Telling Buyers You Are Away

You are going away, or you are ill, or the week ahead is simply not one where anyone is getting a parcel. This happens to everybody and it is not a problem. What causes problems is handling it by saying nothing and hoping the orders do not come.

The difference matters more than it sounds. A shop that goes quiet without explanation looks abandoned, and a buyer who messages an abandoned shop does not message twice. A shop that says it is closed until the eleventh looks like it is run by somebody organised, and that is a better impression than most sellers manage while trading normally.

So say it, in the places people actually look. Your profile is the main one. Put it at the front rather than at the end of a paragraph nobody reads, and give a real date rather than a vague soon, because soon means nothing and a date lets somebody decide to wait.

Deal with anything already in flight before you go, and be honest about timing rather than optimistic. If an order will not go out until you are back, say so now and let the buyer choose. Almost everyone is fine with a wait they were told about in advance and almost nobody is fine with the same wait discovered on day six of silence.

Decide what you are doing with messages. Answering nothing for a fortnight is fine if your profile says so. Answering slowly is also fine. What is not fine is answering some and not others, because the ones you missed will assume they were ignored personally.

Then come back properly. Take the notice down the day you return, not a week later, and pick up the oldest conversation first. Coming back is worth doing well, because the buyers who waited for you are the ones worth keeping.