Host questions answered: Airbnb’s Summer Release

Stephanie
Community Manager
Community Manager
London, United Kingdom

Host questions answered: Airbnb’s Summer Release

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Updated Jun 19, 2022

 

Just to share a quick update that we have created the promised Resource Center guidelines for listing descriptions has been published and you can read it here.

 

Hi Hosting Community, 

 

A month ago, we introduced the Airbnb 2022 Summer Release with a new way to search designed around Airbnb Categories

 

Since then, we’ve gathered feedback from thousands of Hosts through our Community Center, Host Clubs, emails, and in workshops with the Host Advisory Board and Host leaders. Thank you for your valuable comments and suggestions. 

 

Today, we want to share an update on some of the important feedback you’ve shared.  More updates will follow. 

 

You can read about them here.

 

Please continue to share your ideas and feedback as it directly assists in how we evolve our platform. 

 

Your continued support, feedback and constructive thoughts on this and many of our release features is incredibly valuable and I encourage you to continue sharing here.

 

Thanks,

Stephanie

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Please follow the Community Guidelines 

258 Replies 258

I agree @Lisa34 regarding availability dates.  I have a prime 4th of July week at my Pigeon Forge cabin.  5 bedroom, family, high quality cabin from an experienced Superhost.  Exactly what should be rented easily. 

 

And yet, the availability dates listed in those general searches is for April.  

 

 I've had zero bookings for either of my cabins since this summer release.  I should be filling up my fall right now and it is scarce.  And when looking at the views, both show plummeting numbers beginning at the release.

 

@Catherine-Powell and @Stephanie - I've been a Superhost for years.  With Airbnb Plus listings and consistently high reviews across all my listings.  I put in the hard work to make these places high quality and memorable for my guests.  I've always valued Airbnb's commitment to improving the user experience and making it a user friendly platform .  But, I don't understand the logic of making an algorithm that pulls random dates from a listing, instead of listing "the first available week" on their calendar. 

 

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I sympathize. We have 2 Plus properties in the mountains of NC. Our views are slowly starting to come back up, but that is after tremendous compounded losses, so they are basically back up to off season views but for peak season dates. We have July 23 week open and it is crazy because that is one of the most traveled weeks of the year as people try to squeeze in a vacation before kids go back to school.

 

Airbnb Plus kind of makes an extra challenge, even though I want to say up front I do not want to lose that status - those in the program worked too hard to get in Plus just to have it disappear, because we cannot just list on other sites like a lot of folks are doing right now. Also, a Plus category I think would be a nightmare, because it should be something you can stack. Being Plus is very different than having an Amazing View or Chef’s Kitchen, because it gets at the quality of the stay not the amenities and shows a more advanced approach than traditional listings owing to the 100 point inspection we went through.

 

I hope something lets loose soon, as fall is looking grim on many fronts.

Emilie
Community Manager
Community Manager
London, United Kingdom

Thanks for the feedback on search dates @Christy8 and @Lisa34!

 

As mentioned in our last set of news, we’re currently exploring updates to the booking experience and will come back with more details this month. I'll pass on your suggestions and concerns to the team looking into this. 🙂

 

Emilie

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Merci de jeter un oeil aux Principes du Community Center/ Please follow the Community Guidelines

Patricia1945
Level 8
Hobart, Australia

Im afraid nothing is going to happen until some one pulls their head out of the sand , hosts think that bookings are down due to a downturn in people travelling and are accepting it , this is totally wrong its due to the these "summer changes" airbnb need to brought to account !

 

The OMG Categories vanity project, also known as the Summer Release, will probably not change much until corporate Air notices a precipitous drop in their own revenue due to guests giving up on trying to find anything.. and just going to other platforms. People won't stay on a site trying to book for very long if they keep getting weird or irrelevant results.

 

There must be corporate Air data showing how long they  are on the site searching, try to look at places and then give up and leave the site, perhaps heading to either  BDC or verbo to book a place since the search processes there are fairly straightforward and don't offer the guest novelty  categories, strange dates in the future, mapping errors and other AI content errors. 

 

I have a friend who was a former Air host trying to book an east coast road trip right now. He says there is slim pickings on Air. When he searches for places with a pool, it shows him pool tables. But when he looked on VRBO for listings that would work for his road trip they are more than abundant. 

 

What does that tell you?

yes its very very sad, unfortunately they are not looking but guests are looking else where, my last 3 bookings almost gave up !

 

@Kristina46  I am afraid you are right. People don't have the patience to research not intuitive platforms.

 

I recently downloaded 2 apps for registering my guests to the police ( mandatory in Croatia) because filling the form manually is time-consuming.  I tried one app, but it wasn't user-friendly and I gave up in literary 10 sec. Then tried another one with my first group, it was easy so I bought it.

Kevin129
Level 6
Hove, United Kingdom

@Stephanie  @Catherine-Powell  @Emilie 

 

Hi Guys, 

 

I thought I'd just try to keep some issues visible in case you are able to raise them with product team. 

 

1. I can now see listing title again which is a big improvement. Thank you! However,  when I search for my listings using appropriate filters: e.g. location, dates, price I see lots of Private room in Hove tags in bold. This repetition makes the tag uninformative. It would be better to have the host title in bold and listed first since that allows guests to differentiate more quickly. 

 

2. On my mobile app I can see the return of the review count. Fantastic! At the moment though it doesn't show up using the web front end. Is that on its way? I would like a count of nights hosted for that review rating. That would allow guests to differentiate between hosts that have hosted 10 weekend stays (20 nights) and those that have hosted 10 guests who stayed a total of 18 months. 

 

3. I still can't see my superhost status on the search page. I still see "Rare find" on my listings. That makes it look as though I am not a superhost. 

 

4. The split stay icons are larger and more prominent that a non-split stay. This is the wrong way round. Guests on a long stay look carefully at a listing, reading reviews, checking amenities, then communicating with host etc... They don't want to do this twice unless they have to. Split stays should be more in the background as an option when a guest can't find a complete stay. At the moment they dominate the map. 

 

5. When a guest chooses a location and dates the categories disappear - thank you!  That was so confusing for guests.   

 

6. This is not related to the most recent release, but can we please have reviews in reverse date order? That is what everyone expects. Sometimes my most recent reviews are pages and pages back behind reviews from 2015. It makes it look as if I haven't been booked recently when I have been fully booked. 

 

7. Again this is not related to the most recent release but currently I have to ask guests to write how long they stay in their review because the review doesn't give that information. It would be great for a review for a stay of 6 months to recognisable as a stay of 6 months. I almost only have long-term guests and I know they like to read reviews for other long-term guests to help them make a decision.  There is some kind of long-term tag that has been introduced recent but apparently the guest has to choose it. Of course, they don't always remember or even notice it. Surely it's not a choice, it's just a fact like the date of the stay. Also, the system hasn't been backdated so now stays from the past that were many months long don't show up as long stays. Quite frustrating. 

 

8. Categories - I think the only really relevant category for my listings would be home working as my rooms are set up for long stays for people working or studying. I couldn't find a category for this which seems like an omission. Surely more people are looking for accommodation where they can work remotely that are looking for a grand piano? 

 

I appreciate that you have to funnel all the feedback together to pass it on up but it'd be great if these suggests could be added to the mix. 

 

Many thanks for your help. 

Ditto all of the above and removing the default to a weeklong stay at random dates in the future. Choosing the dates for guests and funneling them to off peak when hosts have many weeks available in the coming month is confusing. I think not choosing dates for the guests at all and letting them explore the calendar would yield better results. 

Kristina46
Level 10
Hawaii, United States

It does appear they are cleaning up some things. I am no software engineer, but don't these things normally get tested and tested before they are released? I can understand a few bugs, but this thing was beset with crazy, nonsensical and hilariously bad errors of many different varieties. As well as just a flawed design. 

 

There's nothing wrong with categories. But to make crazy categories the focus on a search page was wildly confusing and self defeating. The move to push searches in certain directions against the guests' intent just didn't seem prudent, and would logically result in guests just giving up and going elsewhere.

 

Someone said you have to make these things simple enough for Granny to use. 

@Kristina46  but exactly that was the intention, to persuade guests to book out of season and outside popular destinations 🙂 No Kristina, don't go to Paris in June, look how beautiful is Tuzla in November 😄

Louise1097
Level 10
London, United Kingdom

Things are getting worse, not better.

 

We are now in a category. Except it's the WRONG category. Air is now stating we -and everyone in our town - are in the Exmoor National Park (UK). Exmoor NP is a 90-mile drive to the west.

 

Air is now stating that a place 8 miles from us (and all their neighbours) are in the New Forest National Park. New Forest NP is at least 60 miles to the east.

 

Air is telling folks that by travelling just 8 miles on a split stay, they can visit both national parks. This is risible. Insane.

 

Then I check my local map again, and find properties that were not there a month ago. Except they are not new Air listings, they are properties that have been randomly moved on the map to a completely wrong location, miles out. For example, a rural property with extensive gardens and with countryside all around, which is at least 4 miles from my town, has been moved to the centre of my town's biggest, central, car park. It wasn't there a week ago. I would be really angry if I were that host.

 

This is getting frankly ridiculous.

 

 

Louise1097
Level 10
London, United Kingdom

Then there's al the ski resorts that have started appearing. You can now apparently ski-in/ski-out of two flats in central London, and a house in Somerset! For those of you outside the UK, there is absolutely no skiing in England, and even more so in the south of England. Most years we don't even get snow.

Bee149
Level 3
Little Faringdon, United Kingdom

Can someone explain what air b&b have done? Absolutely zero bookings all summer and foreseeable future ?!

Patricia1945
Level 8
Hobart, Australia

I wish they would go back to the old booking platform why are they not listening, dont they care ? I havent changed yet but its getting close