Send messages to guests using their Airbnb email

[Hugo341]

Hi everyone,

I've created a software bot to send messages to guests using their Airbnb email.

Every time I would send an email to their Airbnb email, the message would appear on the message system in Airbnb itself. This way, I was sure the guests were receiving my messages and I could keep track of everything in the Airbnb message system.

Everything was working perfectly until around 2 months ago. Something changed on the Airbnb side and now, all the emails I send to the guests' Airbnb email, are not recorded on the Airbnb message system.

I've tried with 2 types of guests' emails: the one in the "reply to" when we receive the "reservation confirmed" email, and the one on the reservation itself. They seem to be different but none of the emails I send those addresses are recorded in the messages.

Does anyone know how to make this work? Having it automated was saving me a lot of time but now I'm not even sure the guests receive my emails/messages since they can go to spam.

[Lisa723]

@Hugo341 I am surprised that you ever saw emails sent outside the Airbnb message system on the Airbnb message system; I never have seen that. But in any case, Airbnb has eliminated the feature that provides an anonymized guest email address, unless you opt in and attest that you will only use it for specific purposes:

https://www.airbnb.com/resources/hosting-homes/a/an-update-for-hosts-who-use-the-guest-email-feature...

[Hugo341]

Hi @Lisa723,

Thanks for your reply.

Yes, the messages were working and that was a great feature. I didn't want to spend for a third-party tool to send messages, considering it's something I can easily code myself, but looks like there will be no way out now.

[Ian-And-Anne-Marie0]

@Hugo341 

Can you not opt in to the email sending option to retain your mailing ability? It's obvious that any email FROM your Airbnb account email TO the Airbnb email alias should show up in your message history. The only thing to have changed is the opt-in facility.

[Sainjit0]

thanks

[Ronak13]

Hey @Hugo341 , it's interesting to see that you built a bot to make your job easier. I'm curious to know exactly what problem you were trying to solve. Were you trying to automate replies to common incoming inquiries from potential guests or confirmed guests?

I'm guessing you spent considerable effort to build it. Did you get any other benefit out of it? 

For context: I'm doing research into the common problems Airbnb hosts face. Maybe I can solve some and build a startup out of it.