Smart Pricing Can Work – If You Do It Right

[Ann72]

Last winter I spent a lot of off-season time drilling down into my nightly prices, seeing what had worked best over four years of hosting.  I came up with a “sweet spot” for each of the three listings and set that number as the minimum with Smart Pricing.

My prices were already higher than most of my competitors.  But here’s the long story short:

*by May, my booked income for 2019 was 100% of my booked income for 2018

*overall income for the year so far has now increased 25%

*number of nights booked has gone up 13%

*average nightly price across three listings has gone up 10%

*at this point last year, I had 34 bookings; this year so far, I have 68 bookings.

Before using Smart Pricing, I looked into Beyond Pricing. (Wheelhouse is not available in my area.)  Their demo showed that, on average, they would be charging less than I was already charging.  So I decided to try Smart Pricing, which many hosts hate.  They hate it because it “tells them” to set a lower minimum price than they want to charge.  But if you SET YOUR MINIMUM AT WHAT YOU WOULD NORMALLY CHARGE, rates will go up dynamically.

And by adding the Smart Pricing tool to Instant Book, I found my listings rose dramatically in the rankings.  I signed on with Rank Breeze and found that they were almost always on the first page.

Other discoveries:

*after a few months, I found that even when I used Airbnb’s suggested minimum, Smart Pricing set most nights at my “sweet spot” rate – showing me that the algo drew the same conclusion I had drawn.  However, I never left it at the minimum rate for more than a few minutes!  🙂

*Smart Pricing’s suggested maximum changes often, and I always use their suggestion for the maximum, even though my prices have never hit the maximum.

*in an effort to keep the listings fresh and drive them up the rankings, many of us make changes regularly.  Changing or adding photos doesn’t update the listing, but changing ONE LETTER of the listing description does.

*when your prices are up, you might get a suggestion to send out a special discount offer for a period of days.  In the off season, I always did that, because Airbnb sends an email with the offer out to people searching those dates.  It mattered less to me that I got bookings than that I got more eyes and clicks.  And more eyes and clicks raises you in the rankings.

It seems like your listing will get more favorable treatment the more Airbnb tools you use.  I know there are a lot of Smart Pricing haters out there, but why not give it a try, making sure you always use your own minimum, and see what happens?

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@Alice595 

tnx 🙂

no, just one week has these arrows, other dates don't.

[Ann72]

@Branka-and-Silvia0  Is SP turned on for the dates that don't have the arrows?  To check, click on any day where you don't see the arrow and look at the right-hand side.  If you want SP on, just check that the arrow is green, like this:

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@Ann72  hm, no arrow anywhere except for a week or so at the end of September and it seems SP is not set for any other dates so yes, you are right

[Ann72]

It's not turned on - the check-mark isn't green, the X is green.  Click on the check-mark to turn it on.

[Ann72]

@Branka-and-Silvia0  The squiggly arrow just indicates that Smart Pricing is turned on for those dates.  And yes, as @Alice595 said, the direction indicates the hope lol.

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

mah, there is no hope @Ann72 , ABB says my min should be 25€ 😄 😄 😄 I would earn more if I would babysit dogs in it , and they wouldn't complain about a single hair on the bed 😄 😄

[Ann72]

@Branka-and-Silvia0  Darling, you did not read the post!  You are an adult!  You make your own decisions!  You cannot set the minimum to what Airbnb says - you have to set it to what you want it to be!  Naughty, naughty, naughty!  Now go back and try again!  :):):)

[Ann72]

@Branka-and-Silvia0  See my settings?  I never, ever, ever take their minimum price suggestion.

Then look at their little graph below.  They are simultaneously telling me I'll have more bookings at the lower price while showing me the bookings I have at my price:

Ignore, ignore, ignore!

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

don't worry @Ann72  darling, I've set the min to the regular price I DID read your post 😄

I just didn't figure it out  why smart pricing is set just for September and not for all future dates

[Ann72]

@Branka-and-Silvia0  Oh whew!  LOL.  Sorry about that.  🙂

If you set one price in the settings for all dates, Smart Pricing will override that.  But if you've manually set prices on individual days, it will not change those prices.  You have to go in and activate SP on each one.  I don't think there's a way to globally remove all manually set dates and let SP take over.

[Ann72]

@Branka-and-Silvia0  Wait - I misspoke.  You can choose a date range and change the whole range to SP, as long as there are no bookings within the range.

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

@Ann72  didn't find the option to chose the date range, do you have an idea where is it'?

[Ann72]

@Branka-and-Silvia0  Yes.  You click on the first date of the range in your calendar.  The box on the right opens up with an arrow pointing from the first date to the right.  You put the last date of the range in to the right.  Then below that you click the check mark to make it green for SP.

[Branka-and-Silvia0]

Thank you darling 🙂 

@Ann72 

[Rich-and-Yan0]

Thanks for the information. We're totally new to Airbnb and are still trying to figure a lot of things out, including Smart Pricing. I will give your system a try and let you know how it works out for us. Cheers. 🙂