To promote your animal shelter’s or rescue group’s adoptable dogs effectively, you need high-quality photos and compelling descriptions of them. But how do you write pet profiles that stand out from the crowd and draw attention? And how do you craft bios that are uniquely tailored to each dog’s personality? Let’s look at a few ideas!

Do Some Brainstorming

Before you get started writing, take some time to think about the dog’s personality, behavior, and characteristics. Then jot down what comes to mind. What stands out about the dog? Does he know any commands or tricks? Does she have a signature pose or a silly quirk? Is the dog energetic, playful, active, shy, or calm? Does the dog have any specific needs? And, of course, don’t forget about the basics – such as age, breed, gender.

Don’t just rely on your own impressions of the dog. Ask other volunteers who have spent time and interacted with the dog about their observations as well.

Pick a Bio Type

The Basic Bio

As the name suggests, this type of dog bio simply focuses on communicating the basics about a specific dog. Think: age, breed or breed mix, gender, health issues (if any), and observations about behavior.

Descriptions like these are often thought of as boring, but there’s really nothing wrong with getting to the point quickly, without all the fluff of a super creative bio. Remember to think of your target audience here – do they care about creativity or do they just want the facts about a dog? Sometimes, the answer can be… both.

A rescue group, for example, may appreciate a very basic bio when deciding on whether or not they can place a shelter dog with one of their foster caregivers. But they may also want a creative bio that they can later use to promote the dog to prospective adopters.

So, what’s a content creator supposed to do? Write two bios? Chances are, you don’t have time for that. Instead, you could combine the two approaches in one bio, highlighting the basic facts in a bulleted list or in bigger font and then adding a few creative lines with key traits emphasized in bold letters or italics.

The Personality Bio

This is probably my favorite type of dog bio to write. I just love capturing a dog’s personality in a creative way. In writing about a dog’s personality creatively, I find that it helps to think about that dog’s adorable quirks, highlight-worthy skills, and unique character traits. If we want shelter dogs to go to homes where they are treated as family members, then I suppose it makes sense to also promote them in a way that supports that notion, right?

Here are two dog bios I wrote for inspiration:

• Blue
• Jester

And here’s a (very short) story I wrote about Aldo, a former shelter dog, hoping to draw attention to him.

Keep in mind that those were written as blog posts, so they are meant to be a bit longer. If you’re writing bios for social media, you may need to keep them somewhat short. Check out these tips for copywriting for social media.

The Interview Bio

The interview format is a great way to tell prospective adopters in a fun, creative way what you want them to know about a dog. There are so many ways to truly let a dog’s personality shine here. It’s about more than just asking interesting questions and answering them from the dog’s perspective. Think about the dog’s character traits and his or her behavior. What are some adjectives that come to mind? Silly? Confident? Timid? Clever? Strong-willed? Adventurous? The language used for the answers should reflect the dog’s personality.

Here are a few interview topic ideas for inspiration:

• Hopes and dreams for the new year
• Holiday wish list (it’s a forever home, right?)
• Likes and dislikes
• Where does the dog see himself/herself in five years (with his/her forever family, right?)
• Silliest thing the dog has ever done
• What the dog is looking for in his or her forever human
• What the dog will bring to his or her forever home (Fun? Cuddles?)
• Favorite activities
• Noteworthy skills (tricks or commands the dog knows, things the dog does that stand out as silly or funny)

The Résumé Bio

With this kind of bio type, you can highlight a dog’s top skills, talents, features, and characteristics in an easily digestible list format. The dog’s résumé could focus on “applying” for a forever home, for example, while creatively drawing attention to the dog’s unique personality traits and skill set.

Let’s say you’re working on a bio for a hound who loves to howl. Could he be an aspiring singer? Does his experience include “serenading” fellow shelter residents with melodic original songs? Could a noteworthy highlight be that he has given “concerts” in the shelter’s yard or from within his kennel?

Or what if your rescue has a canine who has revealed herself to be very… treat motivated? Could she be described as a “treat aficionada”? Has she ever “acquired” a treat without asking? Or charmed a volunteer into giving her yet another treat? Could those “events” be listed under “achievements”?

Or do you have a shelter/foster dog who often receives compliments on her showstopping looks during walks? Could she be highlighted as a “conversation starter”?

Could a dog who likes to show off silly ear poses be characterized as an “ear acrobat”? Does he have a signature pose that could be listed under “key features”?

And could the bio for a clever, talented dog who knows things like “sit,” “stay,” and “speak” point out his “impressive repertoire” of basic commands and tricks? Has that dog ever entertained volunteers by showing off his tricks or commands? And if so, can they be listed as “achievements” or “experience”?

Review for Completeness and Edit for Plain Language

Before you share your dog bio with the world, take a bit of time to review it to make sure it’s ready to be seen.

Is the dog’s profile complete and accurate? Did you mention everything that a prospective adopter should know?

Which words did you use to describe the dog? Are you using plain language that people who aren’t familiar with the shelter and rescue world will be able to easily understand?

For example, did you use terms like “decompress”? Would a prospective adopter know what this means? Think about what you really want new adopters to do. Do you want them to give their newly adopted dog time to relax and adjust to his or her new home and environment? Will the dog need a quiet, comfortable space away from other pets during the “decompression period”?

It may be helpful to have someone else who is familiar with the dog you wrote about take a look at your draft. They may be able to offer valuable feedback and help you refine your dog bio.

Bonus Tip: “Recycle” Your Writing

Break up a Bio into Several Social Media Posts

To make the most of your writing efforts, you can take key phrases from a bio you crafted and create multiple social media posts with them. That will help generate awareness for the dog and allow followers to truly get to know him or her.

Let’s assume you were trying to promote the howling hound mentioned above on social media. You may want to feature the full bio in one post and could then take a few key parts from that bio to highlight over the course of several days or weeks. One post could include a video of the dog howling in the yard and the accompanying copy could read something along the lines of: “Just [dog’s name] serenading volunteers and fellow shelter residents with his signature song.” While you want prospective adopters to know about the howling, you don’t want to give the impression that this is all the dog does, right? So, other posts could show the dog on a walk, snuggling a volunteer, or sitting for a treat – whatever you mentioned in his bio.

Use Your Previously Written Dog Bios as Templates

Writing a dog’s bio takes time. Lots of it. To speed up the process a bit, you can take a profile you’ve crafted previously and use it as a sort of template or outline for future bios of the same type. Your résumé bios will likely all have a similar layout, and while you’ll have to tailor each to a specific dog, you won’t have to start completely from scratch.

Keep a List of Linguistic Elements to Repurpose

You want each dog’s bio to be crafted just for them. But this doesn’t mean you can’t ever repeat words or word combinations that fit that dog’s personality simply because you’ve used them before. In fact, it’s a good idea to create a list of some terms and phrases that you think may work well for another dog’s profile in the future. You can then draw inspiration from your own linguistic database!

Here are a few examples of terms such a list could include:

• Conversation starter
• Ear acrobat
• Ear acrobatics
• Showstopping looks
• Signature pose
• Statement-making coat
• Treat aficionada
• Treat connoisseur
• Treat enthusiast

The more bios you write, the longer your list will likely get. To keep it useful and make sure you’ll quickly and easily find what you’re looking for, you can organize it not only alphabetically but also by parts of speech (noun, adjective, adverb, verb, pronoun, etc.).

Do you have any additional tips or ideas for writing dog bios? Share your thoughts in the comments below!

And: If you need templates for your dog bios, check out Canva – it’s an easy-to-use design tool that can help you create beautiful, scroll-stopping graphics.

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