Catblogging Explains Pet Business Trend


Embrace Pet Insurance BlogLaura Bennett, the CEO of Embrace Pet Insurance, and one of our guest experts here on the topic of pet industry trends, invited me to write about my pets over at the Embrace Pet Insurance blog. Having been an observer of the trend of catblogging, I decided to give it a try.

My little essay about the joys of having two working cats is posted — check it out.

Catblogging is a trend — I kid you not. Hey, the word is even in Wikipedia, which defines catblogging as “the practice of posting pictures of cats, in typical cat postures and expressions, on a blog. Sometimes a comment on the cat or the situation shown is provided.” No less an authority than the New York Times wrote about the practice of catblogging, noting: “To some, the point is that posting pictures of their animals provides a chance to introduce a softer personality into blogs that are often hard-edged.”

Why is it that people who are intent on politics or business or technology will take time out to post pictures of their cats and write about them?

I think it’s because our pets make us feel good. It’s one of the same reasons that pet-related businesses are such a popular trend today. As the customer, buying stuff for your pets makes you feel good. As the business owner, working with pets and people who love pets makes you feel good, too. Never underestimate the power of the “feel good.”

9 Comments ▼

Anita Campbell Anita Campbell is the Founder, CEO and Publisher of Small Business Trends and has been following trends in small businesses since 2003. She is the owner of BizSugar, a social media site for small businesses.

9 Reactions
  1. Anita, I’m sure I’m not the only one who has done this, but my family and I created a MySpace page for our dog, Bugs. So far he has three friends: Tom, my daughter and her friend’s dog Chief, who also has a page. Can we call this “DogSpacing”? 🙂 ~ Janet

  2. Anita Campbell

    Dogspacing — I love it! Maybe you can add that as a new term to the Wikipedia entry on blogging words.

    Too bad http://www.dogspace.com is taken, Janet. Would have made a great knock-off site for dogs. 🙂

  3. Pets are increasingly becoming more and more a part of the Internet. I have added my pets photos to forums that have dedicated pages for members pet pictures. I like the MySpace page idea – might have to try that!

  4. Can I register another vote for Dogspace! Hmm maybe that’s an idea I should blog about…

  5. Hey Janet! Love the “Dog Spacing”. Great name for a new pet supplier. I also have added my pups photos to internet pages, people love it.

  6. Pet pictures are almost guaranteed to lighten the mood of any blog or website. I also have 3 pets that “clock” in everyday. My dog takes up every inch of space under my desk while I’m on the computer. I wouldn’t trade my co-workers for anything!

  7. The thing about cats is once they get online it’s hard to pry them away from the computer. Then they start stealing your wallet and running up your credit card bill on Russian catnip, freeze-dried mice, and mouse-cam accounts in Taiwan.

    I suppose it would be safe for me to start a frog-blog, though. His flippers can’t reach the keyboard.

  8. Anita Campbell

    Yeah, you’ve gotta watch out for those mouse-cam accounts. 🙂