KennelSource Archives > Technology
Tuesday, August 24, 2010 at 4:38:33 PM by Edward Knittel
Everyone knows that having a website is critical for a successful business. But a website alone is not enough to spell success. It has to have a lot of well-written, relevant content to maximize SEO. Not only should it look good and be easy to navigate but it should also be easy to update.
If you're in the pet care industry and you don't have a website or if you feel like your current website and developer aren't doing enough to get you ahead consider contacting Tasty CMS and see if they can help you out. They offer a complete website and content management system that puts you in control of your website.
Tuesday, August 16, 2005 at 8:41:47 AM by Daniel Rubenstein
Pet businesses are becoming increasingly popular as a means for disgruntled professionals to leave the workplace and begin an adventure as an Entrepreneur. By in large part, this new breed of business owner in the pet industry is very tech savvy and they are competing for top placement amongst the search engines on the internet with the same vigor that they compete for actual customers. In fact, nowadays the former typically leads to the ladder. Most prospective customers are now doing their research on the internet first before making a call. Therefore, websites are becoming the lifeblood that brings in new customers. It is therefore of the utmost importance whether you have been in the business for a long time or if you are just starting out, that your website stands out, provides useful and meaningful information that is related to the industry, and contains content that is going to keep a prospective customer to stay on the site. Recent statistics gathered from a pet business in Chicago showed that over 25% of new leads were generated through their website but the national average for the length of a visit to any site across all industries is only 11 seconds. How then, you might ask, would this company be able to generate so many leads if people generally only stay on a website for such a short time? The answer is simple: they are blogging there way to the top of the search engines. Furthermore, they are keeping their prospective customers, users, clients parked on the site by creating a blog with interesting content that is related to their pet business or our wonderful industry.
Wednesday, June 22, 2005 at 10:46:00 AM by Daniel Rubenstein
Dear Region 2 Members -
It has been quite a few weeks since we met at the Region 2 Conference. Although this is a bit belated, I wanted to extend my thanks for giving me the opportunity to make my presentation to you. I hope that you found the information that I provided interesting and educational. Have you followed up on some of the ideas shared at the conference? I hope so. If not, it’s never too late! I know that we reviewed a great deal of information but if there was one thing that I wanted you to take away from the presentation, it was the information about blogging. Blogging as you may remember is a term labeled by website gurus which simply means the free form exchange of articles, information, thoughts, ideas, etc. among Users via a website as directed by the website managers/owners themselves. Today, it is the most effective tool (cost effective as well) for smaller websites like yours gain ground on the ever popular search engine listings. Don’t be fooled by expensive search engine optimization companies (SEOs)! They will charge you a lot of money to “optimize” your site. It simply is not as effective. Why you may ask? It is because they are so popular that everyone is doing it. So simply put, if you are doing something that everyone else is doing while at the same time competing for the same position on the search engines, the inevitable course of action is that in all likelihood over time you will end up exactly where you started. The fact is that the great search engines today are looking for great content. Google which is tops on everyone’s list uses some very complicated algorithms to produce their page rankings. As a pet business owner the exact algorithm is not important for you to understand. What is important for you to understand however and the one thing that is known in the world of technology and websites about Google’s ranking algorithm is that they put the most amount of weight (importance) on the relevant (it must be relevant to your business) content of your site. And blogging is the most effective means of delivering that content. Next week, I will post the rest of the material that we covered at the conference (which includes some very useful tools and sites that help measure your websites performance). For your own edification, please be sure to visit our site as I will post the entire presentation via our blogging engine (www.kennelsource.com).
For more information about blogging and how to start using this powerful tool, please feel free to contact me directly at 718-801-5590. As I had mentioned at the conference, I have started a small office here in the Northeast and would welcome the opportunity to speak with or come meet with you to discuss blogging and your other technology needs. In the meantime, I would like to invite you all (Vendors Included) to submit a FREE listing on our site for your business. Due to blogging and good relevant content, our site is now ranked in the top ten for our users relevant search strings. We therefore have a large amount of traffic to our site which even includes searches for Dog Daycare, Boarding, Grooming, Training, Etc. Since we are not in your business, that traffic on our site ends up on our listing page. From there, our users can find your site. That is, of course, only if you submit a listing. For vendors, we get many searches and requests as to what information and materials are needed to start a kennel or related pet care business. Please take just a few moments and click on the link below, follow the instructions, fill out the form, and we will have your listing up in a day.
http://www.kennelsource.com/listings/how.asp
Take care
Thursday, June 02, 2005 at 8:31:01 AM by Edward Knittel
I came across Lori Verni's latest web site this morning while perusing the various dog stories via Google News. The press release entitled "A Goldmine of Free Dog Training Information Launched in a Full-Scale Attack on Euthanasia Rates and Family Heartbreak" caught my eye and of course, with a title like that which promised a wealth of free information I had to check it out. Without a doubt I can say that her web site is chock-full of dog training information and articles about behavioral issues.
And although the web site is clearly being used to market and sell her new book (which I have not read so I can't pass any judgement) I have to say she did a great job. The site looks nice, has a DTD of XHTML Transitional and she chose to use a web development company to make sure it all came together nicley. All of which is important since freedogtraininginfo.com uses WordPress for its content management (a.ka. blog software) and the design is based off of a stock template. This solution appears to be a quick, easy, and effective one.
But putting all that aside, Lori's web site is FULL of information and is probably worth a visit to see what she's got. Congrats.
More information from Free Dog Training Info
Wednesday, May 25, 2005 at 8:03:39 AM by Daniel Rubenstein
On May 12th, 2005, Dan Rubenstein, President of KennelSource, presented “Tech Simple”, a fundamental guide to what every Pet Business Owner should consider for making sure that they have the right technology plan in place. The pet business owners that Dan presented to, typically do not have the time to dedicate to insuring that this critical component of their business is well attended to. In addition, most businesses in the Pet Industry are small to medium sized and cannot afford to have their own technology department or even a staff person for that matter. Therefore Dan stressed that companies should hire a consultant or company to assist them with their technology needs and planning. The money that is invested now in technology planning will pay huge dividends in the future as there will be no need to adjust the core components of the plan if it is well thought out.
Dan went on to educate the attendees about the critical components of a good technology plan as they relate to their specific business. These include Hardware, Software, Networking & Communication, Security, and, of course, Websites. Each of these components in and of themselves are important but when they are encompassed in one plan which takes into consideration all of the components together, it will make doing business a whole lot easier.
For a FREE technology assessment and information on completing a Technology plan, please contact Dan at drubenstein at kennelsource dot com.
Monday, May 02, 2005 at 3:12:35 PM by Edward Knittel
When I dig through our web server referral logs I can see how people find our web site based on the words that they are searching for. Obviously, we're concerned about phrases like "boarding kennel software" and "dog boarding software" among others (for Pawtracker™ of course). But it's not unusual to see people finding our web site for searches like "dog grooming and boarding 60181" because of our growing pet listings.
Unfortuantely, while our listings expand nearly every day (and we encourage all of you to add your pet business) we just can't list every single one right by your house. But there's a great service that can even though you may have never heard of it - Google Local.
So, say you are looking for "dog grooming and boarding" in the "60181" zip code: this is what you'd see. Each business entry has an address, phone number, a link to their web site. There's also a map that shows each of the entries in relation to and proximity to each other. It works even better if you supply an address (like, say your home address). So if I wanted to find "dog grooming and boarding" near the KennelSource headquarters "205 N Michigan Ave, Chicago IL": this is what I'd see.
Obviously, this will work for any business type out there as well (pizza, office supplies, etc). But I thought I'd offer this bit of unsolicited advice to all of our visitors looking for local kennel.
More information from Google Local
Tuesday, February 15, 2005 at 1:53:50 PM by Edward Knittel
I bet you're wondering "Who won for Best Portugese Water Dog at this year's Westminster?" The answer of course is Ch Freestyle Ocean Breeze. The truth is you can get all the results for every breed being judged at the 129th Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show through the Wesminster Kennel Club website. They even have a picture of the Best of Breed and Best of Opposite Sex.
But doesn't that seem rather passe? Wouldn't you like to be right in the middle of the whole thing? To be able to see your favorite breed and not just the filtered broadcast available on USA Network? Well, they've got that covered this year.
Now you can view video for each and every breed being judged. Everything for day one (February 14th) is available online and as breeds are being judged today those videos are being added as well. They're not short, one-minute clips either. No, these are 10 minute videos showing every dog being shown in the breed down to the judging and awarding.
It's great to see a prestigeous organization with such a rich and long history adopting to the technology available today.
More information from The Westminster Kennel Club
Thursday, August 12, 2004 at 11:51:27 AM by Edward Knittel
Genetic Savings and Clone, whose headquarter is in Sausalition, California announced last Thursday that the company is ready to start filling orders for cloned pets. You may recall hearing about the them three years ago when CEO Lou Hawthorne and company announced that they had cloned the world's first cat. This more recent announcement comes after Bengal kittens Tabouli and Baba Ganoush were born 9 weeks ago - becoming the second and third cat clones.
Five customers are paying $50,000 each for a clone of their own cats, which the company expects to have available by December. The company also said it has several hundred clients paying $150 a year plus an initial $900 to preserve tissue from living pets for future cloning. The first cloned cat_a calico named CC for Carbon Copy_cost the company $200,000 to produce.
"But when can we expect to see cloned canines?" you ask.
Cloning dogs presents more of a challenge, but Genetic Savings now hopes to produce a dog clone this year.
More information from Yahoo!
Friday, July 23, 2004 at 9:38:01 AM by Edward Knittel
It's 10:00 pm and you're all ready to go to bed. With your pajamas on
you pull the sheets back and get ready for another restful night's
sleep. But wait, did you remember to close the gate? What if the dog
gets out again? You don't want to be running through the neighborhood
searching for him again at 3 in the morning do you?
Well, Global Pet Finder thinks they have a solution that might be right
for you. It's a GPS tracking system that attaches to your pet's collar
and sends a messge to your cell phone or PDA if your pet goes beyond
the boundaries that you have set up.
Software checks the
pet's position constantly. When it passes the default boundaries, an
alert is triggered, and owners receive a text message. It will say,
'Your pet has left' and send the exact location. Locations will be
identified by street name and number or, for certain cellphones, by
maps. The system is designed for any area covered by a GSM cellphone
network.
The company is not yet to market but they are taking
pre-orders through their website. And in good faith, until Global Pet
Finder brings their product to market they are not accepting any money.
Ultimately there is a price to be paid for the product and service. The
system has a one time cost of $289(US) and a monthly service fee of
$13(US).
Whether Global Pet Finder will be successful remains to be seen. But
ever since man has first domesticated animals he has spent some time
searching for them. Perhaps now we will rest a little easier.
More information from Global Pet Finder
Tuesday, June 29, 2004 at 4:02:30 PM by Edward Muldong
I found a very interesting product called Bow-Lingual made by Takara Co. The product claims to translate dog’s barks and body language into English. The Bow-Lingual analyzes your dog’s barks to determine which of the six emotions it is feeling: happy, sad, frustrated, on guard, assertive and needy. It has a database to record the 100 most recent barks. It also has a “Home Alone Mode,” which records your dog’s barks and emotions up to twelve hours while you are away. Besides the translation feature, the device also gives training tips as well as a medical checklist.
I did notice that you have to calibrate the device for the specific breed of your dog. This makes me wonder does each breed have their own “language?” Can a Golden Retriever talk with a Poodle? Can a German Shepard from Japan talk with a German Shepard from America?
A test model tried the week before it was made available to the public had mixed results. Those who want to believe that their dogs are talking to them think the Bow-Lingual is great. Those who were skeptical going in remained skeptical heading out.
Last week, the Bow-Lingual was tested at the Chicago Anti-Cruelty Society's animal shelter. Surprisingly, the first thing out of the test dog's snout wasn't, "Get me out of here!" Instead, it seemed to translate the dog's bark. After fidgeting with Brassy, a 2-year-old Akita mix, for about 15 minutes--adjusting her collar, making her sit still and then trying to get the perfect picture--Brassy's first bark was one of frustration.
On the translator screen appeared Brassy's first words: "Enough is enough." Later, after bringing out another dog to get Brassy to bark, the screen displayed her new thoughts: "I might bite."
It turns out, the shelter people said, that the two dogs have never liked each other. Although the bark sounded the same to the untrained ear as Brassy's earlier barks, the Bow-Lingual said differently.”
Source: Chicago Sun Times
Can you actually be your very own Dr. Doo Little for $150.00? True or not, caring and loving your dog is still the best method of communicating with your dog.
More information from Takara USA
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