Curious- who else is experiencing slow season

[Yadira22]

Hello All,

hope you are well.

this month has been terrible for us, anyone else? 
I still have people looking but no  much luck with actual bookings- have changed settings to make it easier to book (IB is on), updated the listing itself, spent time in the photos, etc. Anything you found helps this? 
given my location, saying it’s due to increased competition and also a bit due to brexit and season (it’s not really peak season in London) but also Christmas just passed and this is obviously a very expensive time for anyone. 
Any ideas/suggestions would be greatly appreciated. 
thanks,

yadira 🙂

[Mark116]

We are slower, by far, than we've ever been, and despite turning on IB a few weeks ago, we were still at 90% below the median.  We turned IB  off because it didn't seem that it  helped us at all in the ranking.  We will now finally, finally have to get off our a*** and list with HA.

[Yadira22]

I guess I will too! I am so sorry to hear this @Mark116 , I really do hope business picks up and good luck to you! Wishing you an awesome Feb! 🙂

[Trevor243]

I have multiple properties (10+), each one listed on multiple OTAs (TripAdvisor, AirBnB, HomeAway, Booking.com. So far this year, the pattern of bookings for the year seem much the same as the pattern for last year - each property is getting bookings coming in through the different OTAs, often many months in advance. This year, we are open January and February for some properties - we've had a few bookings for Jan/Feb, which is good, but nothing spectacular.

We can get a couple of days when it's "quiet" for bookings, then we get a flurry of bookings on different properties via different OTAs, within the space of a few hours. And then it goes quiet again for a few hours or until the next day.

There is no way to find a specific cause - it's all random. If we look at the visibility graph on AirBnB, some properties have been flatlining on zero visibility for months, yet the bookings still come on those properties, from AirBnB and other OTAs. If there was a problem on AirBnB, we would see a very clear difference between booking levels on AirBnB and the other OTAs.

Will it help to reduce pricing on one of these properties? No. We tried that and it made no difference - there was no increase in bookings from AirBnB and bookings still came in on other OTAs at the higher prices anyway.

Is AirBnB trying to push us into accepting their Price Tips by flatlining our visibility and repeatedly showing the same "Ways to earn less"? Who knows.

I put it all down to "it's just the way things are". Maybe it's "something in the air"?

There are a few things I've noticed over the 20 years I've been heavily involved in e-commerce (and property rentals are still e-commerce). One of these things is that after a grey, wet and miserable winter, like we've had here in the UK this year, as soon as we get a couple of sunny days in March, the internet will be "dead" - everyone will be out enjoying the sunshine, cutting their grass etc. It will be very noticable for me as most of my guests are from the UK, might not be so noticable for other hosts with guests coming from abroad. I'm pretty sure that, as always, I'll have a little panic until I look outside and see the sun shining.

One thing I'm a firm believer in is "give people a reason to book, and they will book". My target market is primarily the 66 million people in the UK. Many millions go on holiday somewhere - around 2 million come here to the Isle of Wight each year. I want them to choose my properties over other properties in other locations. It's not the colour of the bed-sheets that make them choose where to go - it's that there is a good reason to go there.

Many people don't realise that here in the Isle of Wight, it's business as usual all year round. Many tourist attractions are open, pubs are open, beaches are dog friendly, and accommodation is available all year round. Last Saturday, I took my dogs to the beach. The seafront bars and cafes were open and people were sitting outside drinking coffee or eating lunch - ok, so they were in coats and hats, but they were enjoying themselves. Some were even having ice-cream, in the middle of January .....

So this year, I'm ramping up the marketing - showing people that there are very good reasons to come to the Isle of Wight, even in the middle of winter. Social media will be very important. Show them, and they will come .....

[Yadira22]

Thank you for your reply @Trevor243 and I love the Isle of Wight! So gorgeous! Wishing you a great month 🙂

[Ute42]

.

@Trevor243 

Very helpful information - thank You. Are You using a channel manager? And if so are You happy with it?

I've read a couple of times that channel manager tend to confuse the data of the original OTAs calendar.

[Trevor243]

@Ute42No, I've built my own system to read and manage calendar data - 20 years in e-commerce web development so I tend to do these things myself rather than buy in systems. My own system is still pretty basic and is more about my admin, seeing when properties need cleans, income and payouts for each property etc etc - and where we manage properties for owners, those owners will soon have a login to see the bookings and other info for their own properties. I don't know if there's a channel manager that can do everything I want to do ....

[Sarah977]

@Trevor243  About the ice cream- I read that the highest consumption per capita of ice cream is Canada and Sweden. Apparently has nothing to do with outside temperature.

[Trevor243]

@Sarah977The best ice cream in the UK (as voted for on Trip Advisor) is made only 15 minute's walk from me in Ventnor, Isle of Wight. Different flavours all the time, plus gluten free and dairy free ice creams. I might have to start marketing my properties to Canadians and the Swedes!

[Sean433]

@Trevor243 

I agree, its very important to diversify. I am on air, homeaway and booking.com. Some properties are on tripadvisor/flipkey however I find that platform only accounts for 1-2% of our bookings which doesn't make it worthwhile to manage. Definitely, homeaway and booking.com are useful platforms. It is because of them that we have many future bookings in spring/summer. Another thing I noticed is that we tend to charge higher with homeaway and booking.com. The guest that come through there are generally less price conscious and generally higher quality guests. We have yet to have a guest through those platforms that smoked inside our property or caused damaged. Airbnb seems to attract cheap people, a younger crowd and a lot of locals trying to book for parties. Homeaway tends to attract mature clientele which is a ++. Airbnb has a lot of work to do to try and improve the quality of their guests. I am not sure why they are attracting such people more so than Homeaway.

Just be very careful with booking.com. Lot's of scammers on there. They do not collect a damage deposit for you. You have to physically greet the guest and collect it. Also, if you do not set your cancellation policy correctly, you will get a lot of scammers who will book and then cancel same day of check-in. If done correctly, booking.com is extremely helpful and has an even bigger audience than airbnb and homeaway.

Trevor, just curious, do you meet your guest that book through booking.com and collect a cash deposit or do you charge it through a terminal virtually and then refund them?

[Trevor243]

@Sean433I'm totally with you! I don't check which OTA provides the best guests though - most guests have been great.

If people think AirBnB has problems, they really should look at Booking.com - Booking.com has numerous problems that they're just not interested in fixing - it's their policies, their programming, and their staff training - everything.

As for our damage deposits on Booking.com ..... well, after fighting for well over a year, maybe 18 months, I've had a brilliant victory ..... read on!

We use Payments by Booking.com - guests must make payment at the time of booking, just the same as they do on AirBnB. We also set this as non-refundable. The fees are 16.9%, but we increase prices to take this into account. By requiring payment at the time of booking, we don't get fake bookings, no-shows etc.

Our guests come from all over the UK. They normally drive quite a long distance, 100-200 miles, and have to get a car ferry too. Sometimes they are delayed in motorway traffic jams, delayed by problems with car ferries etc. It is impractical to have someone waiting at each property for guests to arrive. Therefore, we use key safe access for each property so that guests can let themselves in whatever time they arrive.

Every time we add a property, the policies show "cash only" for the damage deposit. We set up a message template for "Booking Confirmation", which is sent automatically after we get a booking. The message thanks the guests for booking, tells them we will send directions and check-in information a few days before they come, and asks them to pay the damage deposit by bank transfer. We give the bank account details - it's a separate account, only for Booking.com damage deposits.

Then we ask for changes to The Fine Print (Property > View Your Descriptions) to tell guests to check their inbox for instructions for paying the damage deposit. This Fine Print is shown on the booking confirmation page that Booking.com guests often print out before going on holiday. When asking for these changes, we explain the above, explain the need to protect the property and future guests etc. We also explain that damage deposits must be paid and refunded electronically so that there's a proper, permanent record of payments and refunds to protect ourselves and our guests.

Booking.com *always* refuse these changes.

So then we get into a battle with Booking.com. We tell them that they should be more like AirBnB and that the property will remain closed on Booking.com until they allow these changes. We stand our ground on this. We send message after message - I'm quite happy to lower the tone each time, asking that "minions should pass this on to someone with more than one brain cell" and so on. Eventually, someone higher up allows the text and then we set up the pricing and open the property.

It's hard work, draining, and doesn't solve everything, but we only need to chase about half the guests for payment now.

And then last week, a miracle happened. Booking.com changed the policy settings for all our properties to allow damage deposits by bank transfer, even the new one we had just been fighting them over. Naturally, they didn't tell us - we found out by pure chance. But it proves that their claims that "the system won't let us change your settings" is complete BS and that by fighting and standing your ground, we can win.

I would still prefer that they reserve £100 against guest's cards at the time of booking, just like on AirBnB etc, but bank transfer is better than nothing.

Did you know there is a Booking.com partner community at partner.booking.com ? I'm in there, same ugly mugshot as in here .....

[Sean433]

@Trevor243 

On VRBO and Booking.com, at least you have the ability to charge damage deposit. I think this is one of the reasons for the difference in quality of guests. Maybe you have  been lucky but I definitely notice there is difference of quality guests between platforms.

But going back to the topic, I cannot see how operating solely on airbnb these days can get  you full unless you have an ultra unique high demand home.

[Juan63]

For me, all I need is Airbnb. The UI is simply much better than vrbo and booking.com.

[Yadira22]

Thank you for the insight @Sean433 ! I have gotten up the courage to sign up to home away several times but every time I have done it, my nerves get the best of me. I hate « figuring things out » so any input would be greatly appreciated but no pressure! 🙂

[Ute42]

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@Sean433 

"Airbnb has a lot of work to do to try and improve the quality of their guests. I am not sure why they are attracting such people more so than Homeaway."

They are attracting such people bc

- there is no real security deposit

- airbnb in most cases sides with the guest

- if guests break the houserules and You evict them, they get the money for the

   not used nights refunded, no matter what happened

- in most cases You never really know what the actual name of a guest is

- if You make a claim You can be sure to get a retaliatory review

- guests can leave a review even if they have never been to a place

- there is a class of guests that know very well how to play on that airbnb-piano and they

   scam You all over. And airbnb lets that happen

Airbnb deserves the credit that they made homesharing popular. But in the end they will be remembered as the company that ruined the guest quality due to their guest centric policy.

[Jocelyn369]

I have multiple different options for guests to book and this is the lowest booking season I have experienced.  I can only assume it’s because everyone and their neighbour have listed random spaces on airbnb in my area