Anyone else's experiences waaaay down?

[Kendra181]

Hi All,

I'm kind of new to all of this, but I'm at a loss, so here we go.

I run a small tourism business. My bookings are down and I started digging into the numbers. When I look at what I get from AirBnB I'm down 75% from last year. Mind you I have a 4'97* ranking. Most mention that they found me at the top.

I've been trying to see if AirBnB bookings generally are just down or what may be happening.

Speaking to folks in the industry across Europe I am hearing similar stories, and speaking to other comparable folks in Amsterdam (where I am) I hear the same thing.  So it's not just me in tourism but I do not know other host... So, I'm also wondering why?

Some theories I have:

1.Airlines and hotels are outrageous! Like it's wild how bad it is, so folks are spending less on tours.

2. In general inflation is way up (my prices did not change from last year), hence less money.

3. There's something I could be doing better. ie SEO, social media etc. or something I did wrong.

Any thoughts? Any ideas, help, advice would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

[Helen3]

Many hosts are seeing falls in bookings - a lot of this is down to falling demand because of the recession and oversaturated markets. @Kendra181 

Have you looked on AirDNA? 

[Kendra181]

Hi Helen 

Thanks for that tip. I did not know about AirDNA so I went poking around. Seems that a resource for Homestays (vs experiences)? That seems to be the issue I keep seeing, that everything is geared towards homestays but that we don't see much about experiences. 

I do agree recession is frustrating. Hence why I didn't change my rates this year. I wanted to ensure I'd not price people out. I even try dropping my rates nearly 30% in a short lead time to encourage more bookings. I set up a discount rate for booking made more than 2 weeks out but have yet to see any changes. 

Thanks for your help. 

[Helen3]

Ah sorry you didn't say it was about Airbnb experiences rather than accommodation. Sorry it's not a market I know anything about other than Trip Advisor/Lonely Planet and other travel sites promote them so worth looking at investing in marketing across these sorts of channels.  @Kendra181 

[Kendra181]

Yeah it was in the title. I'm specifically looking at why AirBnB is down 75%. I am on the other platforms and thankfully many of them (including my own direct bookings are waaaaay up), but a 75% drop in a year is a wild difference imho. 

Thanks for your help! 

Cheers

K

[Jessica3347]

Did you check to see if your area is overpopulated with Airbnb? I was worried about this part when I thought about doing Airbnb. I don't have any other ideas right now because I don't know much about your area.

May I ask are you still able to keep up with the Airbnb expenses because I'm scared to start a business and immediately just in debt that I might not get out of.

Best of luck and research.

Keep researching!