New Data Finding: More Pets Posted = Higher Save Rates

Shelters that post more of their pets to Adopt a Pet and Petfinder have higher save rates than those that post fewer of their pets — with shelters that post all the available pets in their care having save rates five percentage points higher. 

This new analysis by the Best Friends data team comes with a clear call to action: Post your pets! 

Seen = saved should be our industry’s new slogan because it highlights how important it is for pets to be visible to the public. After all, how can someone who hasn’t met this cat or that dog form a connection with them, and want to adopt them, if they don't even know their name, or their story, or how much they love to snooze in the sun?  

How would they even know the pet exists, and needs a home? 

This is not just intuition. The Best Friends data team recently set out to look at Adopt a Pet and Petfinder data, to see what, if anything, would be revealed that could be used by shelters to save more lives.

Looking at over 1,000 shelters with an annual intake of more than 300 pets, the team found that not only is there a significant correlation between the proportion of pets posted to these adoption platforms and a shelter’s save rate — but it can be quantified.  

Just to repeat, because it’s so important and striking: On average, shelters that post all their adoptable pets have save rates 5 percentage points higher than those that don't. 

What does a 5 percentage point increase in save rate look like? For a shelter that takes in 1,000 pets per year, that's an additional 50 pets who could go home each year!

There is a correlation between save rate and the share of pets posted — so even if you can't post them all, data supports getting as many as possible on the adoption platforms.

Share fully personalized bios, when you can. Recruit volunteers and fosters to help, if staff time is in short supply. You can also use AI tools like Petfinder’s Magic Bio to help.

Did you know that you can even streamline the process by having your shelter management software automatically post pets to Adopt a Pet? Most of the popular shelter software programs can be automated with Adopt a Pet. And Petfinder has a how-to guide on how to link your shelter software, as well.  

Now post your pets and save some lives! 

How we did it — the nitty gritty: The data team started by taking a snapshot of the pets posted on Adopt a Pet and Petfinder on a single day, for each shelter whose data we examined. We have intake and save rate data for each of the shelters that are part of this analysis, and only included shelters with an annual intake of over 300 pets.

We calculated what percent of that shelter's total intake for the year was posted on each platform. Assuming an average length of stay for pets in care of 15-30 days, a shelter can expect to have 4-8%* of its total yearly intake in care on any given day. Not all of a shelter's pets are up for adoption right away (due to quarantine, stray holds, or other reasons), so we used a threshold of 3% or more of a shelter's total pets for the year being posted on a platform on a given day as indicative of the shelter having posted all available, adoptable pets. 

Finally, we compared the group of shelters that met that threshold to shelters that did not meet that posting threshold — and saw the 5 percentage point difference in save rate!

*Let's assume a shelter takes in 1,000 pets per year and each pet stays 15 days. That means there are 15,000 (1000 x 15) "stay days" in a year. To calculate the percentage of the yearly intake that is in care on a single day, we divide 15,000/365 to get approximately 41 pets in care on a given day, or about 4% of the total intake for the year. If the stay length is 30 days, using the calculations above, you'd expect 82 pets in care on any given day, or about 8% of the total intake for the year.