Pest Control or Animal Removal?
Since our beginning, we here at Frontline Animal Removal have always had somewhat of an identity crisis in a marketing sense.
This is because nuisance animal removal (think mammals) is a subset of the pest control (think insects) industry.
As such, “What does your business do?” is a legitimate question we’ve been asked numerous times and one of which we are acutely aware.
We believe it’s pretty easy for people to understand what we do and don’t do once they start looking through our web site, but getting people to our web site through all the pest control sites poses a challenge.
In this blog post, we describe the challenge of marketing nuisance animal removal related services in the broader pest control industry.
Pest Control/Exterminators vs. Animal Removal
People have been at war with creepy crawly things since civilization began…think of plagues of locusts and the Bubonic Plague.
As such, the lion’s share of the pest control industry focuses on insects and rodents.
The battle against termites, ants, mice, rats, bedbugs, fleas, etc. is on-going and is a multi-billion dollar industry in the US.
But, it is not a battle in which Frontline Animal Removal has chosen to be a part.
We don’t consider ourselves exterminators and don’t kill any insects or manage rat/mice problems. We almost exclusively remove mammals(excluding rats &mice) from people’s homes. Therefore, it is neither ethical nor financially prudent to market ourselves as an all encompassing “pest control” company.
Can you feel our frustration then, when even close friends refer to us incorrectly as “Frontline Pest Control’?
If you’re thinking right now, “Not a big deal…Get over it…What’s in a name?”, bear with us. As the following examples show, this pest control/animal removal semantics issue is real and affects us often.
Consider the following three scenarios:
- A Canton homeowner believes squirrels are living in her attic
- Neighbors have alerted a Kent couple that they’ve seen bats leaving a dormer on their home the last few evenings
- Tenants inform an Akron landlord that raccoons have been keeping them up at night
We’ve chosen these three animal removal problems because they are great examples of what we do! We can solve these problems and have for many clients.
But, because of the pest control / animal removal issue, there is a chance the three homeowners in the scenarios might never know we exist and can solve their problem if:
- Missed client #1 enters “Pest Control Canton” into a Google search. Try it on your computer. Frontline Animal Removal is nowhere to be found. It’s like we don’t exist to this homeowner. Ads for Industry Giants like Orkin and Terminix dominate the top of the page. Our advertising budget is way too small to compete.
- Missed clients #2 got on their smart phone browser and entered, “Kent Pest Exterminators Bats” and, again, Frontline Animal Removal is nowhere to be found in these search results. But, by entering “bats”, we are getting closer.
- Missed client #3 jumped on Bing/Yahoo and typed in “Pest Removal Akron”. We did show up on this search with an ad, but not in a very noticeable position and not at all in the organic search results with this one.
We point these realities out not to complain or gripe. These are the realities of web marketing and we accept them.
Also, please don’t read this piece as a pity party! Truth be told, pointing out this marketing dilemma is all of part of our solution/strategy to compete in the pest control market in the Akron, Canton, Kent, OH area.
And, if we have the tenacity to solve web marketing strategies, you can bet we have the tenacity and skill it takes to solve your bat, squirrel, raccoon or other animal problem!
All we ask is that if the situation affords itself to you in the future, help your family, friends, and co-workers make the distinction between pest control and nuisance animal removal when they are trying to find a service provider.
Solutions for Portage, Stark, and Summit County Residents With Animal Control Needs
So whether you want to call it pest removal, pest control, pest extermination, or anything else…if you have a problem with an unwanted animal in or around your property, give Frontline Animal Removal a call.
