Airbnb 2022 Summer Release: What you need to know

[Airbnb]

Our 2022 Summer Release represents the biggest change to Airbnb in a decade. We’re introducing:

• Airbnb Categories: A new way to search that makes it easy for guests to discover millions of homes they never knew existed

• Split Stays: An innovative feature that pairs two listings when a guest searches for a longer stay

• AirCover: The most comprehensive protection in travel, included for free with every stay

Get all the details on the Resource Center, and tell us: Will you be updating your listing for Airbnb Categories and Split Stays? How will you update it?

[Louise1097]

It's time to bail from Air, given the radio silence for almost 4 weeks.

Today we signed up with VRBO. 

Tomorrow is own website, for which we have just registered domain names.

Plus Bookalet to integrate calendars.

At which point we turn off Air instant book. 

Wednesday will be Booking.com

[Gillian166]

currently this Chesky-announcement post has 20 likes and 46 pages of comments. the ratio is clear. 

[Peggy137]

Yeah. It's getting pretty obvious they're not listening.
I've been contacting my friends who are Airbnb hosts, a lot of them aren't aware of why their bookings have drastically dropped, they think it's the price of gas, or ...something.
Contact all your host friends and get them to weigh in so Airbnb gets an idea of how widespread this really is. 

[RoniSue0]

It's been a month since the release, but I'm not seeing anything in the media about all the concerned and upset hosts for whom Airbnb has killed or dramatically slowed business with their summer roll-out. I can only find articles on how great Airbnb's updates are, and how profitable their last quarter was.

Has Airbnb tuned hosts out because this roll-out really is working for them in some mysterious way that I can't see? Or, have overall bookings dropped as much as I'm guessing they have, causing Airbnb to be overwhelmed and incapable of keeping up with the number of hosts' concerns?

Either way, Airbnb doesn't seem to be hearing us, and judging by the news, neither is anyone else in the world. 

[Tony-And-Una0]

This will only make the news if Airbnb reports a drop of bookings or revenue.

But of course due to the covid travel bounceback, this probably will not happen. Bookings and revenue will probably show a year on year increase, so they will say it is a success.

[Lisa34]

I think they are waiting for at least a full months data, I know I would, to evaluate. Personally I think the categories is a good concept and an interesting way to go in differentiating themselves in the market even further. That only needs to be fully populated, which IMO it should have been prior to roll out. As I have said before, it not being is frustrating and confusing to hosts and is misleading and frustrating to guests.

IMO the thing that is effecting hosts the most right now is how the search works if guests skip putting dates in. Used to when you skipped dates it would just show you everything in a region. Now it defaults to week long stays at what ever time seems to have the lowest price. This is confusing for guests and not helpful to hosts. When I searched it was showing me mountain properties in January. Almost no one goes to the mountains in January unless they are going to have snow fun, so it is odd. It also implies these properties do not have weeks open before then, which they almost all did. If guests click on a category and skip dates it changes the market entirely to places far away. For me it was showing places 4 hours away in Gatlinburg and also in South Africa. Weird mix that was all pretty improbable for me as a traveler because I never wanted to go to either. That is why I entered a place.

While these are great options guests may want to use, having them as defaults is problematic. 

I do think they administrators for this conversation have said all they know to say at this time. I did glean one piece of useful information last night though. 

I was told the categories get added to every 2 weeks and that for the most part it is using the photos that show up first in your listing to determine things like Amazing View, etc. As for a chef’s kitchen, I do not know how you demonstrate that in photographs as that entails things like sharp knives, good cookware, etc… Things that not a lot of hosts show in their listings and the amenities do not seem detailed enough to determine a chef’s kitchen IMO. Time will tell. Also, who knows if what I was told is completely accurate either.

Anyway, I think we are all just going to have to give it time. I am not happy about it, but here we are. Please do use the feedback feature and give them pointed feedback on how to improve the roll out. They have chosen this direction and I cannot imagine they will give it up, so figuring out how to dial it in seems the best course to me.

[Tony-And-Una0]

I think everyone  agrees  that having categories, such as beachfront  etc,  would be a good idea. Maybe as filters populated  by the hosts.

But this is a shambles. I know this from my own experience  of trying  to book places.

By rolling out such a major change that is not fit for purpose, Airbnb has caused many hosts  a great deal.of distress and left them with no income. 

So just having to wait until they fix it will be a disaster for many hosts.

They need to take some corporate responsibility  and fix it or at least communicate  with us.

It really  isn't  good enough. 

[Patricia1945]

Surely they must being seeing the massive drop off by now, by the sound of it ,the hosts that understand how the changes have impacted their bookings are seeing why their bookings have dropped.

I emailed them 2 weeks ago and have not had a reply, maybe given I am a small fry operation , they just don't care, but surely they must see it in their overall revenue which must be massively dropping ?

[Tony-And-Una0]

  Oh and they will blame any slow down in the last quarter on the economy and travel delays that many countries are experiencing.  

[Louise1097]

We are a short-stay destination.

Now, our mid-week availability is invisible (weekends booked, no seven-day runs)

Our weekend availability is invisible (we are three day min, and apparently Air uses a 1960s definition of a weekend)

Air is currently surfacing our 7-14 November, 7 days.

Well let me tell you, mid November is dark, is cold, is wet, is windy, is stormy, and there are no events. Funerals only.

We are trying to sell June, July, August, September, October. I give not a toss about November 

We are a town centre short stay with a kitchenette, no washer or dryer. Nobody but nobody comes here for seven days. In November or at any time of year. But Air is suggesting that November is our first availability, which is a lie.

Actions:

1. Domain names registered - check

2. VRBO signup completed - check, today

3. Air instant book switched off - check, today

4. Own website with Bookalet - in motion, today/tomorrow

[Gillian166]

---

@Louise1097 wrote:

We are a short-stay destination.

Now, our mid-week availability is invisible (weekends booked, no seven-day runs)

Our weekend availability is invisible (we are three day min, and apparently Air uses a 1960s definition of a weekend)

haha, you need to give them this feedback! I suspect being considered "old fashioned" might be something that they try to fix. perhaps tell them only Republicans consider a weekend to be Saturday + Sunday, that might get them to react!  🤪

[Louise1097]

Have already fed that back!

It is a bit culturally dumb of them to try to predefine what a weekend is. Every country and culture has different norms and habits and observances and national holidays. Even the UK and the US are quite different, as we get a lot more annual holidays in the UK, plus all our national holidays except Christmas are on a Monday, so we don't even have to take a day's annual holiday to get a long weekend.

[Louise1097]

What is pissing me off is that I am seeing plenty of grotty properties being surfaced - virtually no reviews, bad review scores, student digs furniture, bad photos, bad everything etc etc. This is because they have loads of 7-day runs available all over their calendar, because nobody wants to book them. Because they are sh*t.

Meanwhile perfectly fine accommodation is being rendered invisible owing to the new rules (default rules on weekends and weeks etc)

Dear Air, I don't think trying to get people to book sh*t accommodation is the way to go.

[Nancy1633]

Repeat: AirBnb has BURIED this thread. Why? It's active and growing, with 700+ comments. 

Their problem: (presumed) precipitous drop in bookings timed with "2022 Summer Release"  can't stay hidden forever.  Burying this thread won't make the problem go away.

AirBnb can't blame the economy if VRBO and Booking.com experience growth spurts during the same time frame, as frustrated travelers and hosts are leaving or have left.

The "new AirBnb" is a failure.  AirBnb has stepped over the line:  removing Host's descriptive listing titles, offering arbitrary WEEKS in the future, messing with a traveler's ability to search WHERE they WANT to go, WHEN they want to go, "curating" Host properties so that some can be found but most CANNOT.  The arrogance and stupidity of this "new AirBnb" is breathtaking. And without the courtesy of Host input on such radical impacts to our listings on AirBnb. 

Chesky has betrayed his main customer base.  Guests are simply seeking an alternative to a hotel WHEN and WHERE they plan to travel-- for a variety of personal and professional reasons.  They don't give a crap about igloos, tree houses, giant potatoes, grand pianos and designer architecture-- they need a simple search showing all results (not "curated") in order to make their OWN CHOICE... not where Chesky THINKS they may want to go for $15,000/night,  thinking like the average billionaire.  

Chesky has betrayed Hosts. Our properties, miscategorized or omitted from proper categories and not appearing on the map, or appearing with generic titles and weird, arbitrary future "available" weeks, are virtually unbookable.

Most guests will NOT jump through so many hurdles to book on AirBnb when it's so easy on competitors' web sites. That is showing. 

If bankrupting Hosts and losing customers was the goal of Chesky's "new AirBnb", then Mission Accomplished. 

[Lisa34]

I agree this roll out has been clunky. It would have been much better if the categories had been accurately populated prior to launch and that hosts would have been in the loop. I think the concept of helping guests find what they are looking for is a great one. We book places for architecture/design, views, and kitchens all the time and this could make it a lot easier to find places that serve guests. 

However, I will absolutely agree with you the default to random weeks if you skip entering dates is TERRIBLE. I have given a lot of feedback on platform to this effect. I think this is largely what is hurting hosts right now, as it is misleading and frustrating to use as a guest, especially as a DEFAULT setting. The setting makes filling week nights and orphan days really difficult. There is no setting for a 3 night weekend, which most properties require in our neck of the woods. There is no setting for searching week days and that makes filling those nights very hard. However, guests often look for them because they are sometimes less expensive. 

Please everyone, let’s give feedback at minimum that this default is not a good feature.

Also, giving no way to get in the correct categories except for the algorithm to find you is really unhelpful. I know tons of places in our mountain location should be in amazing views and chef’s kitchen, yet they are not and guests are being directed away from the area when they search because of it. Smaller markets are really suffering because of this.