It’s almost noon, and Loni Edwards’s client is drooling on the carpet in the lobby.

Chase, an 8-year-old pitbull mix, is large and stout, with a smooth, gray coat that makes him look more like a seal than a dog. He plops onto the carpet with a hmph, and glances slowly around the room. He’s quiet and laid back, with a disposition that makes his giant frame seem more dopey than intimidating. His tongue lolls out of his mouth, forming a sweet grin under his big, yellow-brown puppy dog eyes.

This dog’s a star. Or, at least, that’s what Edwards is betting on.

Edwards is the founder and CEO of The Dog Agency, a New York City-based management agency that caters exclusively to “pet influencers.” The popularity of pet accounts on social media has exploded in the last few years–particularly on Instagram, where #dogsofinstagram has more than 124 million posts and the most popular dog account, Jiff the Pomeranian, has more than twice as many followers as Hillary Clinton. Edwards’s 160 clients also include a few cats and monkeys, though her primary focus is still canines. She advises their “humans” on growth strategies and brand management, and books for paid posts, ad campaigns, and in-person appearances around the country.

“We help them think about how to grow their brands,” Edwards says from the midtown Manhattan WeWork she’s based out of. “We help them think about what makes sense for them to do next, whether it’s getting a book deal or starting a merchandise line.”

Edwards’s entry into the pet influencer world began in 2013, when she got a French bulldog named Chloe. At the time, the Harvard Law-graduate was running a fashion technology business in New York City, and got a dog to keep her company as she managed a hectic schedule. When she started posting Chloe’s photos on Instagram, she amassed tens of thousands of followers–and with them, offers to begin posting paid content.

“Chloe was getting all of these opportunities to work with brands, and I was meeting all these other pet influencers and their humans at events,” Edwards says. With her background in law, Edwards began advising other pet influencer owners on contracts as a favor. When a buyer expressed interest in her fashion technology company, she took the opportunity to make advising a full-time gig with The Dog Agency.

“There was no central hub pulling together this new pet influencer space,” she says. “Brands were sending direct messages to hundreds of pets and hearing back from a fraction of them. These humans a lot of times have full-time jobs, they’re not checking their dog’s email regularly. So there was a definitely a need to kind of pull everything together.”

Today, Edwards’s portfolio includes both superstar influencers–like @tunameltsmyheart, a chihuahua-dachsund mix with 2 million followers–and up-and-comers, like Chase, whose account @sometimescarl has a still-impressive 85,000-follower reach. Her clients have worked with plenty of pet supply companies on product placements and ads, but also book gigs with human brands like Dyson, the Ritz Carlton, and Ralph Lauren.