Elevate categories algorithm assign wrong locations and therefore unable to add listing in correct category.

[Don63]

My listing is a lakefront cottage on Lawrence Pond on Cape Cod MA, but Elevate is assigning its location to the wrong lake (Peter's Pond) that is about 2 miles away.  Therefore its category is only "Lake" (which means within a 10 minute walk) instead of "Lakefront".  In fact, Elevate has grouped about a dozen homes not on Peter's Pond to that lake. I also see this is true across the entire region where homes are assigned to lakes that they're not located on. 

My title, description, photos, and reviews all clearly indicate that the home is a lakefront property.  However, my request to add the "Lakefront" category has been denied 4 times in a row.

I've called Airbnb about half a dozen times seeking help, but as everyone knows none of their representatives can contact Elevate (which is a third party department) directly about any problems.  The representatives agree that this is a problem, but no one knows what to do other than advise the host to submit a request through the app, which I've done repeatedly with photos and detailed explanations.  I get automated responses, but no resolution or explanation.

What seems to be happening is that the Elevate algorithm can only handle a limited number of geographic points, and then uses those few points as a reference for an entire category.  Because there are probably tens of thousands of lakes around the country, they only select a few in each geographic area.  However, that negatively affects the other 90 percent of the lakefront homes that are on their own lakes by not being included in the "Lakefront" category.

One solution would be for Elevate to rely less on geographic locations on a few random points, and instead looks at the photos, titles, and descriptions more carefully when a request is made as often as I have made.  Can someone share any insight on how to get Elevate's or Airbnb's attention that the algorithm is flawed? The reason I'm pushing for this correction is that I'm losing bookings and potentially higher rental income because a "Lakefront" category is more exclusive and valuable than the normal "Lake" category.

[Joan2709]

@Don63 

I would request to remove the "Lake" category and then request after they remove Lake to add "Lakefront" (screen shot from another Host:

Elevate.translated.com/categories:

[Don63]

I would try that, but Elevate has been so mysterious I would be afraid of even losing the "Lake" category permanently and being denied "Lakefront" again, and then I would be completely without any mention of a Lake.  I didn't even mention that because this is a lakefront property, we have our own private beach (complete with lounge chairs) and we've been denied requests for "beach" and "beachfront" as well.  One step at a time, I guess. 

[Joan2709]

@Don63 

Yes..that is a risk.

Exact Location

One thing I did note is you have chose "general" rather than "exact" in your location as indicated by the red shading around the house icon on the listing. I always advise Hosts to choose exact location when near a beach or water. Also, the AI for categories relies heavily on what you put in the Location section. It may be confused by the fact you have not chosen "exact" location and can't "see" where you actually are. Be sure to turn on address privacy when choosing exact location. See what happens after you do that:

[Don63]

I did as you advised and changed it to "exact" location.  Then I received a note from Airbnb that my Google geographic location was wrong.  I checked my Airbnb map listing and its Google Maps listing, and both were exactly correct, so they're still trying to figure things out on their end with their engineers.

[Joan2709]

@Don63 

Oh brother...well at least this might end up helping your categories issue. It could be that this is what cauded the issue in the first place. It does seem the Location Section of listings is the key area that elevate uses to determine categories.

What has gotten Hosts in hot water is deliberately moving the map pin (you can do that when first creating the listing) too far away from their actual geographic location. Sometimes unscrupulous Hosts try to move their pin to a better neighborhood, or closer to a popular attraction. The real purpose is to allow Hosts to offset the pin by a bit when using general location so guests can't track down the listing before booking by using the photos and the map pin.

Stick to your guns and don't let them drop this. If your exact location map pin is correct (I would screen shot your Googlemaps image), then make them fix it. This may eventually lead to solving your issues with the "lake" and "lakefront" categories.

[Don63]

Yes, over the last 10 months (and again yesterday) I've sent multiple screenshots with arrows and texts explaining how the website information was explicitly incorrect.  Often times I would get an articulate, bright and sympathetic representative on the phone who would agree with the obvious evidence I was sharing, but they would say that there was nothing that could be done other than me to send a "suggestion" through the app because Elevate was a third party or inaccessible department that they themselves could not reach.  (By the way, I understand from the reps that I'm not the only one who have raised this issue of incorrect categorization, which is exacerbated by the lack of explanation of why their algorithm could not be fixed.)

The good news is that I now have "Senior Case Manager" at Airbnb community support (Moumita) who is helping me.  For the first time I feel like I'm communicating with someone who may actually have some real authority and compassionate comprehension of how error this affects my business.  She is passing on the information to the programming engineers which seems like a small miracle.  

I love Airbnb very much, but this demonstrates one weakness in that there are firewalls of procedures that prevent common sense and clear evidence from reaching those who ultimately can make decisions.  I'm hoping my experience will help strengthen the company's communication procedures.  I still love Airbnb.

[Joan2709]

@Don63 

Yay! Hopefully this will help!

Airbnb is increasingly using 3rd party vendors and relying on AI to perform vital functions on the platform. While this may be a significant cost-saving measure for Airbnb, it can have disasterous consequences if not monitored by Airbnb carefully. Sadly, it seems that AI (used by Airbnb or their 3rd party vendors) has run amok at times. : (