Feedback appreciated

Alexandra1640
Level 1
Santa Monica, CA

Feedback appreciated

Was a host for 11 years with great reviews and all of a sudden my bookings stopped all at once. Airbnb couldn’t figure out why and neither could I so I finally had to delete and start over. Still not receiving bookings. Any insight or feedback is much appreciated 

10 Replies 10
Sudsrung0
Level 10
Rawai, Thailand

@Alexandra1640 

 

Have you taken a look at other listings in your area? maybe give you an idea what people are charging,

Also take a look at their calendars see if they have bookings

 

 

Yes of course. I've been a host for 11 years, this was one of the first things I looked at. There was an obvious bug with my listings that had nothing to do with me. Airbnb kept passing me around customer support because no one could figure it out on their end. I'm now $55k in debt because of all of this. 

 

I don't want to come across as big headed but I'm extremely analytical and tech savvy and I can tell you with 98% certainty that this wasn't a supply/demand issue.

Kia272
Level 10
Takoma Park, MD

@Alexandra1640 Wow. Why on earth would you delete  successful listings with good reviews and start over? If there wasn't a problem with the properties, why would you delete them? Makes no sense whatsoever. 

 

I also don't know why you would turn to AirBnB to "find out" why your bookings dropped off? They have no clue. AirBnB is a listing platform and nothing more. 

 

The STR market is supply and demand. AirBnB screwed everything up with their summer "update" and the search algorithm. That's the overall problem. 

 

If you had come here to check the community forum, you would have realized that this happened to many, many hosts. But deleting two established properties with good reviews makes no sense whatsoever. And you're in branding? Go figure. 

Huma0
Level 10
London, United Kingdom

@Alexandra1640 

 

I basically second what @Kia272 wrote. While creating new listings can give you a boost in the search results, it's only temporary, and then you are back with the same issues again. It's so not worth losing years of great reviews just to get a short boost.

 

Are you sure you actually deleted your listings because Airbnb doesn't make it that easy to do so? Perhaps you have just deactivated them?

 

For example, I have four listings. Three are active, but one is a property that I sold ten years ago! At the time, the system simply wouldn't let me delete it and Airbnb CS never got back to me when I asked them for help. So, it is still there, but marked as 'unlisted', unlike the other three.

 

Have a look and see if you can reactive the listings.

Oh it's deleted alright. The customer support rep who suggested it went through every step to ensure that there were no traces of my email or account in the system anymore. Of course, I don't trust airbnb's customer support so I had to confirm it on my end as well. 

Huma0
Level 10
London, United Kingdom

@Alexandra1640 

 

You are certainly not the only host to do this. I hear that many established hosts are deleting or deactivating listings and posting them as new in desperation. But, you would have to do that over and over because the 'boost' you get is only temporary and I'm kind of appalled that a CS rep would tell you to do this. 

 

Also, I would always be wary of advice given by Airbnb customer support, unless you are given the same advice over and over by different reps, because a lot of the time, they aren't that well trained or versed. I have lost count of the amount of times one CS rep has contradicted another when asked the same question and, often, CS seem to be the last to know about policy changes.

 

You wrote: "Airbnb could not figure out this bug nor why I wasn't receiving bookings." Firstly, I doubt the bug has anything to do with your bookings. This is a bug that has been happening for years and it seems to come and go. I have it right now with an unread message in my inbox. It often happens if you have a review to write, even though you have opened the message. But sometimes it's just random.

 

As to Airbnb not figuring out why you weren't receiving bookings, I'm sorry but that's total BS. Even the most clueless CS rep must know by now that bookings fell off a cliff for numerous hosts after the Summer Release. They are lying to you. 

 

It's no coincidence your bookings were healthy for the first half of the year and then went to zero. It happened to me too, directly after the Summer Release, which was rolled out in early May. There are threads here on the CC with hundreds of hosts reporting the same. Basically, if people cannot find you, they're not going to book. It doesn't matter if you price your listings at $50 or $10.

 

Anyway, I feel for you. I really do. If it wasn't for bookings made in advance of the Summer Release, including a super long one, and repeat guests and direct bookings, I would be totally up sh*t creek myself. 

 

I would suggest you try other booking sites if you haven't done so already. A lot of hosts have reported that they are getting bookings elsewhere, just not on Airbnb, or that the percentage of their bookings from Airbnb as opposed to other sites had decreased dramatically this year.

@Kia272 @Huma0 Kia, I've been doing this since Airbnb started over a decade ago. I wouldn't delete 11 years worth of great reviews unless I was positive it was the only thing left to do to give me some chance of receiving a booking. If you were to look at the first 6 months of the year, you'd see $70k worth of bookings. This literally went to $0 and I tried everything on the moon including lowering my listing to practically free!! There was a strange bug that I think could've been related where my inbox always showed incorrectly that I had an unread message. Airbnb could not figure out this bug nor why I wasn't receiving bookings. After 6 months of no bookings and me trying everything possible including all the help articles and every suggestion they gave, I had no choice but to delete and start over. 

 

If you were correct, then my listings would've been booked when I lowered them to $50/night. Keep in mind my rent on the listings is 4x what I listed them for! 

@Alexandra1640  I still don't understand. Did you miss the part about supply and demand? You can lower your price to $1, but if there's nobody out there looking to stay at your place/in your area/looking specifically for what your listing offers, then you're not going to get bookings. 

 

I really don't understand why anyone would lower their prices to "practically free!." Most hosts also seem to have forgotten that the pandemic changed the STR landscape pretty drastically, and that in 2022 travel opened up somewhat, and people were traveling internationally again, as opposed to domestically-specifically in their home states. I had a banner year in 2021, and I'm not bothered that my 2022 bookings were about half of what I did the prior year. There are no guarantees in this business, and people forget that. 

 

I also remind hosts that the "update" affected everybody across the board. Not just a host here and there, everybody. 

Burke10
Level 4
Atlanta, GA

@Alexandra1640 

 

We just started hosting a few months ago and after this winter software update, I noticed I didn't see my house listed unless your search was for the exact small town that the house is in.  Asheville, NC is the closest big town and is what people would probably put in their search criteria. I then noticed because we can sleep 8 that it didn't show up if you left the default 1 guest in the search criteria, but it would show up once you put 4 guests in the criteria.  I went around with AirBnB for a week before they could even understand my problem and now it shows up on searches even with 1 guest.  This Winter update is a $h!tshow.

This is great insight and something I actually noticed as well and tested with several variations. I'm quite analytical so I feel like I tried everything under the moon but if there's something else you might think of, please let me know. I spent hundreds of hours trying to resolve my issue before finally giving up and having them delete every trace of my account.