What my dogs teach me
Announcements, awards, birthdays and more!
Are you stymied about how to start a blog? Stuck three-quarters of the way through writing a memoir? Wanting to get a more consistent look and style with your client handouts? Needing information about self-publishing? I can help!
Continue reading “IAABC Writing Mentorships With Eileen Anderson: 2020”
Note: The recording of this webinar is available for purchase at the links below.
Have you struggled to protect your dog or your client’s dogs from intrusive sounds?
You’ve probably heard the advice to cover a dog’s crate in heavy blankets or even acoustic foam if the dog is scared of thunder. But does this practice create a barrier against sound? How much? Are you sure?
Continue reading “Sound Decisions: A Webinar on Dogs and Sound”
This course is not currently available, but will be re-released.
If you are a professional dog trainer, you probably have to write a lot. If you have a small business, hiring a copyeditor every time you put out a document is not feasible. But my new course provides a practical way to help you create more polished and professional writing.
You can learn how to edit your own writing.
Continue reading “Edit Yourself: A New Writing Course for Dog Professionals”
Thank you to GoPetFriendly for another opportunity to learn about other pet blogs and to showcase my own. These are my answers to the 2019 Pet Blogger Challenge.
Continue reading “Eileenanddogs 2019 9th Annual Pet Blogger Challenge”
I’m pleased to announce that I am offering writing mentorships for trainers and behavior professionals through the International Association of Animal Behavior Consultants (IAABC) again in 2019. The mentorships will enable professionals to improve their writing and better represent their businesses. Mentees who make the most of the course will leave the mentorship with documents they can immediately put to professional use.
Continue reading “IAABC Writing Mentorships With Eileen Anderson: 2019”
Six years ago today I published my first ever blog post. By now I have published 304 (this is #305) and have 184 drafts in the works. I love blogging and I appreciate every kind word and constructive suggestion I get. Thank you readers, old and new! Here’s what’s going on for the dogs, for me, and the blog this year.
Continue reading “Eileenanddogs’ Sixth Anniversary!”
These are my responses to the questions from the Go Pet Friendly Pet Blogger Challenge.
For those who may be visiting your blog for the first time, how long have you been blogging and what is your main topic?
I have been blogging since July 2012: five and a half years now. My focus is positive reinforcement-based dog training. I have an interesting niche because I am fairly well versed in behavior science (for a person without credentials in that field) but I am not a professional trainer. So one thing I do a lot is to analyze my own klutzy training errors (sometimes with video). Sort of a real life “Don’t do as I do.” I also write about misconceptions in dog training and produce some more technical articles about learning theory.
What was your proudest blogging moment of 2017?
I think it was being able to blog about the successes of my formerly feral dog Clara. Clara got a rough start in life with no human contact. She came to me at about 10 weeks of age. She accepted me as her family, but every other human was greeted with growling. With the help of a fabulous trainer and friend, we did slow motion catch-up socialization for six years. There were some long plateaus, and even some steps backwards. But I realized this year that Clara has become resilient. She is more relaxed at the vet than most “normal” dogs. She is confident in new locations. She is much more comfortable with people. She has always been fabulous at home; now I can share her with the world a little bit. I blogged about this in November.
A Milestone for Clara: Socialization Work Pays Off
Also, a post of mine on conditioning my dog to the sound of Velcro got picked up and purchased by Clean Run magazine. (That’s in addition to four articles I wrote directly for the magazine this year.
Which of your blog posts was your favorite this year and why? (Please include a link.)
It’s a tie between the post I wrote about my dog Summer and one where I defined a functional assessment in dog training. They are very different. The post about Summer was a tribute to my non-dramatic dog, my quiet dog, my alter ego. I wrote it before I knew she was sick. I published it after she died of canine hemangiosarcoma.
Changing gears a bit: my post about functional assessments may sound a bit dry, but actually it is a great help for people trying to find or assess a dog trainer. Putting it bluntly: hacks and one-size-fits-all trainers don’t do functional assessments. They don’t study the dog’s behavior, determine what is driving it, and design a plan with those things in mind. In the post, I explain the functional assessment and its purpose, and I teach readers how to recognize when a trainer is doing one.
What’s a Functional Assessment in Dog Training and Why You Should Care
In terms of your blog, how do you measure success?
Besides the usual—hits, shares, and comments—I feel that a post is a success if someone tells me that it changed the way they looked about something or helped them with their dog. I’m also very proud of my posts that are on the first page of Google, especially in the top spot.
In what ways has your blog changed during 2017?
I’d like to think that my writing has gotten tighter. When I first started blogging, I let my posts run as long as I felt like. I have always edited a lot, but in the past couple of years, I have started editing more for length. I don’t want to be one of those people who take advantage of the tolerance of their readers. I want to make things as pleasant and smooth and non-wandering as I can.
What was the biggest blogging challenge you overcame in 2017, and what did you learn that could help other bloggers?
When things get hard, what keeps you blogging?
I hope I don’t sound like a jerk here, but things never get really hard for me when blogging. Some of the other writing and editing I do can get to be a chore sometimes. But blogging is dessert. I love it. I don’t have any problems thinking of things to write about—I have 100+ partially written posts in the works at any given time. Motivation isn’t a problem. Just carving out the time.
Looking forward to 2018, what are you hoping to accomplish on your blog this year?
I haven’t had a blockbuster post for a while. I like serious posts that bring something new to a subject. I have a couple in the works, including one on Herrnstein’s Matching Law. I’m excited about that. Yes, I’m a nerd.
In addition to what you’d like to accomplish, is here one specific skill you’d like to improve or master this year?
I am working on setting up schema for my blog posts. It’s a way of adding coding to the posts that tells Google in a language it understands about the topic and technical aspects of the post. Posts with schema often appear in Google search results with a photo included and are presented in a more attractive way. I’m actually starting on my dog dementia blog and will get to Eileenanddogs.com a bit later.
Now it’s your turn! You have the attention of the pet blogging community – is there a question you’d like answered, or an aspect of your blog that you’d like input on? Share it here, and we’ll answer you in the comments!
I would love to talk to others who are working on schema and other SEO enhancements of their blogs, especially WordPress users. I have specific questions about how to edit the WordPress code directly after using a plugin to set up schema. If anyone can help me with that, please comment! I’ll be happy to offer some other kind of technical support in exchange.
Thank you to Go Pet Friendly for the 8th Annual Pet Blogger Challenge!
Copyright 2018 Eileen Anderson
Five years ago today I published my first blog post.
It included this training blooper movie I made, still one of my favorites. If you’d just like a smile today, stop right here and check out the video.
When I set out to be a blogger, the main thing I knew was that I had something to say. A lot of things to say. The problem was that I was Continue reading “Five Years of Eileenanddogs”
My book won!
I’m proud to announce that Remember Me? Loving and Caring for a Dog with Canine Cognitive Dysfunction has won a Maxwell Award for 2016. The Maxwells are awarded yearly by the Dog Writers Association of America. My book won best book in 2016 in the category of Behavior, Health or General Care.
The winners in all categories were announced at a banquet in New York City on February 12. I didn’t get to go, but a friend texted me as soon as it happened. I’ve been on Cloud Nine!
I thank the Dog Writers Association of America for the recognition and honor of the Maxwell Award.
I’m running a celebration discount on the PDF version. The PDF is available on my Dog Dementia website, and I’ve marked it down from $12.95 to $9.99.
Click here or the “Add To Cart” button to buy the PDF.
The PDF is designed for both pleasant online viewing and a nice print copy, so it’s like getting two versions in one. The print is large, at 14 points, and the photos are in color. Here’s a sample page. The discount will run through midnight on March 21, 2017.
In addition, Amazon and Barnes and Noble seem to be having a price war. They have marked the paper book down from $15.99 to $11.48 and $11.36 respectively.
My book is also available in Kindle, Apple iBook, Nook, and Google digital formats. You can buy all the formats here.
Please feel free to share this announcement with anyone who has a senior dog. My book can help!
Copyright Eileen Anderson 2017
Thank you to GoPetFriendly for the Pet Blogger Challenge. This is my third time doing the challenge. I always enjoy it, and I’m looking forward to being introduced to some new blogs from other participants. Continue reading “Eileenanddogs: 2017 Pet Blogger Challenge”