Hi I am wondering if anyone knows what happens to listings if they are paused and then unpaused? Does their status change somehow?
I ask because the only time we have had anything less than a pile of wonderful applicants are the two times I paused the listing, then unpaused it when the initial applicants didn’t work out.
In any case our Xmas-time sit in the SF Bay Area is sitting open for the first time ever, so if you want some nice weather and a million dollar view, please drop us a line.
I’m going to tag @Therese who can connect with you when she’s next online, with suggestions for how you can promote your listing. I’m not a homeowner here, but I do know that some membership levels can bump their listings up to show at the start of the new listings again (I can’t remember the correct term). However, forum rules do not allow for direct links and you will be asked to delete it from this post. You can add it to your forum profile, or you can add details (city, dates) under the forum post on Christmas sits.
You’ll see on the forum there has been lots of discussion on how we’re still in different times because of the pandemic and that has affected listings in many ways. I hope things go well for you.
I don’t know the answer to the pause/unpause question.
One obstacle to travel right now is the cost and availability of rental cars. Looks like a week’s rental in your area for that week is ~600+. HOs who include use of a car are likely getting more applications (where a car is necessary).
It’s also a bit unclear from the photos and description where the sitter would be sleeping (and the photos are pretty dark). If you read some of the recent forum posts, there are suggestions for adding enticing photos.
Of course, you have many excellent reviews so I imagine you’ll get some applications soon.
My impression, as a sitter who lives in the Bay Area, is that demand for holiday sitters in our area is very high right now.
I see many, many sits listed that I would think would be highly valued by sitters with 0 to 7 applicants.
I’ve been getting a lot of invites and messages from Bay Area HOs who are reaching out proactively to find sitters for the next 2 months.
If you haven’t already, you could try reaching out to sitters who have favorited your sit profile, or who live in the area.
(I’m an experienced sitter, but new to this site… so I can’t compare the demand here this year to previous years. I also don’t know the answer to the “paused” question.)
Hi @ericbarnhill … In answer to question. If you haven’t secured a sitter yet, and you unpause your applications, (therefore you still have your dates), the system automatically boosts your listing … so you will see a New button above your photo. This means it is now on top of the website and emailed to all available sitters. If for some reason, you do not see that New Button, do get hold of us at membership services, so we can do this from our side. I hope this helps. Kind regards Therese
Hi @ericbarnhill welcome to our community forum and thank you to our members and @Therese for helping with your question, there is still time to find your sitters and it has to be said that tis year is different to past years where travel is concerned. You have a great opportunity for sitters and we hope you will have some great applications.
Thank you for joining us from Northern California, enjoy connecting with members from around the world.
@Angela_L
I had to unpause our listing (it had auto paused on 5 applicants, and we wittled it down to two, one of which was local and was a no show to a prearranged interview with no communication, and hence not qualified). On unpausing the listing, I checked the listing and found it does not promote and have New, contrary to the above description. Does the above description still apply to the unpause of an auto-pause? What’s the relationship between that and a boost?
Thanks!
Bruce
Hi @BruceT … Just dipping in as Angela is offline at the moment. I think this is a question best answered by the product team as they’ve been make changes and improvements to the system. I’ll tag @Ben-ProductManager so he can pick this up and get back to you tomorrow morning. Thanks for your patience and I hope you find someone suitable soon.
Thanks Vanessa, I look forward to seeing @Ben-ProductManager 's response. If the resume after auto pause does not revert the listing to new and promoting it, I’d like to know the reason why and to convey that this is very much not conducive to having a successful experience as it has squandered the new status on subpar applicants (mostly who want to bring their own dog along) and then lost the prominent listing position when this is realized and a resume occurs. At this time, our listing is number 24 of 27 active listings just in our town, even though the listing is quite new, so you can understand the frustration with the loss of listing position. It is a 3 week listing competing with many 2-4 day listings related with Thanksgiving and Christmas, sort of lost in the fray at the moment.
It would also be a good idea to add a listing profile flag for “no sitter pets” to help us avoid applicants that have pets in toe and to help those sitters find a suitable sit that allows sitter pets.