70% of people are just leaving your site without going to another page on your website. That's not good, right?

[00:04:20] Now, obviously on like a contact page, you're gonna see a higher bounce rate, which is totally fine 'cause that means that maybe they reached out to you and now they're all done so they can fix it out. So that's something to look at. And then, um, you just wanna make sure about like conversions too. So if you are getting visitors.

[00:04:36] From Google that you're not getting inquiries from Google. It's not a traffic problem, it's a website problem. Like you're not converting once they land on your website. Right. And that's kind of where we say, you know, I've said in some previous West or previous episodes, and I've seen this before on like blog posts and stuff, it's not like your website's desires draw necessarily to grow the business.

[00:04:56] You wanna find the source or the root of the problem, right, which can create a beautiful website, but if the copy's lacking, you don't have great copywriting that's not converting or. You know, something like that. If you wanna see like where it's coming from. So there's a traffic, like typically there's either a traffic problem or it's a conversion problem.

[00:05:14] Once you're getting the traffic, if you're getting the traffic, they need to make sure that people are converting what they land on your website, right? So that's where you can look at data to piece together where the problem is figuring out what's working, what's getting new clients, and what's not working.

[00:05:27] You also wanna monitor page performance. Are people actually clicking on your services page? Are they spending time on your site or are they leaving right away? So you can typically go and see like exactly how people are using your website, which like maps, are they following, which pages are they going to, which ones are they leaving from?

[00:05:43] You wanna do that analysis to make sure that once people are even, you know, say you focus all of your time on Instagram, you're getting a lot of traffic to your website, but you're like, it's not helping me grow my business. Well, is this a conversion problem? Or are your ideal clients not actually on Instagram?

[00:05:56] Right? It's actually kind of like a detective work. Like you really have to give for aite with like what, you know, where are these people coming from? What are they doing? And where are like, where's the cutoff? Where's the cliff? Where are they dropping? And lastly, you wanna look at social media insights.

[00:06:12] Engagement is great, but are people actually clicking through to your website? Are your posts attracting? Your annual clients are just random pet lovers, lovers who are never going to book your services right now. There's something to be said about social media too that I don't know if this is controversial or not, so I'm, if you don't agree with me, I'm sorry, but this is just my opinion that social media isn't necessarily a business builder for local pet service businesses.

[00:06:37] I think it's better for engagement and community. To show that you're active and present and you have, you know, a reputation, you're, you're there, you exist. Um, and again, like fostering that community with either your clients or even, you know, people wanna be a part of it, but it's not necessarily going to be the thing that's getting new clients.

[00:07:00] If people aren't necessarily reaching out via Instagram to book a service, maybe they are. Um, and when I'm saying this, I'm not saying that you're never getting business from it, I'm just saying. You might find that you're getting more business elsewhere via search on like Yelp approval or workflows or events, things like that.

[00:07:18] So just something to keep in mind when it comes to the purpose of social media, just because you aren't getting clients from social media and you shouldn't be doing it. Just something to know. So those are the three strategies or things that I would recommend that you start tracking if you are not already to know what's working with your marketing and what's not.

[00:07:34] Now before we get into cutting out marketing tasks that don't work, let's talk about one of the biggest mistakes that I see, because here's the thing, you can tweak and track your marketing all you want, but if your website isn't set up to convert, you're still going to struggle to see your results. We talked about that a little bit ago, but I really want to get into the website stuff as well.

[00:07:54] 'cause how can I go through an episode without talking about websites, right? Or website designers. Your website is your home base. Social media is great, but if you're driving people to a messy, confusing website, you are losing potential clients. And all of that time and money that you put into the social media, whether you're hiring somebody to help you or you're spending lots of time on it, is wasted because they're getting to a website that they're not gonna convert at, and then you lost them.

[00:08:18] Your branding needs to be clear and consistent. If your branding is all over the place, people will not recognize you or worse, they just won't trust you. So if your social media is like rainbow colors of all over the place and then they get land on your website and it's just like a green naturey type website, they're like, well, is this the same business?

[00:08:35] And what is this? It creates a disconnect. We wanna make sure that everything is consistent. This, this falls aligned with the visual, select the colors. The fonts, the verbiage, so like how you're actually speaking, what language you use, all of it needs to be very clear and consistent in order for people to be able to go from elsewhere, like off your website, onto your website, and then to book to actually reach out to you.

[00:08:59] Your website also should make it easy for clients to take action. If people have to dig to find your pricing or your services or your contact information, they're just gonna move on, right? We're in, in like an instantaneous, we want results society. We need it to be super easy for clients to move through the process because if it's confusing, if they have to use extra brain power, they're just going to leave your website.

[00:09:20] So if you, again, if traffic is not your issue, you know that you're getting people to the website or you're getting people engaged on social media, but then you're not really getting the inquiries, it's probably time to fix your website before investing more in marketing. Okay, next, let's get into what you should cut from your marketing if something's not working.

[00:09:40] If you are short on time, you want to focus on what actually is converting for your business. Now, this sounds obvious, but it's something that most of us are still doing, myself included. Like it's a good idea to remove or at least reduce from your plate what's not working, and that's what we're, we're doing now.

[00:09:55] So, you know, full transparency, we're actually, now we're moving ourselves from not, we're moving ourselves. We're just not going to be posting in the future on Pinterest. It's not something that's generating, it's generating traffic to our website. We get tons of clicks to our portfolio pages because people are clicking on like elements of our branding projects and things like that.

[00:10:13] They like to look at that. But then we're not necessarily getting leads from software. So we've decided let's focus more, double down, more time on what's actually working for our business. So that's kind of a, a good example of how that plays out. Where Yeah, like you look at the platform separately, right?

[00:10:30] We wanna look at everything holistically. If you just were to look at Pinterest and be like, oh, this is great and you have tons of engagement, we have tons of people landing on our website, this is awesome. Keep doing it, right? But then when you look at where over purchase is coming from, where all of our service and our clients coming from it stop Pinterest.

[00:10:47] So I'm not going to do it anymore. We're releasing it. We're gonna focus on what works. So here's what to stop wasting time on for you. We don't wanna blindly post on social media without tracking conversions. We don't wanna spend hours on trendy content that doesn't attract ideal clients, and we don't wanna waste time on, on SEO or ads before your website is actually built to convert.

[00:11:11] A lot of people also pay for like Google keywords or AdWords, but their websites it built to convert and it's just a waste of money. So. You wanna get, make sure that your website is built to convert first, and you want to double down on what is working currently for your business until you have the capacity to expand that and to grow into other avenues.

[00:11:30] So whatever's working, whether that's email, oring, referrals, SEL, word of mouth, or something else that's bringing in actual inquiries to your business now. And I do wanna acknowledge that this can feel super scary, like you've been told to post, that you have to post every day on social media or engage post stories or whatever it is that you're doing.

[00:11:50] There's always a marketing person out there that's, that says you need to like be doing all the things right? There's always someone that says, you have to do this as part of your business. I call Bull what? You know, and it's just, but I can feel very scary and same for me, right? So like to just stop it feels really scary.

[00:12:07] But you have to remember that every single business is different. Different things work for different business owners, different business structures, different markets, different things that bring you joy, you name it. So I highly recommend looking at the data for what works in your business. You can let go of what does not serve you and your business best.

[00:12:26] You have enough going on to spend so much time doing something that's not generating a return. You are so busy already. Just focus on what is already working. Okay, before we wrap up, let's get into some q and a that you may be wondering based on everything that we've gone over in this episode. Number one, how long should you test something before making a decision?

[00:12:49] This is something that can also be very individual, like it depends on the platform and all that kind of stuff, but I know that people like to have estimates and ideas for something like this, so, and don't hold so tight on what I'm saying. I just want to give you somewhat of a reference point. I would give most things at least 60 to 90 days, depending if you go much past 90 days without any sort of uptick or difference or momentum or anything you may wanna reevaluate at that point.

[00:13:17] Now some strategies are more long term like SEO and things like that, so keep that in mind. But best practice overall is to evaluate by 90 days and see what you think there, and at least look at the data and see is there anything kind of churning or changing at this point. All right, another question.

[00:13:34] What are the signs it's working versus not working? How do I even know what's working and not working? We talked a little bit about the inquiries and seeing where people are coming from, but let's look at some other like examples of metrics and things to look at. So for signs that it is working is that you're getting consistent inquiries or bookings from your ideal clients.

[00:13:52] And the focus of that is like your ideal clients because you may be posting on a certain platform that actually is not your ideal clients, even though it's getting you, those people reaching out, right? There can be a difference between two avenues that get you inquiries. One of them are great clients and one of 'em results in not so great clients, right?

[00:14:10] So you wanna pay attention to that, and that's how you know that something was working properly. Another sign that it's working is that people are mentioning your content or your branded conversion and conversations. So people are saying things like, I saw your post about X, Y, and Z, and it really resonated with me.

[00:14:25] That's a sign that it's working because if that's the ideal client, they actually specifically referenc something that you've done that, that working, and you wanna do more of that. Another sign that your engagement rates are high and people are actively commenting, sharing, or saving your content.

[00:14:40] Another sign could be that your website can ruin random hurry, meaning that more visitors are filling out your contact form or booking services with you, or that your marketing efforts are leading to referrals because happy clients are now spending others view away. Here are some signs that it might not be working, or perhaps there needs to be some adjusting, is that you're getting views that no engagement, so your content might need stronger messaging, better visuals, or clear call to actions.

[00:15:07] Or here's another sign is that your website has tropic, but no inquiries. Your website may be confusing or lacking trust signals, or maybe not clearly communicating that your service, what your services are. See if you can see where they drop off in the Google Analytics and see what page that they're leaving from.

[00:15:22] Another tool that we talked about, I believe it was on the podcast with To Nest about email marketing. It's called, uh, it's a free tool. You have a paid version too. It's called Hotjar, and you can actually see how people are using your website and where they're actually dropping off. But like you can physically see like the mouse moving and you can see like more red in the areas of like, where people typically like stop or watch buttons.

[00:15:44] They typically collect things like that. It's really helpful. Another sign of something that may not be working or need addressing is people are engaging with your social media, but it's not translating to website clicks. You might be attracting the wrong audience, or your content isn't guiding it toward booking, so there's something to look at.

[00:16:00] Again, we kind of talked about how social media can be more of like a community platform versus a service generator, but still something, again, to take a look at in terms of how much spending on this and what return getting on that investment. Then another sign that's not working is that people are asking you these same questions repeatedly, which means your marketing might not be answering their key concerns upfront, or your website is not addressing the FAQs, or they don't even know how to access it.

[00:16:24] So a lot of things to think about when it comes to things that might not be working or need adjustment. Now, keep in mind with all these things I just went through, again, your business is individual. You might have different goals. You might like. There's just so many different things to keep in mind. So when it comes to this specific platform, it might not be as relevant, so just keep that in mind.

[00:16:44] I just wanna get the conversation going towards how should your brain be thinking about what's working and what's not working in your business. Alright, another question. What should I do if I'm getting website traffic, but no inquiries. First, you wanna check your website. Is it clear, professional, and easy to navigate?

[00:17:03] Does the brand feel cohesive between where they originated from versus your website? Does your site load fast? Do you speak to your ideal clients? There are a lot of things to look at on your website to make sure that it's not affecting those inquiries, because ultimately you're getting the traffic and not the inversions, either your website lacking or you're not on the right platform.

[00:17:24] You also wanna look at your services pages. Do they provide enough detail and include an easy way to book and core track you? Do. You have easy to read, call to actions with strong birds, like get started. Uh, you can customize, like walk my pup. Like you can get very specific with what action you want them to take so they know exactly what the next step is going to be when I click that button.

[00:17:43] You also wanna add trust factors to your website if you don't have 'em already. So that means testimonials organically scattered throughout your website versus like a review separate reviews page that people don't click on. So organic case studies, organic testimonials, guarantees can really make a big impact.

[00:17:59] And final question, how do I know if I should change my marketing strategy or just tweak it? So here are a couple things to think about if you are getting subtraction, but not the right results. Start by tweaking things before scrapping the strategy completely. So if you're, if you're noticing that like, okay, things are kind of moving based on what I'm doing, but it's not necessarily getting me the results I want, can we make small tweaks before just like scrapping it completely, right?

[00:18:27] If you're not getting traction at all, it may be time to shift your focus to a different platform audience or messaging strategy. If a strategy worked before but suddenly isn't, you wanna look at external factors. Is there like a seasonality, something going on? Algorithm changes or shifts in client behavior?

[00:18:42] You wanna look at what's going on that could have like externally. So it's not like a marketing strategy that's faulty, but like is the tech still working? Is there something going on in like the community that is impacted by, you know, an example, this would be like covid, where all of a sudden now things are shifting and it's not necessarily your marketing.

[00:19:00] That's a, that's the issue per se. You just wanna look at what's going on. Is there something that you can adapt to and adjust to based on something external so that you can pivot? When looking at marketing data, a lot of it, when done properly, can feel like detective work. You want to take the time to figure out what's working, what's not working, what can be tweaked, and you'll find yourself seeing more results in less time, which is really the goal.

[00:19:23] You wanna release what doesn't work and double down on what does. We have covered a lot in this episode and a lot of like very specific information, but if you are wanting some support on the next step to take, if you are struggling with pushing people to a website that you really don't feel so confident or when you don't know is working and converting for you, I highly recommend checking out our free seamless onboarding masterclass.

[00:19:45] It walks you through crucial mistakes and steps to take to get your website working for you. While, as I like to say, you are away from your desk or out with the docs. Because all the marketing in the world won't help if your website isn't built to attract and convert, and we can help you with that, whether it's through that free masterclass, one of our website templates, or a custom brand in website design.

[00:20:07] You can find out more about all of these in the show notes of the episode, including the masterclass. But that is all that I have for you today. Thank you so much for listening all the way through. You are truly awesome, and I will catch you in the next episode. Thanks for listening all the way to the end.

[00:20:22] I appreciate you being here, and if you enjoyed this episode, which I think you did 'cause you're still here with me, then I want to invite you to check out our website templates over@petmarketingunleash.com slash shop. As a podcast listener, I know you're serious about taking your pet business to the next level and your website is a crucial piece to making that happen.

[00:20:40] After all, your website is more than a digital business card. I. It's your virtual assistant, your marketing person, your booking manager, and it should be working for you around the clock, bringing in clients, saving you time, and growing your business. Our Pet Marketing Unleash website templates are not just pretty, they're also strategically designed for your type of business, built with search rankings in mind and are truly easy to customize.

[00:21:03] So you can launch a successful website and streamline your operations. You'll also get access to our signature course that shows you how to write website copy like a pro. Do foundational SEO, and set up your tech. So with a few clicks to customize, you have absolutely everything you need for our website that stands out from the pack.

[00:21:20] And as a thank you for being a loyal podcast listener, you can use the Code pmu podcast at checkout to get 10% off your website template. Again, that's PMU Podcast for 10% off your template. If you are ready to elevate your website and make it work as hard as you do, head over to pet marketing unleash.com/shop and explore all our templates.

[00:21:39] Also, if you love this episode, sharing it with a fellow prep nor or leaving a review and rating is a great way to support this podcast and keep it running. Thanks again for tuning in. I'll be back soon with a new episode.