Airbnb Summer Release = New Coke

[Suzanne302]

Anyone old enough to remember the "New Coke" fiasco?

Around 1985 Coca-Cola was losing sales and decided to rebrand under a new formula called "New Coke."

It was a complete marketing failure and after 3 months they brought back the original formula and called it "Coca Cola Classic."

Is there hope we might get an "Airbnb Classic"??!!

[Heather1086]

YES!!! The thing that is really hard about this is I am watching thousands of dollars of lost income go by. I went from around 5+ bookings every 30 days to 0 as soon as they launched their "New Coke". I'm trying to figure out how to fill my house during the popular summer season since Airbnb did their update.

[Suzanne302]

@Heather1086 

If an iconic company like Coca Cola can recognize and admit a mistake, surely the execs at Airbnb can swallow their pride and set aside their egos.

I did hear a major publication is working on a story about host frustrations with the summer release so maybe VERY public opinion will do the trick...

[Robin4]

@Suzanne302 

Absolutely Suzanne, I do remember that, and it is happening again along the way with their continual branding changes. In the last 8 years Coca Cola has lost marketing share every year in increasing amounts. In 2021 alone Coca Cola lost 13% of its market share.

Suzanne the reason for this is, Coca Cola and Pepsi have become a 'knee-jerk' reaction companies, they try to read the market and jump with it. This simply confuses their long time customers....those ones that got them to be leaders in their field.

And I am afraid Airbnb is the same, they are a knee-jerk reaction company, every year they 'throw the baby out with the bathwater' in order to run a new bath. Since the failure of Select, Plus Luxe you would hope they would learn but......Airbnb are a knee-jerk company, once again we are seeing the results of that!

Cheers........Rob

[Judy858]

Insightful!

[Debra300]

@Suzanne302 ,

You and I are of the same mind.  I was visiting with @Ann72 the day after the latest release, and we played around with it over the weekend.  I expressly told her, "This looks like New Coke to me."  

Ironically, I now have a home in Atlanta where Coca Cola headquarters is located, and have taken their tour where guests can sample the different beverages they offer around the world.  Many of the flavors are definitely geared to regional preferences, but none of them are New Coke.  No one wants it!

Folks need to understand that Airbnb cannot simply rollback the changes they made last month.  It was a significant rollout that probably expended years  working on dev, infrastructure, networking, security and deployment planning.  Something this large is rolled back only if the system is down.  Otherwise, they will gather the list of defects, prioritize them, and work on resolutions, accordingly.  The announcement about re-enabling a limited version of free text labeling for listings is probably low hanging fruit to appease the masses for the time being.  It will take them some time and effort to smooth out all of the lumps in the Cream of Wheat of a release.  If you've had that hot cereal, you know that some of the lumps sometimes take a while or never fully dissolve into the rest of the mix.

[Robin4]

@Debra300 

Debra, bad decisions are made all the time, they have been since time began. Those governments, corporations, entrepreneurs that stuck with their bad decisions have always ended up paying the ultimate price.

The public is the final arbiter, as has always been the case.

No matter how big and powerful you are, without those who support you at your side.....ultimately, you are nothing!

Cheers........Rob

[Debra300]

@Robin4,

I am not saying that Airbnb doesn't need to make changes and improvements on its latest rollout.  I am merely speaking out to a larger audience who have demanded instantaneous rollbacks to the previous version, and that isn't going to happen.  Although New Coke was on the shelves for only 77 days before Coke Classic was introduced, Airbnb will not be able to revert to the previous version of the site like it was a stored recipe that can be taken out of the vaults and reintroduced to the public.  I believe it's going to happen, but just not as quickly as people are demanding.

[Huma0]

@Debra300 

I suspect you are right, but in the meantime, many Airbnb hosts will go out of business.

I know that if I don't see an improvement soon in my views/bookings, I'll have to switch to Plan B asap and Plan B does not involve Airbnb.

[Chris2003]

@Huma0 You don't have any availability in your  "Large & lovely room" until September.. and the "Spacious double room" until March 2023?

I've noticed a decrease in my views.. but is that not because the majority of my upcoming dates (like yours) are booked? If people are searching for places for summer, your places aren't going to show up?

The 28 day minimum is.. interesting. If that works for you then fantastic! 

[Huma0]

@Chris2003 

I host long term guests who typically book months in advance (before the Summer Release I was getting enquiries for dates as late as January 2023), so it is not at all unusual that two of my rooms are booked until late August/early September.

What is unusual is that I don't have bookings for either for the rest of September and October. I normally would by now and probably for dates after that too. Many of my guests are students and they would be booking for their autumn term. So, I really don't think it's got anything to do with availability. Nothing about this is normal for my listings.

Since the Summer Release, I am getting hardly any views or enquiries, let alone bookings, whereas directly before that, my views were high and plenty of enquiries were coming in.

All the bookings I have for the Large & lovely room were made prior to the Summer Release. Since the release, I have had no bookings for that or another one of my rooms at all. The Spacious double room is currently occupied by a bachelors student. The other day, she booked for her next two terms, i.e. from September to March. That booking is the only one I have received and is not relevant to this discussion because it's a repeat guest, not one who has found the listing recently.

The screenshot of my views was taken a few days ago, which is why it is showing dates up to 6th June. I posted it to illustrate the difference between the month directly before the release and the month directly after.

The guest currently in the Spacious double room booked her second stay on 12th June, so her booking would not have had any effect whatsoever on the views shown above, as the room was still available when that screenshot was taken. The guests that are booked into that room in between her two stays booked months ago (one in March 2022 and one in December 2021 - that's how far in advance my guests book.

So, again, I don't believe availability has anything to do with the views. I would expect to have all three of my rooms booked 2-4 months in advance year round and still receive enquiries/booking requests for dates after that, plus my views were very high in the month before the release and are now down to almost nothing at all. I can't believe that's a coincidence.

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Huma0 if I understand the graph correctly it shows the views you got for someone wanting to stay between 9 May and 8 June. If your place is booked for these nights then the views will be much lower than for the month before when I guess it wasn't booked.

[Suzanne302]

@Mike-And-Jane0 

No, that's how many views she got between May 9 and June 8.

[Mike-And-Jane0]

@Suzanne302 If that is the number of views Huma got between May 9 and June 8 how do you explain the views that show for days/weeks/months in the future? 

[Kelly149]

Just chiming in to say that I too have seen the future views like @@mike-and-jane which has always struck me as odd. But I’ve given up a long time ago understanding this platform

here’s a screenshot of my views 180 days forward