In what geographies should THS spend its marketing?

THS News & Feedback
1

THS Forum community, in interests of helping THS Management then thought brainstorm input on geographical focus for THS marketing budget. This may include attraction of new pet parents and new housesitters.

THS does not publish data on the number of pet parents or housesitters; the number/location of confirmed housesits; the trends in numbers over time; or other relevant metrics. The only publicly available metric seems to be the number of active housesit listings. As at 27 May 2025 then THS has 9,805 active listings with the following geographic profile:

9,805 - 100% - Worldwide
5,129 - 52% - US
3,471 - 35% - UK
453 - 5% - Australia
306 - 3% - Canada
273 - 3% - Schengen Area
60 - 1% - Asia
59 - 1% - New Zealand
29 - 0% - United Arab Emirates
20 - 0% - Africa
5 - 0% - South America

Note: For simplicity, Schengen Area is defined above as Europe excluding UK

Relative to current percentage spend then in which geographic area would you like THS to spend more/less of its marketing budget? And on pet parents or housesitters?

By way of example, we are experienced international housesitters and we would love THS to spend marketing to attract more Pet Parents in Schengen Area.

2

THS has previously said it wants to focus on U.S. growth. Not surprising, given the market size.

3

Considering how small the UK is compared with the US we still have the relatively biggest share

4

I agree with this statement

5

Latin America. This is where i have been and will be spending a significant amount of time. I feels like there are more sits in Latin America all the time, but it is a very slow growth.

6

This is a more complicated question than it might appear. I have a suspicion that there is more to THS than meets the eye. Only they can know what their long-term strategy is, and the marketing approach needs to align to that. For example, are they planning to eventually offer pet products to homeowners? In that case, targeting their marketing to the geographic areas where the margin on pet products is highest (low cost products, easy shipping) would make the most sense for them. Or are they planning to integrate with real estate listing firms to better match potential home buyers with homes suitable for pets? Targeting their marketing to countries where this market is appealing on many levels would be the way to go. Are they planning to get bought out by, say, an AI firm who wants to use the underlying data from all the reviews to feed a model? Only THS knows.

It is easy to assume that the intent is to have more homeowners plus more sitters. But I’m not sure about that. That might just be a “land and expand” strategy - let’s get lots of members so we have lots of data and lots of insights into what homeowners and sitters want. And then turn the key to our real strategy of selling - doggy sweaters (I made that one up!)

Having said that, in my ideal world every home would be available for sitting and every pet would have someone to love them twenty-four hours a day. So I am doing my part to tell everyone who will listen about Trusted Housesitters, so they’ll sign up. If each of us tells three people, and they tell three people - word of mouth might go farther than any marketing budget ever could. I would love, love LOVE if there were more Schengen-area sits, as that is the prime area of interest to me (and further love it if they would allow us to exclude UK sits from searches for Schengen sits, since most Schengen-legal folks are not UK-legal from a sitting standpoint).

7

I think that many THS sitters are dissuaded from visiting the US, because of the tourist visa restrictions and how robustly these have been implemented recently. Many European and British sitters would like to see more sits available this side of the water, in the Schengen zone. Yes, there are restrictions on the number of days non-EU sitters can stay, but this is manageable. There must be many owners in countries such as Holland, Germany, Poland and Italy to name a few that are unaware of THS. Now that I think of it perhaps there’s a gap in the market for me to exploit.

8

Marketing dollars are usually based on likely return on spending, as lines up with a company’s strategy, as well as timing. That’s because even if a company ideally wants X, it might not be able to realistically achieve that in the short or mid-term.

What spending is done is usually heavily driven by cash liquidity. So it often doesn’t matter if members want X in X country — the key thing often is, where does the company get the fastest and greatest return on each dollar spent (lowest hanging fruit), because that then allows them to make enough to invest more (otherwise they risk running out of money).

That’s why the U.S. is such an appealing market for so many countries — it’s huge in numbers of consumers, has the world’s biggest developed advertising targeting network (easy to pick which type of consumers to surface advertising to at lowest cost). Plus, for THS, it’s already culturally acceptable to many U.S. consumers to have a stranger sit.

Marketers usually are asked to track nonstop and show return on investment for each dollar they spend on digital advertising, for example. Marketers who can’t show healthy measured returns often end up fired. So why would they pursue riskier spending vs. pursuing the lowest hanging fruit? Few would be rewarded by their current employers. Plus, they would have a harder time getting future employment that’s good if they have crappy numbers from previous jobs.

9

This is a very interesting question. It would be awesome if THS’ advertisement could help to bring forth a huge mental shift in countries where welcoming a virtual stranger in your home goes totally against the way people live, to show that there is a way of leaving your pet in safe hands when traveling, creating a win-win situation for all involved. Sadly, at least in Italy, many dogs are still abandoned in the summer when everyone and their uncle takes their vacations.

For this reason, I vote for Schengen area, or at the very least Italy.

10

Language will be an obstacle to growth in many countries . The website and App already has many glitches and there are many frustrations with membership support services who already seemed overwhelmed and unable to cope with current demand .

Imagine how much investment would be needed to create a fully functional multi- language website ( or even just a bi-lingual one ) and a bi-lingual member support services . Not impossible , but expensive .

11

I know that even people in “ordinary” locations manage to get THS sitters, but I think it would make sense to market to places that people want to visit where THS could be a good alternatives for travellers with pet sitting experience. I’m always on the lookout for Paris, London, Madrid, etc. I think more sits in those areas would attract more sitters so it would be a win/win for the company. But they could also do something to market to extraordinary unique homes in different settings. Maybe offer homeowners a discount in certain locations or if they can offer certain amenities.

12

It would make sense to spend on

Locations where people have pets (not farm animals and such) that others want to visit
Where people are open to sharing their home or petsit and have a reasonable chance of seeing eye to eye and communicate in a common language
Where people need a petsitter (cultures where families live together probably don’t)

At present I think the Schengen area makes most sense. And key would be towns and cities - cats, dogs, rabbits and such, easy to travel to, lots of pet parents. Probably many «attractive» sits, like easy cat sits and such, where it would be matches and mutual member satisfaction for host and sitter.

People from key member groups like US and UK are interested in the Schengen area too. One might argue «what if they are hosts and not sitters». That is also a source of growth - dual memberships.

And get us a Schengen-search. For the same reasons.

13

@Peonie19, italy sure is a nice place to visit. We completed a housesit, albeit brief one, in Italy earlier this month. Lovely experience.

14

I love everything about Italy , the food, the scenery, the culture, the history, the architecture, the people, the wine and did I mention the food ? :rofl: :face_savoring_food: :spaghetti: :pizza: :wine_glass:
so I am in favour of the idea of something that would deliver more house sitting opportunities in Italy …

However one reason many Italians take their vacation and leave in August is go to cooler locations . I think it would be extremely difficult to attract sitters to house sit in Italy for those extremely hot summer months when as you say all the locals have left town because it’s just too unbearable . Many restaurants and family run businesses are also closed in August or run with less staff . It wouldn’t be a mutual exchange .

15

I never paid that much attention to THS’ marketing, and I learned about the site from a friend.

But I just looked and - well, I think THS is doing it wrong! (Sorry THS, love ya, mean it) For example, I think a key demographic for marketing would be veterinarians. Vets are motivated to ensure their charges are well cared for. I had a cat that required daily medication, and it was my vet that helped me find local sitters capable of succesfully pilling my fluffy boy when I was out of town. If a vet knew about the THS program, they could similarly tell me, who clearly had such pilling experience, that I could catsit for other cats in other places. Plus veterinarians are generally already trusted by pet parents. And they have organizations like the “Feline Veterinary Medical Association”, where you can get to all the vets in one fell swoop with the conferences or mailings.

Instead, from what little I can glean from public searches, THS is going after Instagram and TikTok “influencers” who have 5,000 followers or more. Many, many successful THS sitters - and eager homeowners - are of an age where Instagram and TikTok are not a thing. The Instagrammers and TikTokkers that I know are either too young to own a house, or they are of an age where travel is super challenging because of family obligations. Those who are digital nomads, responsible, and able to travel freely might have 5,000 followers but about - I don’t know, Minecraft or craft beers or flowers or whatever. Not necessarily followers who are into travel or who care about animals.

By contrast, the average veterinarian has at least 1,000 active clients - all animal related. And those clients all have friends who also have animals.

I’d target my marketing efforts to veterinarians over TikTok dancers any day. A quick search indicates that there are roughly 330,000 veterinarians in loosely-defined Europe. Of those, roughly 65% are vets for companion animals and thus for THS-types. So ~214,500 humans to reach with the THS message. That’s a very manageable target market.

16

I agree that demographics not necessarily say «TikTok». It is also a concern that the terms of TikTok really says that they harvest all your personal data they can put their hands on, which could be a problem also for businesses.

For the veterinarians I’m sure you’re right about conversations of sitters. As a sitter I am not sure if I want to be recommended by veterinarians. Not because I am not quite able, but because it could influence the perception and expectations of the host towards me, expecting and requiring services more towards «a professional service».

17

Speaking personally as a sitter, anywhere EXCEPT the UK, US, Canada and Australia. I will be using the site a lot less frequently because sits everywhere else are few and far between. Once you factor in desired dates, length of stay, intensity of pet care needed, and access to public transportation or a loaned car, I typically have zero choice.

With that said, I don’t know what priorities control THS’s marketing choices. Based on other platform developments, I sincerely doubt that sitter preferences is in even the top 5 motivations.

18

@Silversitters, maybe but where’s there a will then there’s typically a way. Technology solutions advance such that there must surely be options. Even much smaller platform Nomador has a ‘translate with google’ feature for non-english listings.

19

What I meant was that the veterinarian would recommend to me, as a sitter, that I join Trusted Housesitters. And then it is back to the normal host- and sitter relationship. And vice versa.

My most recent kitty passed away at the ripe old age of 21. Never, not once, in any of his many vet visits (or those of his siblings) did I hear about Trusted Housesitters despite frequently asking advice about what to do when I went out of town. If my vet had simply said, “Oh, I’ve heard of this service called Trusted Housesitters - you should check it out”, it would have been wonderful.

Or if, when I took my boy to the vet when she taught me how to give shots and subcutaneous fluids to him, she had said, “Oh, now that you have this skill you would be an in-demand sitter for Trusted Housesitters - you could travel all over while helping cats!” - that would have helped me, the cats, and the vet. Because the vets don’t want the homeowners skipping meds or treatments either.

So all I’m saying is that Trusted Housesitters’ marketing spend would be best targeted toward raising awareness with vets, who are the true influencers in the animal kingdom. It would be easy enough to find out by running a pilot program in, say, a Schengen country and measuring the impact to site enrollment.

This takes planning, of course. If I were running the campaign (and hey, THS, I’d be happy to if you give me a buzz) I’d start by targeting an area that has high sitter application rates and high satisfaction scores already, to increase the chances of the recommendation working out well (homeowner enrolls and gets suitable applications instantly versus waiting months and months). And it would be worth finding out which vets are the most influential within a region with their peers, and doing a personal outreach to them (for example offering them a trip to another country to try THS for themselves - this is just one idea. Most vets would say no but the offer would get their attention) Or a lobby-worthy book of true stories about animals that were saved by a vet thanks to the timely intervention of a THS sitter. And a basket of pet toys or treats for them to give away to their patients with the THS web address on it.

What you don’t want is a client asking their vet, “Hey, I heard about this thing called Trusted Housesitters - what do you think?” and the vet saying, “I’ve never heard of it”.

20

Not every Sitter is interested in the same things, same don’t care about eating out and attractions.
Even the people who live in the cooler locations of Italy go on vacation; some have time off in months that are not August, for instance at Christmastime. Or teachers, who enjoy a longer break than most, not to mention people who travel for work.

In my opinion the biggest hurdle would be being comfortable with a stranger occupying their house.