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Your Toolkit for a Spooktacular Halloween

Published on 10/9/19

 

 

From carving pumpkins to getting dressed up in costumes, Halloween can be a great holiday to bring a little fun into your practice and engage your customers. It’s also a great opportunity to educate pet owners on the dangers that Halloween can bring for their pets. To support your practice in making the most out of this holiday, we’ve built a Halloween toolkit - complete with resources and tips on how to use them!

 

1. Pumpkin Carving Stencils

 

It’s the signature event of the holiday: carving pumpkins! Your community may already be riddled with ghosts and scary faces carved into the orange squash. While your practice should carve (or paint!) whatever reflects your brand and personality, we’ve got heart eyes for these Cat Breed Templates and Dog Breed Templates from Better Homes & Gardens. If you give them a try, take a picture and tag us on social media so we can see it!

 

We’ve also created a simple template to let your patients know that while Halloween is all about the scary things, your clinic is Fear Free Certified.

 

Here are some fun ideas to incorporate pumpkin carving this Halloween:

  • Boost employee morale by hosting a fall fun day after hours or on a day your clinic is not open. Carve or paint pumpkins and display them proudly out in front of your building!
  • Host a pumpkin carving competition for your customers. Ask them to carve a pumpkin (maybe of their pet!) and post on social media, tagging your clinic. This spreads awareness of your practice to their followers! Choose one lucky winner randomly or by voting as a staff.
  • Print out a few pumpkin stencils (there’s a ton online, just make sure you give them credit for their work) and staple your practice’s business cards or a coupon for a new client discount to the stencils. Seek out local pumpkin farms/markets and ask if you could leave the free stencils near their register for customers to pick up when they buy their pumpkin. You may help them carve their pumpkin while also gaining a new customer!

 

2. Client Education Resources

 

Mummies and ghosts aren’t the only scary things about Halloween - a dog ingesting trick or treat chocolate would be really scary to a pet owner and strangers dressed up in costume constantly ringing the doorbell can be really scary to a pet. Help your customer avoid the anxiety that can come with Halloween by using these client education resources from our online Marketing Resources Library:

 

 

To access the full Marketing Resources Library, you must be signed in to pennvet.com. Don’t have a User ID? Request an account!

 

 

3. Something For The Younger Ghouls & Goblins

 

It’s important that young pet owners understand that, while sharing is caring, sharing your trick or treat haul with Fido is NOT caring. To help educate the children that come into your practice, we’ve created two educational coloring pages that you can print out:

 

 

Want to get creative? Here are a few tips for using these coloring pages:

 

  • Get out in the community! Sign up for a table at a local fall festival or participate in a community trick or treat/trunk or treat event. Have these coloring pages handy and either hand them out or provide crayons for kids to color them during the event.
  • Provide crayons or colored pencils in your waiting room for kids to color them while they wait for their pet to be seen. Proudly display all of the finished products around your practice.
  • Get in touch with local after school programs or daycares. Offer to send one of your staff to talk to the group about pet safety during Halloween and leave them with the coloring pages as a follow-up activity. Ask if you can also leave business cards for their parents to pick up - include a new client discount!

 

4. Frighteningly Good Homemade Pet Treats

 

Although dogs and cats can’t participate in all of the yummy Halloween candy and treats that humans do, there are a lot of fun recipes out there for homemade dog and cat-friendly treats. Here are few that we found that we’ll definitely be trying this season:

 

 

These are great pieces of content to share in your October newsletter to your customers or on your practice’s app!

 

5. Halloween Photo Booth

What’s cuter than a Halloween photo booth? If you have space, set up a little photo booth at your practice for pet owners to take photos of their pet on their cell phone. Include a hashtag you’d like them to use when they post on social media or ask them to tag your practice’s account! Here are some great ideas to get your Halloween photo booth going:

 

We’ve also created some Free Photobooth Props that you can download, print, and cutout! Simply glue them to sticks for pet parents to hold up to their pets. If you have someone on your team who’s really crafty, they could make some for your practice as well!

 

If you don’t have space in your practice for a photo booth, here are some alternatives:

 

  • Get involved in a local trunk or treat where participants and take photos with their pets at your trunk.
  • Host a Halloween get together at your local dog park and set a photo booth up there.
  • Print a few photo booth props for customers to take after their visit to your practice. Ask them to post a picture of their pet with the prop using a certain hashtag or tagging your client. Choose a random winner to receive a prize!

 

We hope this toolkit helps bring some spooky Halloween fun to your staff and to your customers!

 

 

Check out our previous blog post that shares what we learned at the NAVC eCommerce Summit!

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