Changing to 2-night minimum stay has led to better reviews!

[Patricia55]

OK, I hope I'm not speaking too soon (touching wood etc) but since we changed to a two-night minimum stay, last September, I don't think we've had anything less than 5* ratings. [We made the change because we had a run of one-nighter/four-star guests.]

I don't know whether it's just coincidental... but my thinking is that:

1. many of the one-nighters weren't particularly up for/didn't have time to make a connection with us;

2. with the cleaning fee, the one-night price was relatively high;

3. they didn't really chill out/settle in/avail themselves of the facilities, eg kitchen. (I like it when people use our kitchen, feels like they're making themselves at home :))

It's a shame really, cos we met some great people who only stayed the one night, and I didn't really want to close ourselves off to them... but!  D*mned reviews, eh 😉

[Patricia55]

@Emilia42 

I've never been a guest, but if I were, I do wonder how I'd choose a place in somewhere like Paris or Amsterdam where there must be '000s to choose from! I suppose, as with my listing, I put my hope in people's use of filters in order to get the best fit on both sides. But we're not yet saturated with listings in Newcastle, so it would be easier for a potential guest to do the legwork of actually reading the listing descriptions!
An added bonus (yes, certainly not overlooking the reduced housework!) was the fact that our bookings weren't adversely affected by cutting out 1-night bookings, may even have increased a little. Sounds like a good plan to give a discount for 3 nights+ - do you write that into your listing?

[Emilia42]

@Patricia55, the discount can go right into your pricing. This is a great feature when you use the professional host tools: (https://www.airbnb.com/help/article/2499/how-can-i-use-professional-hosting-tools)

[Patricia55]

@Emilia42 

Thanks for that - I hadn't realised there was such an option...

[Sarah977]

@Patricia55  One great thing about being a participant in these forums, is that I know exactly who I'd want to book with if I went to London, Paris, Croatia, etc. I wouldn't even bother looking through all those listings- if I was going to Tyne, I'd just book with you 🙂

[Patricia55]

@Sarah977 

Aw, sweet, that made my day! Yes, after seeing so many wonderful listings, and people, on here, I often think it would be great to do a grand tour of all of them! Sadly, my “travelling” these days seems to be limited to books and TV 😉 Never mind, one can but dream, eh? 🙂