@Gerges2
Hi Gerges welcome to Airbnb hosting I hope your hosting experience can be as rewarding as ours, and many others here on the CC have been and continue to be.
Remember Short Term Rental is not an alternate hotel....it is an alternative to a hotel. The rules and the clientele are different. You will find it hard to succeed if you treat Airbnb guests like hotel patrons. Airbnb guests require a more personal service.
What you have asked covers an enormous field and would require days and pages to adequately address.
But to break it down into a few relevant points.
1/.....Don't try to be everything to everyone, guests are all different, they are travelling for different reasons. Pick yourself a market that you want to appeal to with your listings but prepare to be adaptable. Remember guests fall into 2 categories. Passive/complimentary or Aggressive/demanding! Guests either like what they see, just want to pull out their credit card and stay, or they want to jerk you around with question after question until you get to the point where you will give in to anything just to get them out of your life. Never deal with a Haggler.....hagglers don't make good guests!
2/.......Some times we have to buy our business by giving a bit of ground. Your future business will come from your review base, not how rigidly you upheld your rules. I know it's hard with multiple listings but make each guest feel special, as though they mean something to you. I am finding more and more of my business is coming from word of mouth. Guests who have good stays pass their experience on to others.
3/.......Give each guest something they were not expecting. The less a guest expects the more they will be delighted with what they get. I give each guest a cheese plate and a bottle of wine, it gets the hosting off to a great start. Although they had a fair idea it was coming from many past reviews, when they open the fridge and it's there, any inhibitions they may have had just melt away.
4/......Don't try to be the cheapest on the block.Use a spreadsheet to work out exactly what it costs to have guests in your particular properties, not set your price by what someone else down the road offers. Airbnb will always tell you you are too expensive and to take notice of the market. Host to a standard, not a price. There is a guest for every market, attract the cream of what is out there, not the dregs!
5/.....Don't expect Airbnb to bail you out if a hosting goes off the rails. It may never happen but be prepared if it does. You no doubt have property insurance but it is almost always cheaper to put a contingency sum of maybe $2,000 away in a damage fund you can draw on when things don't always go as planned. Don't argue with a guest, just put things right, get on with hosting and keep those good reviews rolling in. Being 'right' doesn't always make you money but covering yourself against situations does!
Good luck with you venture Gerges I hope it goes well for you and remember this Community Centre is a great host resource. Individually we don't know everything, but collectively there are not too many issues we can't offer constructive advice and help on.
Cheers.......Rob.
