Setting up Preorders is a great way to generate funds to help pay for new releasing products. Additionally preorders will give you an idea of how much of a new product you should invest in depending on the preorder request for it by your current customer demographic. After you set a product as preorder, any subsequent order containing that product will automatically appear in the Preorder status tab on your Orders page. Once the release date for that product arrives, those orders will update automatically and move out of preorder status for processing.
There are two ways to update products as Preorder:
An individual item on the Inventory > Products page.
All products in a category through the Inventory > Categories page.
Steps on setting up an individual product to preorder status:
Navigate to Inventory > Products.
Search for the Product you would like to set as a preorder.
Click the Edit link under the product.
Check "Product is a Preorder Item" and then set the available date. Hit Save at the top right or bottom right of the Edit window.
Steps to set all products within a category to preorder status:
Navigate to Inventory > Categories.
Find the category you would like to set to preorder status, and click on the blue name links to expand that category's basic information. Scroll to the bottom to find the preorder controls for that category.
Set the date that these products will be available and save. All products within this category will have been set to preorder status. Any subsequent order containing one of these products will automatically appear in the Preorder status tab on your Orders page.
Note: Any products imported into this category after the preorder date is set will not be marked as preorder unless you perform these steps again.
Preorder products on External Channels:
You can list Preorder products onto all the External channels, and as long as the product is set to Preorder, that will translate over to the channels.
With TCGPlayer, you will need to enable Preorders on their website as well. This article goes over setting that up.
With Amazon, and Ebay, you do not want to list the products more than 30 days from when they officially release. Both those channels have policies against orders sitting for more than 30 days.