Dogs Trust Loughborough: Photos, Info and Jobs!

Did you know there's a brand new Dogs Trust rehoming centre coming to town?

Dogs Trust Loughborough will be opening late Spring / early Summer. The centre will be based in Wymeswold, Leicestershire, to cover that area of the country (although, as ever, if you have a UK address and can visit as often as you need to, you can rehome from any centre).

Recently we held an Information Day at Loughborough Town Hall to share information on our plans for the centre as well as career opportunities. There are over 38 job openings in at least 13 different roles... more about that in a moment!

First, here are some great photos from the day, many featuring Nikki Smith, the new Centre Manager, whom we warmly welcome to our team.

More information about what to expect from the centre can be found on the Dogs Trust Loughborough page on our website. This will be kept regularly updated, so it's the place to look for opening dates, events and more. You can also follow the centre on Twitter @dt_loughborough, so do go and say hi to Nikki there.

So, about those jobs! Here's where you can find the details on our website. The closing date for most of them is February 3rd, with interviews taking place from late February, so there's still a little time to think about your application.

Please note: it's important to carefully follow the instructions given for each individual role, as most require an application form (no CV), though some might require a CV instead (with a supporting statement). If you're not sure which, or you have any other questions just drop a line to our HR department. You are welcome to apply for more than one position. Part time roles are indicated.

Salisbury's Seb was SO ready for his closeup...

Supporter Relations Officer Leslie Gold Carley at Dogs Trust Salisbury (follow them on Twitter) recently discovered the power of a rehoming appeal by video. This is Seb's story in her words...

Just a few weeks ago we started using video here at Dogs Trust Salisbury to help publicise our dogs. The idea, of course, was to let people see them in a different light. We all know that people respond to still photos of dogs – after all, what’s cuter or more appealing? – but would harnessing the powers of video help some of our dogs find new homes?

The very first video we shot was of Seb, a young Collie who has struggled to find a home in part because of a medical condition. Seb is also very much a full-on Collie, with behaviours that are delightful to those familiar with the breed, but which the average first-time dog owner might not be prepared for. So we took video of Seb playing with his tennis ball and posted it, tweeted it, and Facebooked it. You can see the result below.

In the meantime, a very nice gentleman had come to the rehoming centre and spoken to the staff about Seb. He was interested, but wasn’t sure, so he went away to think about it. Then he went online and watched Seb’s video – and suddenly, he said, he saw Seb as a normal dog who happened to have a medical condition. He saw the dog he wanted to call his own. He came back to Dogs Trust and reserved Seb, and took him home this past weekend.

We always knew Seb was a star! We’re delighted we were able to use video to help Seb find his forever home, and we wish him and his new owner all the very best as they settle into their new life together.

Now…who should we film next?

Puppy Tweets: Woof in 140 characters?!

I had to give a heads up to this brilliantly bizarre blog post on Dogster today: Twitter for Dogs Who Can't Type.

It's all about Puppy Tweets - a Mattel-manufactured sound and movement sensitive tag which transmits a selection of 500 preset tweets from your dog. All you need to do is set up the account and use the USB receiver. The device, clipped to your dog's collar, does the rest.

I'm aware of a good number of tweeting dogs that we follow (and that follow us), but so far I have reason to believe they've been hypnotising persuading their owners to do it for them. I guess this makes it easier for those of the non-opposable thumb persuasion...

Dogs Trust gets two commendations at Golden Twit awards!

Jacqui and I were delighted to head off to the Golden Twits last night - the first UK Twitter awards. We were up for a gong in two categories: Best Charity and the Public Vote.

The Best Charity category was decided by the judges, and here we narrowly missed out on the top prize; congratulations must go to Action for Children and Keep Britain Tidy. However, the judges still awarded us a Commendation for our interaction with supporters on Twitter, so we were pretty happy with that.

The Public Vote was a collection of all the votes cast across all categories. The top ten was announced a few days ago, but we didn't know the final order. We were thrilled to discover we'd come second out of all 200+ nominees!

This earned us another Commendation, which we were really happy about. In the end, it's lovely to be judged by professionals as being good at what you do, but in this weird and wonderful world of social media it's what your supporters - the people following your Twitter feed and interacting with you online - think that really has an impact.

It's great for us to know that the people who talk to us every day, who ask us questions, rehome and sponsor dogs, fundraise for us and are generally big fans of the whole dog world, think we're doing well enough to vote us into second place.

We promise to keep up what we're doing well and find ways to improve, and we wholeheartedly thank you all very, very much for every vote.

See? We knew we had the best followers...

Here are all the places you can follow Dogs Trust on Twitter:

@dogstrust

@dt_educ

@dt_glasgow
@dt_canterbury

@dt_honours (retired for now, but we'll start it up again for the 2010 Honours next year!)