Washington-based startup I am Adoptable is a Web site and mobile application designed to optimize online pet adoptions by searching beyond photos with on-demand videos, as 57 percent of consumers say that product videos make them more confident in a purchase and less likely to return an item.

Consumers who are interested in adoption will not exactly get a dog delivered by UPS to their doorstep, however the experience will be a lot like browsing on Amazon. People can easily peruse videos online or in-app and instantly bond with an animal.

?A picture doesn?t tell a story, but a video can,? said Kate Herbert, founder of I am Adoptable. ?Currently, the main way people locate an animal online is by seeing his or her picture, and then reading a bio.

?There unfortunately are a lot of high-kill pet shelters in the United States, and 3-4 million dogs and cats are euthanized each year according to the Humane Society, as well as about 160,000 horses slaughtered annually. By giving these shelters a free tool to easily upload videos of their pets needing urgent adoption, this will reduce euthanasia and slaughter numbers dramatically.

?This will also increase transparency into what really happens to animals that aren?t adopted. Visitors to our site or app can see that an animal is located at a high-kill shelter and can act quickly, while sharing the urgency with pet adoptions needed through their social network,? she said.

One-stop adoptions
Strong emotional response typically elicits feelings to take action, and facilitates impulse and quick purchase decisions which may mean animals spend less time in rescue shelters, freeing up space for the organizations to save more animals.

One click will contact a shelter or rescue to reserve an animal for an introduction and pickup.

Shelters around the country state that a common reason pets are given up is because owners purchased an animal and then claimed it was not a good fit for their household.

On the shelter functionality side of the app a rescue organization can take or upload a video, as well as add a short bio of their pet in a matter of minutes.

Consumers are able to easily visit and watch endless numbers of videos based on parameters they choose such as breed, location and age. If a consumer finds an animal that he or she would like to begin the process of adoption with, there is an online form that can be submitted directly through the app.

?People will no longer need to drive from shelter to shelter searching for the right animal. Americans especially have tight schedules, and if the adoption process can be simplified, it will make adopting easier, hence increasing the popularity of animal rescue,? Ms. Herbert said.

IamAdoptable.com and its mobile app will also help potential pet parents see the true personality and characteristics of their new animal so they can make a better-informed decision, be more equipped to commit to a long-term decision.

?Many people think that purchasing an animal is the way to go because you know about the animal?s history, plus for some reason some people tend to think there is a certain societal status associated with buying an expensive animal,? Ms. Herbert said.

?Through video we are confident that it will eliminate this myth.?

Right now, until August 16, 2014 I am Adoptable is running an Indiegogo campaign to raise funds to complete its Web site and mobile app rollout.

Challenging standards
Presently online pet search is only prevalent on a few larger sites that shelters and rescue organizations use such as PetFinder.

PetFinder search

Getting to know animals from current methods of short bios and stagnant pictures is inherently limited and not up to speed with how consumers use mobile and Web as shopping tools in other segments.

Short descriptions don't cut it

Shelters and rescue organizations need more tech-savvy tools to showcase their animals, and this will help simplify their adoption processes as a whole. Even when there are walk-ins to a shelter counselors can pull out prospective great fits with potential parents instead of overwhelming guests with hundreds of animals.

?With I am Adoptable, we are making it incredibly easy for rescues and shelters to utilize the site at no cost, and they are eager to begin uploading their videos to a site that people will be driven to in order to see animal adoption videos,? Ms. Herbert said.

?No longer will the shelter teams need to create videos and go through the steps to post them on YouTube, and maybe even on their own site, because they can point and shoot through I am Adoptable and the videos will upload in our searches with proper tags, and the videos can feed to their website if they?d like with a simple embed code.?

 Final Take
Michelle is editorial assistant on Mobile Marketer, New York