If you want to walk dogs as a side hustle and earn up to $1,000 per month, then Rover is a company that you need to put on your radar.  It’s one of the biggest in the industry and it’s a great tool to help you connect with people in your neighborhood who need your help.  It’s a simple as creating a profile and then waiting for people to contact you.

The great thing about Rover is that you can control your rates and schedule, and best of all, Rover provides the platform so that you can focus solely on walking dogs.  Rover collects the payments, provides customer support as well as offers Rover Guarantee, which is a reimbursement program primarily intended to protect pets under your watch.  All you need to do is create a profile and wait for pet parents to contact you.  Yes, it’s that easy.

Whether you want to solely walk dogs or you don’t mind pet sitting for a day or two, then this is the guide for you.  In this post, I’m going to talk about how Rover works as well as how you can take full advantage of it to potentially earn hundreds per month simply walking dogs.  I will also talk about the many strategies you can use to get more eyeballs on your listing.

As always, I’m 100% honest and only recommend what I feel is worth your time.  Let’s begin!

How To Become a Dog Walker for Rover

Requirements To Become a Rover Dog Walker

Before you get excited about becoming a dog walker on Rover, let’s first decide if you’re eligible for the platform.

In order to qualify, you must be at least 18 years old and pass a general background check, that it’s.  As long as you don’t have a criminal record of sorts, you shouldn’t have a problem getting accepted.

No matter who you are, whether you’re retired, a college student or a corporate professional, they don’t care as long as you’re 18 years old older.

Background Check Information

To get started, you will need to conduct a background check via a company named Checkr, and Rover will pass along the fees to you, which is about $10 if you choose the basic option.  This is necessary to get started.

Now, when you sign up, you will notice there are two options, either a basic background check or a more enhanced one.  Of course, the enhanced one will cost you a bit more, about $35, but this is a one-time fee and can offer you more opportunities to gather customers.

And, if you’re wondering what the difference is, let me explain.

An enhanced background check will cover everything in a basic background check, which includes checking your personal information, the sex offender register as well as the National Criminal Database for any disqualifying criminal offenses.  The enhanced background check will then verify the information and manually check country court history based on your address for the past seven years.

If you choose the enhanced background check, you will get a “better” badge for your profile, which can add some credibility to your profile.  Some dog walker customers would rather see an enhanced background check walker rather than a basic one, but this isn’t always the case.

Nonetheless, if you want to get started, I would highly advise you to at least budget $35 to get started with just the background check.  Again, this is a one-time fee.

How Much Can You Earn Walking Dogs With Rover?

This is probably the most important question and it’s one that is hard to answer, however, I can provide an estimate.

On average, you should expect to bring in anywhere from $150 to $650+ per month, but this is going to depend on multiple factors, including the following:

• how often you’re available to walk dogs
• what times you’re available (people often need dog walkers during the morning and afternoon)
• your profile and ratings
• how much you’re charging
• where you live
• what kind of dogs you’re willing to walk

If you were available 24/7, for example, and you lived in a busy metropolitan area, then it wouldn’t be hard to get close to that $1,000 a month.  However, if you were to live in a rural area and you were only available for a few hours a day at night, then you may be lucky to break $100 a month.  This is why it’s hard for me to give an estimate as so many factors are involved.  What I would recommend is taking a look at the walkers in your by searching the website.  See what they charge, what kind of services they offer as well as take a gander at their profile.  I’m not saying that you should copy them verbatim, but at least take some ideas to turn them into your own to see yourself thrive on the platform.

NOTE:  Rover pays you via PayPal about one to four days after the job completes.  Customers will always pay in advance.

The Fees

Of course, you don’t get to keep the full rate since Rover has to keep the lights on.

You get to choose your rates, but Rover will take a chunk.  If you’re a new member as of this publishing date, you will be charged a 20% fee if you’re a Rover sitter or 25% if you’re a RoverGO sitter.

So, what this means if you charge $30 for a walk, they will pay you $25 if you’re a Rover sitter (80% of total) or $22.50 if you’re a RoverGO sitter (75% of the total is yours).

Lastly, if you’re a Rover Now member, the fees will vary depending on which city you’re working in.  Right now, it’s only available in a few cities, but from what I see, the fees can be as high as 40% in some cases.

What’s the difference between Rover and RoverGO?

Well, with the regular Rover service, you can market yourself and find the clients on your own.  Clients can pick you out and then you can decide if you want to work with them.  It’s up to you.

RoverGO, on the other hand, is only available in certain cities like Rover Now.  RoverGO is more like your Uber, where you can view at current job requests and select ones that you feel you can do.  In this case, you apply to the jobs rather than having the clients find you.  However, you do have to pay a 5% premium.  It’s up to you to decide if it’s worth it to you.

How Does Rover Dog Walking Work?

1. The first thing you will want to do is sign up for an account by following this link.
2. Then, once you sign up, you will have to conduct the background check, which will cost you at least $10.  Again, this is mandatory.
3. Rover will ask you for at least one testimonial from someone you know, and this is required to get your profile live.  You can do this via a text or call, but it should be someone that trusts you and can vouch for you to be a great dog walker.
4. Rover will then ask you to go through a tutorial of sorts, in which you will watch videos and answer questions after the videos are complete.  This revolves around safety while working with customers.
5. Lastly, you will fill out your profile, which will act as a resume of sorts.  This is where you will sell yourself.  Upload a few pictures, preferably of those with dogs and explain why you would be the best choice for a dog walker.  Don’t be afraid to sell yourself!

As you can see, there aren’t many steps.  Once you complete this process, Rover will manually approve your profile, which will take about 10 to 20 business days to improve.  You will be notified via email once approved.

NOTE:  It’s very important that you take your time on your profile.  I mentioned it earlier, but I will do it again.  Try to compare other profiles to see what other successful people are doing.  Basically, you will want to show that you truly care about walking people’s dogs and you’re not in it solely for the money.  The more comfort you can provide these pet parents, the more comfortable they can be in

How To Make Money on Rover

Like any business online or in person, the key here is to find clients who want to continue to hire you.  This will start with a good profile.

In your profile, you will want to describe who you are, what kind of experience you have as well as include as many pictures of yourself with dogs as possible.  These clients want to feel a connection to you.  And, while this may feel overwhelming at first, don’t fret, as Rover will walk you through the sign-up process to let you know what you should include.

In short, act as if you were hiring yourself.  What would you want to see?  Again, I can’t stress it enough that you should look at other popular profiles to see why people are hiring them.  There’s a reason.

I have no feedback, though!

This will be your biggest obstacle at first since many people will only hire those with reviews.  It makes sense after all, right?

Well, don’t let that stop you as you can market your Rover profile outside of Rover itself.   In fact, the company encourages it.  To find potential clients who can book you through rover, consider the following:

• post on a local Facebook Group
• tell everyone you know that you walk dogs
• post flyers around the neighborhood and/or community mailbox if allowed
• ask previous customers if you have walked dogs before

Again, it’s a business, so you will want to treat one like such.  Once you get a few reviews, it can snowball from there.

Aside from the previous tips, you may also want to consider lowering your rates at first to attract new clients.  This doesn’t always work because people may see you as being “cheap,” but it can draw in a few people to at least get you some reviews.  Once you get those reviews, you can then up them to a rate that works for you.  Only you can decide what rates work best for you.

Final Thoughts

If you want to walk dogs and earn money in doing so, then Rover is your number one choice.  I have done the research and no platform really comes close.  Wag, for example, is another option, but their fees are much higher, which sadly means less money for you.  Plus, since Wag works like Uber, you never know who you’re dealing with.

While there are other options, in which I mention here, I recommend you put most of your attention with Rover to make things easier.  While other sites are okay, I just feel there aren’t as many customer opportunities.

That’s going to wrap it up for now.  I hope this guide gives you a bit more guidance as to how Rover works as well as how you can succeed.  As always, if you want to add to what I have written or maybe you want to share your experience, you’re more than welcome to share your thoughts in the comments below.