Case Study: What's Barking
What's Barking Social Growth
Growthbuster grew What's Barking's Instagram from 279 followers to 51,378 in 20 months (February 2025 to October 2026), roughly 184 times its starting size.
The audience isn't just big, it's active. In the last 90 days the account reached about 267,000 accounts, more than five times its follower count, and earned an interaction rate of roughly 16.7% on that reach.
20 months vs. the category
Typical dog treat brands grew about 20%. What's Barking grew 184x.
What's Barking figures from Instagram. Brand 1–3 are comparable DTC dog-treat brands; their lines use current follower counts and an industry benchmark growth rate (~1%/month), not month-by-month history.
The client and the challenge
What's Barking makes soft-baked dog treats and food toppers from Non-GMO Project Verified, real food ingredients, oven-baked in small batches in Simi Valley, CA. Flavors like Peanut Butter Honey, Mushroom Mango, and Oatmeal Cookie are made without wheat, corn or soy.
In February 2025 the brand had a great product and 279 Instagram followers. Premium dog treats is a crowded category, and "healthy" and "natural" claims are everywhere. The brand needed a social presence that made people stop scrolling, remember the name and follow.
The insight
We built everything around one audience: people who parent their dogs. They read their dog's ingredient labels as closely as their own, and they treat their dog like family, the way they'd treat a child.
That gave the content two jobs:
Entertain first. Dog humor and pure dog joy earn the stop and the share, so the brand reaches people who don't follow it yet.
Land the quality message second. Once the joke lands, the caption connects it to real ingredients: you read labels for yourself, so your dog's treats should get the same energy.
The rule we held to: the caption has to match the post's energy. A funny video gets a funny caption that turns toward ingredients, not a sudden brand manifesto.
What we did
Growthbuster ran strategy, content concepts and copy across Instagram and TikTok, built around a small set of repeatable formats.
| Format | Example | Its job |
|---|---|---|
| Dog-humor Reels | A dog is told to sit, never does, and gets the treat anyway | Stop the scroll, get shared, reach new people |
| Slow-motion treat moments | Close-up, slow-mo clips of dogs going for the treats | Show how much dogs love the product |
| Recipes and lifestyle | Pupsicle recipe, pup cup moments | Give dog owners something to save and try |
| Launches and monthly giveaways | Mushroom Mango launch, led by "We want to give your dog a free box of treats" | Turn launches and giveaways into follow spikes |
| Boosted top-of-funnel posts | Best-performing humor posts, with a caption that ends in a follow CTA | Put winning content in front of new dog lovers |
Every format followed the same playbook: hook in the first seconds, deliver the joy or the joke, then point back to real ingredients and a clear next step (follow, enter, shop).
Content highlights
Not every post is built to go viral, and that's by design. The feed mixes breakout shareable content with steady product and launch support, each with its own job.
Your birth month = your FrenchieShareable "pick yours" graphic56,435 views
Your dog's birth month = their treat flavorShareable graphic tied to the flavor lineup13,320 views
Summer Celebration treatsCreator product photo for a seasonal flavor2,929 views
Pookies treatsCreator product photo1,494 views
Howl-o-ween alter egosSpooky alter-ego name-generator graphic
The stars have spokenZodiac carousel, 13 slides
All figures are lifetime per post, from Instagram Insights. The treat-flavor graphic figures include views from ads.
Our top posts
A few favorites, straight from What's Barking's Instagram. Tap any to open it.
Results
Followers grew 184 times over, and recent content reaches well beyond the existing audience. Figures are Instagram, from Instagram Insights, unless marked TikTok.
| Metric | Result | Period |
|---|---|---|
| Followers | 279 to 51,378 (+18,315%) | Feb 2025 to Oct 2026 |
| TikTok followers | 0 to 1,403 | Feb 2025 to Oct 2026 |
| Accounts reached | 266,990 (5.2 times the follower count) | Last 90 days |
| Views | 758,548 (about 2.8 per account reached) | Last 90 days |
| Content interactions | 44,582 | Last 90 days |
| Interaction rate by reach | 16.7% (interactions ÷ accounts reached) | Last 90 days |
Interaction rate here counts total interactions (likes, comments, saves, shares) against accounts reached. It isn't a per-post engagement rate, so it shouldn't be compared directly to follower-based benchmarks.
What the client says
If you are looking for a trustworthy and proactive partner that consistently over-delivers, Growthbuster is in a league of their own.
Working with Growthbuster has been a complete game-changer for What's Barking. As a Marketing Manager for a small and dedicated team, I needed an agency that didn't just execute tasks but truly lived and breathed our brand. Vasa and his team have exceeded every expectation in that regard. Raquel, Brooke, and Simon are not only incredibly easygoing and approachable, but they bring a level of diligence and passion that is hard to find. It feels less like we hired an external agency and more like we have gained a group of dedicated partners who are truly part of our team. They have taken our brand to the next level by matching the internal energy and commitment we have here at What's Barking. If you are looking for a trustworthy and proactive partner that consistently over-delivers, Growthbuster is in a league of their own.
Eric Casas, Marketing Manager, What's Barking
Why it worked
The growth came from strategy, not volume. Three choices did the heavy lifting:
- One clear audience. Writing for label-reading dog parents kept every hook, caption and CTA pointed at the same person.
- Repeatable formats. A handful of proven formats meant each post built on the last, instead of starting from scratch.
- Entertainment that carries the message. Humor and dog joy earned the reach; the ingredient story turned that reach into followers.
Growthbuster helps founder-led CPG and DTC brands turn a strong product into a brand people follow and buy. Want results like this for your brand? Let's talk.
Let's talk