hello i am new to this sevice. typing with one finger as cat is glued to my lap. we have many likes and only one applicant who chose another sit.
getting anxious as sit is feb 21
any suggestions
(Listing added to member’s Forum profile)
If the one applicant chose another sit you should decline them so that your applicant count is zero and then you can delete the dates and re-post them. This will bring your sit to the top of the listings again and get rid of the low applications flag.
A winter sit in a small town 2+ hours from Toronto isn’t going to be the easiest sell. A car rental for one month would be quite expensive. Can you offer a car? You mention that the town itself is walkable, but how would an out-of-town sitter get there if they chose to do it without a car or you can’t offer one? Can you pick them up from Pearson? If so, you should mention that.
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All of my sitters applied much closer to the date of the sit even though I had them posted a couple months in advance. Don’t get anxious yet!
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@Mannette ‘Walking distance to grocery stores’ is a subjective statement. You are better to describe it as, for example: ‘800 metres (½ mile) to …’. However, given your location and the time of year of the sit, weather conditions might dictate whether it’s walkable (snow/ice, for example). For that reason, you might want to include specifics on whether there are any delivery services for groceries, take-out food, etc.
Perhaps many sitters won’t consider a sit for over a month where they don’t have a vehicle and there isn’t any public transportation. Is Uber available and, if so, where might that take them that would be of interest to a visitor?
Your Amenities section only has 13 items listed. Most I view have 30-40 items. Did you skip some sections? For example, there aren’t any details about the bathroom and your photo doesn’t tell me whether there’s a bath tub or only a shower. I suggest you review this and make sure you cover all options.
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Hmmm. I’d give it more time, but your location is kind of remote, not to mention cold, so I think you’ll have to make some changes to make this more appealing to sitters.
I would subsititue the 6:30 am feedings for:. “Molly is fed twice a day– early mornings and about 12 hours later.” The precise time is going to turn off many people who aren’t normally up at 6:30 am. My guess is Molly might start to meow for breakfast early, and sitters can deal with it. You should let sitters know that you are an early riser and she usually gets fed around 6:30, but I wouldn’t make it seem like she has to be fed at precisely that time.
You do show basic photos of the rooms, but I might go for more and cheerier.
Hanover from what I can see is a very small town about 2.5 hours driving from Toronto. You need a little more than you have about the area and what you can do there especially in winter. If you’ve got snowhoes to lend or sitters should bring or rent some cross country skiis, let them know. Since the sit is in winter, think about what the sitter can do in winter.
The stuff you wrote about the bus from Walkerton to the airport just makes it sound even more remote and is a little confusing. You might say that the sit will work best for someone with a car, unless you are open to lending your car and/or picking them up at the airport. It becomes very complicated when there is only one bus every 3 days from the airport to another town and most sitters who aren’t planning to drive from Toronto or Rochester or Buffalo might just stop reading. Personally, we live in NYC, but we sit in homes in small towns and rural places all seasons to get away from the City, so I’m guessing you might find someone like that, if you can sell your place as a kind of small town retreat. How are the stars on a clear winter’s night?
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Thank you for your comments. I will make those changes you suggested.
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Thank you, when do you think I need to consider an alternative plan?
Welcome to the forum @Mannette
Even when you confirm a sitter with THS,
If there is an extraordinary circumstance, the sitter may need to cancel . So it’s important to have a back up plan in place asap.
Your hot tub if it will be usable for these dates maybe your USP - could you take a photo of that open so that sitters can picture themselves there and move that to the first photo ?
Do your sit dates align with the dates that the bus service runs ?
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Change your title - “Molly needs a friend while her humans go off travelling again!” says zero about your place, it covers every sit on THS.
Your title needs to sell your place, not be generic. It needs to be something that will want sitters to click to read more.
It doesn’t matter whether your hot tub or fire pit is usable at the time of your sit, that’s for others to decide. So maybe something like…
“Hot tub, fire pit, and a beautiful creek to enjoy”
It evokes the feeling that your place has.
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Those are good ideas!
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Thanks for the help with wording!
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@Mannette It’s too soon to worry. We just posted our sit for February, as well. (We are in the U.S.)
It is a good idea to have a Plan B in place, though.
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Think of your listing as an advert- on reading it it’s rather bland- so add some excitement to it and give us sitters a reason to overcome all the obstacles of how remote it is! Why do you love living there, what are your neighbours like, what do you spend time doing? Give us an idea of daily life there in that season/weather. Show enthusiasm for assisting the sitter to arrive and settle in with eg an overlap day(s). The sit listing needs jazzing up with more energy in it. Best wishes though.
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I have regular sitters as my backup plan and even had one come out in case my THS sitter couldn’t make it due to snow. I paid her for her time and she knew that she would most likely not be needed. Your backup plan would depend on what options you have available to you. If paid sitters are readily available, you can wait longer.
From my perspective the main issues are: time of year and lack of transportation options.
Re the former - scrap the ‘launch your kayak or canoe’ because that ain’t happening in Feb and enhance the things that are lovely like cross country ski/snow shoeing (do you have equipment people can use?), show the hot tub steaming and fire pit roaring.
Can you offer a car for sitters to use? For a month long sit you with no public transport you really are limiting yourselves to car owners.
Good luck.
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