Yes. Start a rehearsal runs the whole thing for real — Practise the whole thing for real — with How long you’ll practise for setting the length. Nobody can buy anything in it.
It behaves exactly like a show in every other way, and it ends with End rehearsal rather than End show.
Why it is better than a quiet first show
The instinct is to treat a thin first show as the practice. A rehearsal is better, for one reason: you can be bad in it.
In a real show with four people watching, a fumbled item is a fumbled sale. In a rehearsal you can hold something up, lose your thread, start again, discover your light is wrong and the item looks grey, and fix all of it with nothing at stake.
What a rehearsal actually tells you
Things you cannot learn any other way:
- Whether your light works. The single most common first-show problem, and invisible until you see your own stream.
- Whether the item fills the frame at the distance you are actually holding it.
- Whether you can reach the controls while holding something.
Start next itemwith a saree in one hand is a different experience from reading about it. - Whether your connection holds for twenty minutes.
- What you sound like. Most people are surprised, and it is better to be surprised alone.
Buyer view is the thing to look at while you do it — the show exactly as a buyer sees it, which is not what your own screen shows you.
How to do one properly
Treat it as a show. Five real items, lined up, held up, described out loud, closed, next. Twenty minutes.
Going through the motions silently teaches you nothing, because the talking is the part that is hard.
Then do a real one
A rehearsal is preparation, not a substitute. The thing a rehearsal cannot give you is a room — the pace of real bidding, the chat moving, the decision about whether to let an item go cheaply.
So: one rehearsal, then a real show the same week, however few people come. Nobody came to my first show
The practice bid, for buyers
Worth knowing that the same idea exists on the other side: a buyer's first encounter with the bid control offers Slide to try — Practice here — this one doesn’t place a bid. If you are also buying here, do that one too. How to place a bid
What a rehearsal is not
Not a private show. If you want a show only certain people can reach, that is Private discoverability on a real show — Not listed, not announced — which does sell. How to schedule a show
More: how to go live, camera and light, what to say on camera.