We have a vacation planned, and are leaving in 3 weeks. We need a sitter from a day before we leave to meet pets and walk through everything.
We have had our listing up literally for over 6 months with no decents candidates…we had 3 total, one wanted to charge us, one did not want to pet sit for big dogs (even though my listing is pretty clear these are big dogs) and the other took a different sit, in a better area for them…I dont know what I am going to do, I am REALLY starting to panic.
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Hi @Ladygreynius,
Thank you for reaching out. We all want you to find a great match for a sitter! Some thoughts from a new sitter:
- First, thanks for linking to your listing.
- I posted a lot of tips for another HO recently. Please see for more ideas:
- Thinking about your listing in particular:
- You had 3 applicants, and it still lists 3 applicants. Why didn’t you reject all 3, so it says “0”? Or maybe “1”? As a sitter, I’d assume you found someone already, are in the middle of picking someone, or are nonresponsive.
- You don’t have any reviews from previous sitters, so it’s tough, with the 4 doggies. You really want to have your photos looking their best, like if you were staging your house to sell, or your pets to be adopted. I also wish the responsibilities were more clear. Perhaps list responsibilities by pet name, or list an example schedule. And maybe more about the pet’s personalities.
- If a car is included, explain more in the text. Perhaps highlight that in the title, like at the start.
- I might even change your profile photo to something without sunglasses. I feel it’s hard to connect with someone when that’s the only picture you have of them.
Best of luck! Looking forward to reading suggestions from others! –Geoff
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Also, this requirement for your handover isn’t in your listing. I think it should be. Questions off the top of my head:
- Do you need the sitter to arrive Dec. 13 (first day listed) or Dec. 12?
- If the sitter has to arrive the day before, then will all of you sleep in the house that night? Sitter needs to know that. Some sitters may not be comfortable with that.
- Alternatively, if the sitter needs to get their own accommodations for one night, they need to know that. Again, some sitters may be turned off by that and apply elsewhere. Unfortunately, this Christmas (every Christmas?) is a sitter’s market, to borrow from real estate.
- How long are you expecting it to take for the handover? (i.e. explanation) If it’s that involved, I would expect a more detailed description in the listing already. It’s not reasonable to just explain things once verbally to a sitter and expect them to remember everything. Everything should already be covered in your Welcome Guide. In my opinion, instructions during a handover should be only redundant (to the Welcome Guide).
You can contact Membership Services for more help. But they will likely first suggest the blog posts I already mentioned.
When there are 7 days left, your sit can get posted to the last-minute forum. I realize that sounds not great, but I’ve seen very few sits there lately (1 or 2 in a couple weeks), so maybe that’s a good sign? Anyway, something to keep in mind as a further back-up plan.
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Well I have the dates listed in my listing, but I cannot list those dates here. The sitter does NOT have to get accommodations on their own.
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I also cannot delete the applicants that are showing for some reason
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I’m just saying, if I were an HO, I’d try to convey as much info as possible that a potential sitter would want to know, in my listing. In your case, I’d want to know that maybe, “We’d like the sitter to arrive the first day (the 13th) by ___, so we can conduct the handover. The sitter can stay that night in the house with us. We’ll leave on the 14th by ___.”
For example, this post came up recently:
Please contact Membership Services, as you should definitely be able to delete (or reject the application) of any applicants.
First make sure to look at this:
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Hi @Ladygreynius I’m going to tag @Therese who can look at the two applications you are unable to reject when she is back online …
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Thank you I appreciate that
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Just had a quick look, I would recommend: 1. relisting / boosting the sit so it shows up on top and with 0 applicants, 2. perhaps reorder the photos so you can see the dogs earlier (maybe change the first photo to a picture of all 4 dogs), 3. don’t get too disheartened, Christmas is the most difficult time to secure a sitter, 4. we would also like to know how often you walk the dogs and how much they bark, especially important for home office (it’s 4 dogs after all), 5. in general we would appreciate as much info about the dogs as possible as soon as feasible (we have 4 years of pet sitting experience but would really hesitate on this one, especially a young Cane Corso sounds challenging), 6. would you be asking the sitter about the vaccination status ? (since you state yours a HS might assume that this is important to you and not apply)
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Hi @Ladygreynius
I have done this for you. For your own info, the 2 applicants were in your archive section, hence, you may not have been able to find them immediately. I have also taken the liberty of boosting your listing.
Please keep in touch with support@trustedhousesitters.com if you do not receive the response you require, as they will assist and support you directly.
Best wishes
Therese
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You have lots of good suggestions here. My usual advice is to have an informative, attention-grabbing, headline. A huge selling point is you providing a car, so lead with that, since only the first few words show on a thumbnail. Tell the sitters something they can’t see when browsing sits, so maybe “Car included near beaches. Gamers paradise”.
I agree with another suggestion about having dogs as your primary photo. The one with the dogs in the car is good. The pool isn’t a big attraction for a winter sit.
The responsibilities section is a bit confusing to me. Divide it into paragraphs for each dog.
Good luck
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