We recently connected with Tiffany Chen and have shared our conversation below.

Alright, Tiffany thanks for taking the time to share your stories and insights with us today. Can you tell us the backstory behind how you came up with the idea?

During the COVID19 pandemic, my husband and I got our first puppy and we named him Sihtric. I was a first time pet owner and I never raised or even lived with a dog before! So, I spent all of my time searching for the right advice on how I can train my puppy and raise him to be happy and healthy. I wanted so badly to have the type of relationship where my dog is my best friend.

Right away, it seemed very strange to me how there was so many different point of views on how you should train a dog. Some say using positive reinforcement was the best way to go, while others say you have to punish your dog to make them listen to you. Harming my new puppy didn’t sit right with me, so I trusted my gut to train him using only positive reinforcement.

One day, I decided to make Sihtric his own Instagram to document his training journey! I began following different positive reinforcement dog trainers to educate myself. And I learned A LOT from these accounts, from dog enrichment to treat recipes to learning how to read a dog’s body language. I remember thinking “Wow, these are my people!”

At the same time, I was taking an online course called Virtual Assistant Internship. I was working a corporate job at the time and I was feeling very unfilled in my life so I decided to invest in this course to start a weekend business. In the course, they heavily emphasized on how finding a niche is the best way to start and grow your online business.

I began to wonder if my niche could be focused on Instagram and positive reinforcement dog trainers. I was thinking that if I can help them grow their business through content marketing, then I could help spread more accurate information about dogs and positive training.

Luckily, I had made a friend on Sihtric’s Instagram who recently graduated dog training school and obtained her certification. I reached out to her and asked if I can help her with Instagram in exchange for a testimonial.

We had a great first meeting discussing her business needs. We talked about her branding & style and we also came up with an Instagram strategy on the different types of content she could put out each day. After I learned about her and her business, I designed a template kit on Canva to match her exact branding and personal style. She started posting consistently everyday and used my recommended strategy.

After one month, she was able to book out three of her virtual group classes and gained 17 new clients. After two months, 2 companies reached out to her to be a brand ambassador. We were mind blown!!

I remember she said, “Tiff, you NEED to do this for other dog trainers and help them grow their business!” And that’s when I decided to finally launch Pawsistant!

I started by just sharing Instagram and Canva design tips. Within 6 months, I grew my Business account to 1k followers and my content attracted enough clients to quit my corporate job! In less than a year, I’ve worked with over 25+ positive reinforcement pet professionals to help them grow their business using only Instagram!

As always, we appreciate you sharing your insights and we’ve got a few more questions for you, but before we get to all of that can you take a minute to introduce yourself and give our readers some of your back background and context?

I am the owner and founder of Pawsistant LLC. My mission is to help spread the word about force free training by helping certified force free pet professionals grow their business on social media via content marketing.

I recognize that certified pet professionals spend a lot of time, money, and energy into their education. Their passions lie with helping pets and they don’t always have time to focus on marketing. That’s where I come in!

My main services include Social Media Management and Content Creation. I repurpose my client’s written content into shareable and save-able posts for social media. I like to say that they have all the knowledge and I have the creative eye!

I fully manage everything from creating the posts or videos, to being active on the platform, and engaging with others on their behalf. Because a big part to growing your business is to create a community and having a strong online presence.

I’m very passionate and proud of what I do. And I can honestly say I’ve never been so happy in my life! I work with people everyday who have the same values and passions as me. All of my clients make me say “Yep, these are FOR SURE my people!”

We’d love to hear the story of how you built up your social media audience?

The best advice I can give to those starting out on social media is to be yourself and provide tons of value! I’ve definitely had to experiment with different types of content to figure out what works best for my audience and the best type is usually the ones with really helpful tips and tricks.

When I first started my Instagram Business account, I posted on my feed and stories every single day of the week. I did this consistently for the first 6 months and after I felt like I had grown a presence, I started posting less to focus on other parts of my business.

The thing everyone should know about social media is that you have to give love to receive love! What does that mean? You have to provide helpful tips that serves your ideal client. You have to interact with others first by commenting, liking, or asking questions. You have to be genuinely interested without really expecting anything in return.

Can you open up about how you funded your business?

A great thing about becoming a virtual assistant is that you only really need to have your laptop and money to invest into an online course. I think I initially only spent about $500 into the Virtual Assistant Internship course. Instagram and Canva were both free online tools that I used to launch my business. As I slowly gained more clients, I began to invest into getting a website, a better phone, and a faster laptop.

Contact Info:

• Website: pawsistant.info
• Instagram: @pawsistant
• Facebook: facebook.com/pawsistant
• Other: etsy.com/shop/pawsistant