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Make a Time Box on BentBox

A Time Box is a Box with an expiry time: once it passes, the Box stops being available for sale. Use it to give a release a deadline and turn a listing into an event.

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A stopwatch, illustrating the BentBox Time Box expiry feature

At a glance

What a Time Box is
A Time Box is a BentBox Box published with a set expiry time. When that time is reached, the Box stops being available for sale.
What it is for
Creating a deadline. A limited-time release gives your audience a reason to buy now instead of bookmarking it and forgetting.
How to make one
Set the expiry time in the Box for sale settings when you publish the Box.

Most content sits on a page forever, which quietly tells the buyer there is no hurry. A Time Box removes that assumption. It is the same content with a deadline attached, and a deadline is one of the few things that reliably converts an interested follower into a buyer.

How a Time Box works

1

Upload your content into a Box

Build the Box exactly as you normally would: photos, videos or both, with a title, description and price.

2

Set an expiry time in the sale settings

In the Box for sale settings, set the expiry. Once that moment passes the Box is no longer available for sale.

3

Tell people the deadline, clearly

A deadline nobody knows about does nothing. Put the end time in the Box title or the first line of the description, and say it again in your message to followers and buyers.

Ways creators use Time Boxes

  • Launch windows. A set available for its first 72 hours only, at a price that will not come back.
  • Seasonal and event content. Work tied to a date reads as more valuable when it leaves with the date.
  • Genuine scarcity. If a set is a one-off, letting it expire is honest rather than artificial, and buyers can tell the difference.
  • Testing demand. A short window gives you a clean read on how many people will act quickly, which tells you something about your audience.

Time Boxes work particularly well with promo codes: a code that expires at the same time as the Box puts pressure on the price and the availability at once. Just do not make every release urgent. Permanent urgency stops being urgency.

Frequently asked questions

A Time Box is a BentBox Box published with a set expiry time. When the expiry time is reached, the Box stops being available for sale. It is used to give a release a deadline rather than leaving it on sale indefinitely.

The expiry time is set in the Box for sale settings, on the same page where you set the price and the rest of the sale options. You can build the Box as normal and add the expiry before publishing it.

Once the expiry time is reached, the Time Box is no longer available for sale, so new buyers can no longer purchase it. If you need to confirm exactly what a previous buyer retains after expiry, ask BentBox support at info@bentbox.co.

A deadline gives your audience a reason to buy now instead of postponing. Content that is permanently available implicitly tells the buyer there is no hurry, while a limited window converts followers who would otherwise bookmark the page and never return.

Yes. Running a promo code that expires at the same time as the Time Box applies a deadline to both the price and the availability, which makes the offer easier to communicate in a single message.

Give your next release a deadline

Publish your next set as a Time Box, announce the end time clearly, and see how much of your audience acts when there is a reason to.

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Questions about anything on this page? Email info@bentbox.co and a person will answer you.

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