Services — Online Classes
Get the knowledge you need without leaving home.
Get help from a professional who understands the pet industry and your business (all without having to put on pants).
Want to learn more about marketing?
Whether you’re the DIY type, or just don’t have the budget to hire a pro, learning about marketing online can be a great tool to grow your business!
I currently offer online classes on a limited basis through The Fenzi Dog Sports Academy. Each class runs approximately once a year, with three enrollment options: bronze, silver, and gold.
Bronze students receive access to all lectures, videos, and trainings related to the course. They have read-only level access to the discussion forum and homework forums, where silver and gold students ask their questions and receive instructor feedback. They also receive access to the FDSA Study group where they can discuss the class with other students (note: no instructor involvement or feedback is included at this level).
Silver students receive everything included in the bronze level, plus read and write access to the discussion forum where they can discuss the class with other silver and gold students, ask instructor questions about the lecture and get individualized feedback on TWO class assignments.
Gold students receive everything included in the silver level, plus they have read and write access to the homework forum, where they have their own unique thread where they can submit class assignments and receive instructor feedback throughout the course.
Business End of the Dog: Marketing for Pet Professionals
Do you run your own pet-related business? If you’re a dog trainer, groomer, or another pet professional with your own business and you struggle with marketing your business, this class is for you. Whether you’re new and trying to figure out where to start, have been marketing your business for a while and just aren’t seeing results, or have enjoyed a ton of success but need to figure out what’s working and what’s not… Together, we’ll create a marketing strategy that’s right for your business.
We’ll cover how to create a marketing budget, how to successfully experiment with various marketing channels, and, ultimately, how to create a custom strategy that gets real results.
Class expected June 2023.
Push It! Treibball Foundations and Problem Solving
Want to build your distance control and connection with your dog while participating in a great new sport? Or maybe you’ve always been fascinated by herding, but don’t have sheep. Check out Treibball!
Sometimes called “ball herding” or “urban herding,” treibball is a cross between billiards and soccer that you play with your dog. It’s perfect for a dog who is retired from other sports, dogs new to the sports world, or reactive dogs (since most venues restrict access to the competition field).
Who should play?
This class is structured for beginner and advanced teams alike. Lectures will cover the basic rules of the game and the foundation skills through to novice to get beginners started. However, more advanced players are welcome to join at Gold or Silver for problem solving and additional help including (but not limited to) help with: control around the balls & stimulus control for pushing, not biting the balls, directionals, steering, adding distance, building confidence for the game, and more.
Melissa has earned her CH. title on her german shepherd Riley through the ATA and is now working on her titles through NATE. Students are welcome regardless of their venue of choice.
Come learn about this relatively new dog sport!
Please note: All lectures in this class will be released on the first day of the class, to allow students at different levels to work on the skills they need most. Students are encouraged to work at their own pace.
Class expected 2023
Business End of the Dog: Building a WordPress Website
A website is often the first impression your future customers will have of you and what you do! This class will help you build a first-in-class website for your dog business — good for trainers, breeders, or any other dog business.
A professional will charge you thousands of dollars to design your website, but with a bit of help from Melissa, you can have the same outcome for just a fraction of the cost.
Whether you’re looking to replace your existing WordPress site or build a new one from scratch, this class can help! We’ll walk through the entire process of building a website, starting with purchasing the pieces you’ll need. Tutorial videos will show you every step of the process and lectures will help explain what each piece does and how they work together.
Students who follow along will walk away after 6 weeks with a completed site ready to release to the world! We’ll be using WordPress and the WordPress Theme Divi, from Elegant Themes, to create a site that’s unique and styled just the way you like it.
Why WordPress and why Divi? This combo is the best combination I’ve found for an incredibly user-friendly experience with an incredibly professional looking final product. It’s flexible enough that no two sites should come out looking the same while being simple enough that you won’t need to learn code or be extremely technical to design something you love.
Class expected 2024
Building a Website Advanced: Handler’s Choice
This class is for alumni of the Business End of the Dog: Building a WordPress Website Class. It will target specific areas of interest based on what the students would like help with.
We’ll be using WordPress and the WordPress Theme Divi, from Elegant Themes, to build on the site created in Business End of the Dog.
Class expected 2024
One-to-One Lessons Through FDSA
Designed to give additional support to FDSA students, one-to-one lessons cost $130 for an hour of instructor time. They run up to about a month.
Unlike classes, they are not a daily activity — this is a forum where we can chat back and forth over the course of a month to help you problem solve lessons learned in one of my other FDSA classes or on a subject I feel able to teach but not yet covered in a class. I usually reply to 1:1 students a few times a week.
As the instructor, I run down the clock, and in that period of time, most students can submit several posts and get several responses. Anytime I spend reading, watching any included videos, or writing my responses, etc is counted.
I ask that you limit yourself to topics that I am highly familiar with, and where you have lecture materials, if that is relevant. I keep One to Ones available on a rolling admission basis. The number I offer depends on my other work, and on how many are currently enrolled – so if you’re interested, reach out.
Ongoing enrollment. Contact me for details.