What is Petfinder?
Petfinder is a website that allows rescues and shelters to list their pets on their platform and allows potential adopters to search the website with their list of criteria to find the perfect pet for them. Listing your shelters animals on Petfinder is an important step to getting your animals adopted.
Why use Petfinder?
Petfinder is the first and largest adoptable pet search, averaging 6.5 million unique visitors each month. Potential adopters can type in criteria like - what breed their looking for, if the animal is kid friendly, their size, their age, etc. and the website will list all the animals that meet their wants. Potential adopters can then click various animals and find out more information, see photos, and contact the rescue they reside in. It allows people to find pets without leaving their house and is a huge success with over 25 millions pets adopted since they created their service.
Not only is Petfinder a great resource to help a rescues animals get adopted, but once registered with Petfinder, rescues will have access to Petfinder Pro where there are adoption resources and articles on all sorts of topics.
Lastly, once an organization is a registered Petfinder organization they will be eligible for medical, disaster, and enrichment grants from the Petfinder Foundation. This opens up possibilities for organizations to grow, expand, and help even more animals.
Using Petfinder on both the rescue and adopters side are quite easy. Use the following instructions to jump start your rescues Petfinder.com account.
How to create a Petfinder rescue account
1. First you will need to register your organization at https://www.petfinder.com/register/ This application process includes filling out a Veterinary Verification Form and creating a personal user account. After these steps you will wait to be contacted by the Petfinder Outreach Team within 3-5 business days.
2. After your approval you will be able to access Petfinder Pro and be able to list available animals on the Petfinder website. See article on "How to write an enticing Animal Description" and "How to take a great photo of Cats + Dogs" for tips on how to get your animals up for adoption, noticed.
How to get potential adopters to your PetFinder page
So you've now created a PetFinder profile for your organization, you've listed your amazing pets, but now what? Well, you need to get potential adopters to know the resource is up and running. PetFinder provides free resources to list adoptable animals on your Facebook page that updates when your petfinder images are updated. Use the link from PetFinder to follow instructions on how to create the Pet List Scroller . You can also post on your social media and website to let people know that you're now on petfinder. Make sure to include a link and a short description so potential adopters understand PetFinder and how to get there.
Note: When posting to Petfinder, it is best to use a high resolution image in good lighting WITHOUT any added template or collage app. People will want to see a full screen image of the animals they're interested in. Canva templates and other editing platforms are perfect for posts on Facebook and Instagram but not Petfinder.
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