Hi everyone
I am new to this site. I posted my ad for house/dog sit about 3 weeks ago. I have 17 sitters save my listing, only 1 application (which was not suitable). I am a planner. My trip dates are January 23 - Feb 27. I have not booked flights, as I need a sitter first. I did invite some of the saved sitters but they had saved my listing for future sits (which I never thought of). In any event, any suggestions from anyone? I didn’t think I posted it too soon? Thoughts? I appreciate it, as I am starting to panic!
Hi, and welcome to the site.
I posted my listing a few weeks ago, and it is for April 22. Due to covid etc I don’t feel i can take anyone from outside of Europe for all of our sakes. I have had no suitable applications - I had two that were withdrawn over the couple of weeks I had admin problems here and had no access to the site. I’ve invited some sitters with no success. Some people have said it is too early for my listing, but I am not prepared to book international flights without a sitter. If I posted only 3 months or so before my trip then it would not be enough time. I know I now need to get some more interior photos onto my listing but there is a lot of other info on there, some interior photos, exterior photos, and more will be coming. I know i have a lot of animals in a smallholding type of environment so it is a tad more complex, but in the past sitters have often wanted sits like that. So I am like you…not sure if I’ve posted too soon, not sure whether I can take my holiday, and wondering whether to simply save up and pay for a professional which i would really prefer not to!
@kootenaygal and @Boodie, I may be telling you something you already know, so please excuse me if this is the case.
if you post some more identifying info about your sits, such as the location and type of pet(s), as well as the dates, people reading here will be able to find your listing on the THS site and may possibly be interested in applying or ar least giving you feedback about what is good and what can be improved in your listing to attract more applicants. You are not permitted to post the actual link to your listing in a post on the forum (you probably already know this), but you can include it in your profile info, so people who click on your name will see it.
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@Boodie - I can see your listing. A few more interior photos, including the kitchen, sitter’s bedroom and bathroom would help, though probably not make a difference between someone applying or not.
I would change the headline. Saying “Looking for an animal loving sitter” is redundant (everyone is here for that reason), so change it to something that makes your sit stand out. For example “Car included! Peaceful, rural historic stone cottage” or something similar
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Thanks Lassie, that’s good advice. I have actually just been doing some updates on my listing. I am waiting for the weekend for my Mam to vacate the bedroom but I don’t want to ambush her - up until this week and reading discussions on the forums I had not thought about the extra interior photos. I’ve just uploaded a quick one of one of the bathrooms though, and will get one of the kitchen at the weekend too. I have given quite detailed descriptions though so the sitter would be aware of the amenities, so hopefully that helps if someone reads it through.
The title - I had meant it to sound like ‘you really REALLY must like animals because we have a wide variety of them’ 
But yes, now you say that i realise it doesn’t come across that way! I shall change the title. Thank again for taking the time to look, it’s much appreciated.
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I totally agree with you with international flights to be booked. I too don’t have a ton of interior photos (I don’t take photos normally of bedrooms - but I can!) but have most of the house. And a great description. I am not sure why we are not getting applications…sigh. It is frustrating. We paid to use the site - you would think that folks on the site are generally interested… I don’t understand it. Let me know if you get any interest. The ones who saved my listing - that I contacted - all said they saved it for future reference, or were not available. Not sure what else to do.
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Thank you for your comments. Yes, I know I can’t post the link to my site, let me see if I can give more identifying info! Feedback would be great - as I am stressing a bit!
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You can post the link to your listing on your forum profile!
Hi @kootenaygal you can also share your listing link with other members via the Direct Message option …