Hi/Salam/Good DayI am Zohairen from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. ...
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Hi/Salam/Good DayI am Zohairen from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. I do hiking, cycling, camping, travelling, photos and of course s...
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I've been thinking about this with recent changes. Ages ago there was a Dublin host named Susan who did a deep dive into ABB booking algorithms among other things. Like many hosts she no longer posts here and I would be surprised if she hadn't left Airbnb. What she posited is that ABB only wants hosts to have about a 5 yr shelf life and that it's model depends on turn over for new hosts. Much like a restaurant, if the same table stays forever it takes away from your ability to seat more people and profit. Unlike a restaurant there's not a finite number of hosting situations...new houses are built, people sell and buy, open up rooms etc. Though the supply is not inexhaustible it's not anywhere near touching the bottom of the hosting pool yet.
As new hosts come in, stricter rules and higher fees are just the norm. Experienced hosts can pound sand or get onboard. This way ABB can keep inventory fresh and control more about what hosts do.
Conspiracy theory? Or do you think this is the actual model?
@Laura2592 I'd believe almost anything at this point. I know Airbnb is a poorly run company, whatever their growth/retention strategy might be. I know this because as someone who used to do public affairs and government relations, I know they are terrible at this. They have the money and the resources for a fantastic grassroots/community relations arm, but they fail at this over and over. Jersey City is a prime example, after being basically outlawed in NYC, JC was their next best/biggest NYC location. Yet, they still failed at their goverment relations and the city put in fairly strict rules...only owner occupied listings are allowed now. The stupid summer release is a disaster unless your worst fears are correct and they have purposely destroyed host businesses under the belief that new hosts are easy to get. I really don't know.
@Mark116 I frankly don't understand why they would roll over experienced hosts in favor of new, as it seems to fly in the face of all conventional wisdom, but I do know that the image is definitely "disruptor" centric. So perhaps they reject the tried and true business 101 guidance because they want to completely thumb noses at other hospitality models.
Maybe someone realized ABB puts zero dollars into host training and retention and so it truly does not matter if they keep anyone. A new host might be less likely to complain or cancel guests sneaking in extra people because they don't know the rules or their rights. Hosts typically start out starry eyed and enthusiastic and that makes good spokespeople for community hearings. Once hosts encounter enough problems, they aren't going to be as Pollyanna about the magical world of opening their homes to strangers.
@Laura2592 Disruptive innovation til the end!! Seems like something Chesky would believe. I imagine their sr. management meetings are everyone trying to impress him with the most OTT zany, 'disruptive' ideas they can come up with. The fact he loves the OMG category and that company created an entire marketing campaign around this says it all. Airbnb. All vision, all the time. Logistics? Execution? Data? Who needs it.
Anyone who truly believes that Chesky gives a flying smell about hosts or even guests while enjoying his life on his superyacht at his super mansion with his super friends is totally delissional.
"the future belongs toy young energetic creative people!" - and it is here
Here, I said it
My rates were cheaper and my rules were light in the beginning. So I can totally see how newer listings COULD be “better”
but also, how many newbies don’t know how to manage their listings, calendars, cleaners… so it’s not all upside
This is the same business model Uber uses. Other tech companies such as Google, Facebook and Microsoft also have this plan:
Our latest ABNB update has probably driven some hosts to lower their prices, I know I have. The least profitable hosts will quit -- we will fire ourselves. But, as you pointed out, there is a never-ending pipeline of new hosts to take their places.
@Ted307we fired ourselves, but not because we were not profitable. On the contrary. We fired ourselves because we could make a very high ROI selling AND we had guests shooting animals on the property. It was a wake up call. Do I risk the well being of my neighbor's kids and pets, or do I make a very nice profit, close up shop, and reinvest somewhere else?
If ABB had been in the least concerned I would still be hosting. The only way I got any traction was with the help of the mods here. I reported my gun toting guest who left a pile of dead animals, out of season, after his stay on a non-hunting property with kids living next door and didn't have the sense to clean up about 3 dozen air rifle pellets from my living room carpet. It was only when I tagged Catherine Powell that his bizarre review got removed.
No host should have to bark that far up the chain to get a review removed in such a weird, dangerous circumstance. That was the last straw. There is no risk free real estate investment but the laissez faire attitude by CSR in our case showed us how dangerous this platform could really be.
I fired Uber, too. But, they have plenty of drivers more desperate than I. Some people will work for less, not you or me, but ABNB will have enough new hosts to replace us. They took losses for a long time to capture the market and now that they own it, they will milk it for all they can get. There is a very high barrier to entry for any new platform to compete with them.
@Laura2592 I am not seeing stricter rules and higher fees among newbies ,although there are a lot of them , rules and newbies, I am sure Susan is still about but like the rest of us struggling to understand Airbnbs model at the moment .I think that many first time hosts are struggling with the rules all together They are no longer simple . there has been a flood of new hosts along the lines of 'pay my multiple mortgages' style. These hosts are trying to juggle a lot while travel and the economy are taking a few bounces. there seems to be some type of effort on Airbnbs part to corral money into a particular area such as OMG listings .This is like the icing on the cake but not the mainstream ,which is being forced to book and to queue, as if there were a shortage of Airbnbs . The only shortage is artificial and it is being artificially created.The people trying to run Airbnbs are often according to this paradigm seen as 'boring'.like most restaurants we are here to provide for all people and their need for an ordinairy roof over there heads style accomodation. We are not the 'destination'. Airbnb now seeks to make the accommodation the destination , so a yurt in the desert instead of a place next to a theme park.This is now compounded by the ordinairy places being 'hidden'. It does not make sense . Not now , not ever. Travellers cannot find somewhere to stay even though 'the inn is open 'H
I had a super host customer support dude say that our listing was boring. We are a rural 122 year old REAL farmhouse but ok I was so insulted but that is the norm for customer service. Newbie here but things got real fast with two reservations so the shine is decidedly tarnished.
Hi @Rhonda301
I'm so sorry to hear about this.
Could you drop me a private message about the conversation you've mentioned please? I'd like to feed back to Airbnb about it.
You've had a challenging time after the issues you've had with the water damage, so I'm sorry to hear this has also tarnished things.
Jenny
@Rhonda301 that is a disgraceful thing to say to you. I'm glad Jenny is going to look into it.