5 New ways to help you increase bookings through social media (Instagram)

[Lucy362]

Hi Everyone, 

I'm coming up with new ways for airbnb hosts to increase their bookings through social media (mainly Instagram). 

If you have some ideas, please share them below, otherwise i'd love you to take a read.

1. Start an Instagram page for your place, call it what it's called on your listing ie, Blackcottage, post regular, nice pictures of your airbnb, introduce yourself on it.

2. Create a hashtag that represents your place ie, #blackcottageuk and keep using it when you post a picture'

3. Include your instagram username in your airbnb profile/ listing, this helps your potential customers find you, take a closer look and get a real feel for your place!

4. Run Instagram ads for your listing, when people click on your ad they will be taken to your airbnb listing where they can book.

5. Influencer marketing- you'd offer your place up for a few nights and a professional Influencer (with a large online following) stays at your place, captures the experience through video/ photography and then posts about it on their channels (ensuring you are 'tagged' into the posts so their viewers can click through to your page and potentially make a booking). 

If you have any questions about the above then let me know and I would be happy to help you. If you haven't tried Influencer marketing before, I would also like to know whether or not you would consider it, why/ why not and what kind of tool or service would help you get more bookings?

Thank you and feel free to ask me anything social media related 🙂 

[Ann72]

Thank you, @Lucy362!  I have been thinking about ways to boost my Airbnb Instagram account and decided to search the community forums.  Your advice is so great because I've been overlooking one really obvious thing:  adding my hashtag to every post.  I'm going through and editing all the posts to do that 🙂

Regarding using influencers, a young photographer approached me a few months ago about one of my listings.  He's going to come for two nights in June and photograph the place and share on his socials.  His Instagram account has over 16,000 followers, so I thought it was worth a try!  I'm to pay his travel expense, which will be under $200 since he's driving up to Maine from Massachusetts.  I'll report back!

My Instagram is @Diagonair.  Since I have three listings, I didn't use the name of any one of them, but made this up since the houses are all on Diagon Alley.  (Yes, you read that right - the fire chief called one day some years ago and said our part of the road needed a name, so my children - obviously Harry Potter fans! - named it.)  I didn't think I could use "Diagon Alley" without some pushback from either the publisher or the movie studio.  I created an email address to go with it and of course all my emails have @diagonair in the signature.  Some guests but not too many have started following and a few have posted and tagged.  

I was thinking about ads and thought I should wait until I had a website and maybe a Facebook page, but your suggestion to run Instagram ads makes me think I could go ahead and get started since there's an Instagram account.  My only issue?  I can't put links to all three places in the bio, and I can't just put a link to my profile, either, I don't think.  So I just change the link that's there to whichever house is featured in the latest post.  Do you have any suggestions for that?

Thanks again, Lucy!

[Lucy362]

Hi Ann 🙂

Wow you have the most amazing airbnb's! I love that they are all on the same street, Diagonair is a well suited name. 

In an ideal world, I would reccomend setting everything up so it works in your favor.  Here is what I would reccomend: 

• Creating a website (one page that showcases your 3x listings embedded from the airbnb website with amazing photos and an introduction)

• Then, you'd link your instagram bio link to your website so people can explore all 3x properties, when they click on a property on your website, it can take them to your airbnb listing. 

• Starting a facebook page is important for ads (instagram and facebook ads are managed through facebook business manager). You can also post content from all 3 places on your facebook page which people will like, you just need to be clear which place is which. 

Running ads are great as you can target by location, gender, age, occupation, interests etc, it's very detailed and you can view all the results. 

With the photographer coming, will he post the photos on his account and allow you to re-use them too?

I think that's a great deal as you'll have some high quality photos to use and you'll feature on his profile for more exposure. 

Let me know if you would like anymore help, you can send me an email to **

I help people like yourself get more growth by making websites, running social media, managing influencers etc 🙂 

**[E-mail address hidden due to safety reasons - Community Center Guidelines]

[Lucy362]

Or feel free to ask me anything that you don't mind everyone seeing here 🙂 

[Ann72]

Thanks, @Lucy362 - for some reason I never saw this until now.  Very helpful suggestions that I'll now bookmark.  In the end I got some great photos that get a lot of views.  My bookings increased a lot this year, but that was due to several factors that I've outlined in a post that's going up later today.

[Tracey245]

Hi Ann, 

How do I see the post on how you got your bookings to increase? thanks Tracey 

[Barbara826]

Thanks for these tips Ann! I’m curious if any other hosts have done #5 and had a good experience with it. I have been messaged by mulitiple influencers asking for a free stay in exchange for “exposure” on their Instagram channels. To me, their messages seemed tacky, like they were asking for a free vacation to my place. But maybe I shouldn’t have thought that?! I would love to hear any hosts experiences with influencers, and if they really brought in more bookings! 

[Lucy362]

Hi Baraba, 

Sometimes influencers as in the wrong way and it can seem tacky!

I suggest you try doing the following when approached:

• ask them for statistics on their audience (they can screenshot this from their instagram account), that way you can see if their audience is relevant to whom you are trying to target

• Agree on what you are willing to offer them in exchange for content, ie, for 1x night stay, you expect a handful of good photos or a video you can use for you own marketing, plus you want them to do 3x posts on their account and tag you in

• finally, review the posts and see how much engagement you got out of it (number of likes, comments, new followers, booking requests etc), was it worth 1x stay? 

If you would like a hand with influencers or social media then feel free to send me an email 🙂 **

All the best,

**[E-mail address hidden due to safety reasons - Community Center Guidelines]

[Helen3]

Hi @Lucy362

I'm always rather cynical about people like you who join our forums, to talk about social media and influencer marketing to hosts.....and oh wait for it...here is the sales pitch.... if they want help to manage this ...yes indeed you are just the person who can help them do so.

For disclosure I have headed up communications and marketing functions for national and global brands so have some understanding of how digital and influencer marketing works and am an established host. And I am not here to sell my services.

My take when it comes to social media and influencer marketing is rather different from Lucy's.

Instagram

Untargeted social media engagement is likely to have a very low to non-existent conversion rate (to bookings).  To work well you need to be followed by the sort of people interested in holidays in your area and in your sort of property and have a fairly substantial following including influencers who will share your content across their platforms.

As a host there is nothing wrong with playing around with Instagram, Pintrest etc if you have the time. However it tends to work best for unusual places such as treehouses, boats, villa's by the sea, properties that have the 'wow' factor visually. (Lucy has given some useful generic tips on setting up an Instagram account).

I am wondering Lucy why you suggest hosts invest their money in instagram advertising?  Do you have any stats on conversion rates for hosts who do this and whether this gives them a better ROI than other channels?

Influencer marketing

It doesn't matter how large a following an 'influencer' might have, but rather whether there influence is with the sort of people who might want to book your place. 

For example if they are  a travel blogger specialising in off the beaten track for the indepedent traveller and you are targetting families wanting a holiday in a mainstream resort they obviously won't have influence with the market as a host you want to target.

Hosts with more unusual or high end properties get approaches quite often from photographers, bloggers and influencers wanting a free stay. Many are just a waste of time and are more interested in getting a free ride.

Of course influencer marketing and social media can have it's place for certain properties, but hosts (like other businesses) can also find investing in social media,  a drain on their precious time, which can be better spent elsewhere.

[Lucy362]

Hi Helen,

I'm sorry you feel that way, that's not what my motive is, I work full time and run a digital marketing company for influencers so I'm sharing insight to hosts on this platform that we are all a part of 🙂 

You're allowed to have another opinion on the way things are done, it's not a competition, it's about sharing information in a positive, value driven format that everyone can understand and use.

I'm not pitching anything, I' simply saying if anyone needs more help then reach out to me on here or email and I'm happy to answer their questions.

I understand you probably see the cynical side to people offering help, if you knew more about me you wouldn't think that.

As you will read in my other threads to questions, I talk about asking for a demographic statistic breakdown from each influencer, so my advice isn't irrelevant or wrong.

All the best with your listings 🙂

[Helen3]

Sorry @Lucy0 

i think you are being disenguous if you are saying you don't have a vested interest in people contacting you as it's an opportunity to sell your services.

Of course there are many ways of looking at a subject. However you haven't responded on the key issues I raised about what sort of conversions a host may expect in terms of actual bookings if they invest their hard earned resources in one of your 'influencers'.

The rules of these forums make it quite clear that it shouldn't be used by commercial services such as yours to pitch their services.

I would hate to see hosts taken in, who understandbly don't have a good understanding of digital marketing including influencer marketing and end up spending their money, time and effort on something that offers no tangible return.

[Sarah977]

@Lucy362  I'd venture to say that "engagement" in the form of likes, comments and new "followers" is of little value or interest to hosts. All those things are just social media phenomena which for some reason many people seem to feel they need these days to stroke their egos. Hosts are interested in bookings from nice guests, not wasting their time being popular on social media.

[Grace329]

Thanks Lucy! 

This is very valuable advice especially in this digital age.. i will definitely try it

[Sarah977]

@Lucy362  I have to agree with @Helen3 here- these types of posts on the forum really rub me the wrong way. This a forum for hosts and guests to exchange info and help each other out, not a place to advertise one's services.

Apparently there are hosts who are interested in this, though, but as for me, I run as far away as possible from social media. As a host, my interest when it comes to guests is quality, not quantity, and in over 2 years of hosting, my listing description attracts exactly the kind of guests I want, and they aren't the type of people who are Instagram followers. 

[Lucy362]

Fair enough 🙂 I can understand.