Social Work

This community has helped over 1000 dogs to be adopted – Dog with Blog

• ByStartupStory     |    September 8, 2021

“Adopt don’t shop” Abhishek Joshi, a digital marketer by profession, started Dog with Blog, a community to help stray dogs get adopted and engaged in taking care of them within the campus as a student at Amity University. He told Startup Story over an interview. Continuing he said that they started a blog on wordpress posting pictures of dogs accompanied by contact details that could be adopted primarily in Delhi NCR. All these adoptions were free and he would vaccinate and sterilize these dogs before they were put up for adoption.  They have helped around 1000 dogs to be adopted. He furthered the community by starting a website and a blog so that the traffic of adoption increased. Currently they are also covering topics through their blogs including pet care, FAQs on their site.

What made Abhishek start the community?

Abhishek shared his memory as a child, while he was growing up his father worked in the forest department and they had dogs around. So, he and his sister developed a fondness for dogs. They were always surrounded by dogs. He also disclosed that everyone in their family loves dogs. “There is no difference in the love of a dog whether it is a highly bred one or a stray dog” says Abhishek pointing out to Startup Story that by adopting a dog from the street “You are allowing him a better life.”

Further Abhishek explained that most people are influenced by watching movies or other sources to pet a certain breed without completely looking into the kind of conditions that are appropriate for the breed. His attempt through his blogs and pieces of work is to subtly enlighten people regarding these things as well as make them more prompt to adoption. He tries to show it in the positive light rather than using negative images to lure people’s attention. He likes to share successful stories of adoption.

When was the Dog with Blog started?

Abhishek started the community in 2009 while he was still in college at Amity University, Noida. Where he was supported by 20+ people at campus at first subsequently, more people started to join in and by the first six months of initiation they had around 7000 people in the community virtually.

They were all connected through social media to promote and generate awareness amongst people regularly creating adoption posts and helping mediate adoptions for families. Abhishek also spent a day with National Geographic when they wished to feature Delhi as the eyes of a blogger and later down the line he also worked with Himalaya pet care.  He wrote pet care content for them, ran contests and generously gave away pet care products to families that needed them for their pets and couldn’t afford these products.

“Try finding your niche and work on it. no matter and this could become a part of their career.” Sharing his own experience he said that being into digital marketing and having created a community helped him with his placement. Moreover, down the line it helps him to become more creative.

Abhishek told us that he did not have to put in special effort to make the community known as the development was mostly organic in nature. As people started joining he started receiving queries from other cities where people were interested to begin something on similar grounds.  He thought of extending the good work beyond NCR so they started to collaborate.

Balancing work and the community

“Dogs and Digital are the two loves of my life.”  For Abhishek the community is an integral part of his life and so he does not mind the extra hours he might have to put in it. He said “I do not mind taking a few minutes to quickly create a post for adoption or answering a query regarding adoption.  He is aware that every single post he puts up is going to help a dog or puppy find a home. It simply comes naturally to him. He also said that he immensely loves being creative digitally and it helps him improve certain aspects of his career as well.

People who engage in adoption

Abhishek told us that he has had experience interacting with different kinds of people. Some of them are particular about a breed. Which Abhishek ignores because he does not consider them serious enough to adopt. He really appreciates the people who wish to know more and are genuinely concerned if they are ready for making an adoption. He is also open to clearing certain doubts or misconceptions people might have regarding adopting dogs that do not belong to a certain breed.  They also make follow up calls just to make sure if the dog is happy with its new family. It is getting better as far as their approach is concerned, he says.

How Do The Dogs Reach Their New Family

Abhishek told Startup story that it was quite simple before the pandemic as people could easily commute and collect the dogs. They could manage this through people travelling to certain cities and willing to help. But since the pandemic they are trying to make the adoptions nearby.

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