Social media campaign encourages pet adoption

The American Pet Products Association (APPA) hoped to add more bark to its social media bite to help encourage pet adoption. The nonprofit organization enlisted The Impetus Agency to help shine a social media spotlight on its Pets Add Life (PAL) campaign. The team created a detailed social media strategy across various platforms to share its message and took home top honors in the Best Use of Social Media category of PR Daily’s 2013 Nonprofit PR Awards. 

On YouTube

PAL paired heartfelt with humor through a YouTube video series featuring “Pet Interviews.” PAL worked with video creator Andrew Grantham to create a six-series collection of YouTube videos of “talking pets.” Pets “talked” about their desire for human companionship. The video series received 2,869,822 views and achieved viral success. 

On Facebook

PAL’s Facebook content includes updates about pet ownership news, fan-submitted photos, and questions to encourage fan engagement. Additionally, a “Call to Action” custom application was created to encourage fans to take a pledge to either adopt a pet, volunteer at a shelter, or capture and share a picture of an adoptable pet. 

PAL also launched a “Help a Shelter Out” contest that encouraged fans to earn cash prizes for their local shelter. PAL’s creative use of Facebook doesn’t stop there. The campaign created a contest for pet owners to submit poems about pets. 

On Twitter

To build engagement, PAL paired with celebrities like Lauren Conrad, TV personality and fashion designer, and Alison Sweeney, host of the popular television show “The Biggest Loser.” The mix of celebrity endorsements and timely content resulted in 7,245 clicks on important links on Twitter and more than 6,000,000 impressions. 

Social media has greatly helped PAL share its pet adoption message, no bones about it.

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