[Closed] May Release: Your Questions Answered

[Closed] May Release: Your Questions Answered

Hi Hosting Community, 

 

It has been wonderful to read your questions over the past week and to see that overall your feedback about the May Release has been positive. It is also helpful to hear your suggestions about features we should consider, and how we can improve launches in the future. Thank you for being candid and for being so collaborative. 

 

Since May the 3rd we’ve been gathering and reviewing a large amount of community feedback via our Early Access program, the Community Center and Host Clubs. We have also held several feedback workshops with Hosts to speak with you directly. There are lots of common themes across your feedback and I am grateful for the opportunity to elaborate further on the exciting changes we made just a few weeks ago. 

 

With nearly 50 questions, we chose the most popular and combined a few that touched on similar topics. So, let’s jump straight to your questions!

 

1: How does Airbnb decide what improvements to work on? There appear to be some good features here but other things people have asked for don't seem to be being worked on. 

By Host:@Mike-And-Jane0  

 

Great question! As you might imagine, there are many factors involved in these decisions. 

 

We are committed to improving Airbnb’s core service, for both Hosts and guests. To do this, we have storyboarded the entire guest and Host journey— from sign up to checking out, and every step in between. The result of this exercise is an extensive “blueprint” of the Airbnb experience— every screen, every policy, and every touchpoint with customer support has been mapped out. 

 

With this blueprint designed, we are now able to clearly map the feedback we get from our community of Hosts and guests, whether through customer service tickets, social media, reviews, this forum, live workshops and so on. This helps us identify priorities to focus on and informs the updates launched at each release. Hopefully you are seeing the results! Since the inception of these launches in 2021, we’ve made over 340 improvements.

 

This is only the beginning, we know that we have much more work to do, and we will continue to listen to your feedback and requests as we plan our next launches! 

 

I hope this sheds some light into how we, at Airbnb,  prioritize what improvements to work on. All of our work has a  very clear focus on incorporating Host feedback. Thank you for your ongoing contributions and presence here in the Community Center

 

2: Given this and the growing value of our community's sense of hospitality, could we expect Passports to be extended to all hosts including entire houses?

By Hosts: @Felicity11 , @Lina88 , @Leo3395 , @Sarah5000  and @Keshav7 

 

It has been great to see the positive response of our Host Community to our new Host Passport. 


We are definitely considering expanding the Host Passport beyond Rooms Hosts. Passports were designed to create more connection between Hosts and guests and we see lots of potential for this feature.  For now, we welcome any feedback from Rooms Hosts about your experience with the Passport.

 

I also encourage all Hosts to complete their new profile fields. We know that guests want to know more about the space they are booking, and they will be looking to your new profiles to provide these insights, regardless of the listing type. 

 

Thank you so much for this question and for actively providing feedback.

 

3: Could we please have the Passport for guests too? So many guests have nothing on their profiles, which is sad. Perhaps more options might inspire them?

By Host: @Kitty-and-Creek0 , @Clara116 , @Christine615 , @Mariann4 , @Laurelle3  and @KatieKayMead0 .

 

Several Hosts have asked about this and as a Host myself, I see the importance of learning more about my guests before they arrive. As I said above, Passports are an exciting new feature and it could be an additional way we accomplish connection with guests in the future. For now, all Hosts and guests can add details to their profiles, and we hope to see more in our Community share information about themselves.


Thanks for the question, Kitty and Creek. I learned someone from our team here at Airbnb had a chance to stay at your listing and shared that you were an incredible Host. You are what makes Airbnb so amazing!

 

I would also like to thank our other Hosts who echoed the same sentiment and suggested guest Passports, including Clara in Florida (US), Christine in Kansas City (US) , Mariann in Bergen (Norway) , Laurelle in Huskisson(Australia) and Katie in Lake Arrowhead, CA (US).

 

4: Why have you removed the option to edit Custom Promotions from the Calendar?

By Host: @Christian2086

 

Hi Christian, we have heard from many of our Hosts in the Community Center and Host Clubs on this topic, so I’m glad we can address it head-on. 

 

The Calendar is a really important tool and a part of the app our Hosts use most. We wanted to make it even easier to use, so we have organized all pricing features in one place. You can now set your custom promotions in the new Calendar settings section (click on the Settings icon, then 'Pricing', then 'Promotions'). This is accessible across all platforms, including desktop and your mobile app. Once you set custom promotions, these will be visible when you edit the relevant calendar dates. We have also updated the current flow to make it easier for you to remove and set new custom promotions across all platforms. 

 

However, considering your feedback and the convenience of editing existing promotions, we are actively looking to reintroduce the 'edit' functionality into the custom promotions. In the meantime, if you wish to change your discount percentage, you will need to delete and create a new custom promotion.


We will be providing an update to our Community when the ability to edit existing promotions returns. Thank you for the feedback to improve our Host experience! 

 

5: Not being able to edit the rule sets within this calendar view is a big step back for me. Would you be able to add back the rule sets?

By Hosts: @Tara44  and @Brux0.

 

The Calendar is one of the most important features for Hosts, so we are always looking at ways to improve it.

 

We made significant changes to the calendar editing feature to simplify the Host experience. We increased transparency regarding what guests pay through the 'guest total' feature, and we now display discounts/promotions applied to each date. We have also added the ability to view the average prices of similar listings in your area through the Similar Listings feature. 

 

As we added functionalities, we simplified the experience to prevent the calendar editing process from becoming overly complicated.

 

Consequently, we removed rule sets from the single calendar view, where the Host's experience was subpar (for example, you could not see different colors). Instead, rule sets are displayed and available in the multi-calendar view (which you can access through the desktop by tapping on the ‘calendar’ tab). In this view, you can color-code rule sets for easy recognition. 

 

We understand that rule sets are important to you, and we want to provide the right experience. We plan to gather more feedback from Hosts to help us design a better rule set experience. Thank you for the question and feedback. 



6:  Previously, Hosts used to receive advice from Price Tips but this seems to have stopped with the release. Is there a reason why?

By Host:@Elena487  and @Daniel1651 

 

Thanks Elena for your question and for letting us know that the Price Tips were helpful to you. 

 

We know how important it is for our Hosts to understand prices in your area and to have access to as much information as possible. During our May release, we introduced the Similar Listings feature. For the first time ever, Hosts can compare their price to the average price of similar listings, both booked and unbooked, nearby. This new feature takes into account over 100 inputs to determine listings that may be best for you to compare yours to.  Bookings are indicative of demand, however we hope the Similar Listings feature will help inform pricing strategies. We will share this feedback with our product team for further exploration. 

 

Daniel also asked how we determine which listings are similar to yours. To curate this list, we consider criteria like location, listing type, rooms, amenities, reviews, ratings, and the listings that guests often view alongside yours.


Elena, it is also great to see you help other Hosts as a Superhost Ambassador and are very active sharing advice here in the Community Center. Daniel, thank you so much for your contributions on the Host Advisory Board!

 

7: I use a Channel Manager to support my Hosting. Will the  new "compare prices" feature work alongside this tool?

By Hosts: @Sabrina-And-John0  and @Charlotte40.

 

Thank you very much, Sabrina, John and Charlotte, for your question.

At this time, we plan to only make our Compare Similar listings feature available via the Airbnb product given its proprietary information. We will keep Hosts informed if we plan to change this in the future. 

 

Thank you so much for the work you do as Community Leaders, Sabrina and John, and Charlotte. We are so grateful for the incredible impact you both have in your local communities. 

 

- -  end of question and answers section - - 



Thank you all for such thoughtful questions and constructive feedback. I am so grateful for the opportunity to have this connection and dialogue with you here in the Community Center.

 

Warmly, 

Catherine

21 Replies 21
Bhumika
Community Manager
Community Manager
Toronto, Canada

Hi @Mike-And-Jane0 , 

 

Thank you so much for participating in the Q&A and your kind words!

 

Your question surely gave us an opportunity to shed some light on the improvement processes and hope that other Hosts may find it insightful!

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Thank you for the thoughtful replies, @Catherine-Powell . Airbnb is at its best when it’s about building relationships. It’s why I converted from being a “guest” to being a host. ❤️

So many people get the impression that individual owners are “hotel” equivalents.

 

Asking guests to fill out a passport/profile too will go a long way to enhancing safety and promoting Airbnb as a community. Especially important since Airbnb controls identities at booking and censors messages prior to booking approvals.

 

The guests who are chatty and share details about themselves  have been my best experiences. 

Bhumika
Community Manager
Community Manager
Toronto, Canada

Hi @Christine615 , 

Such a beautiful comment!

I am really happy to hear what inspired you to become a Host and I am sure, your guests are also enjoying their stay under your hospitality. Hosts like you make our platform engaging and a great place to be!

Thank you for sharing your thoughts on having a guest passport! Really appreciate it.

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Branka-and-Silvia0
Level 10
Zagreb, Croatia

@Catherine-Powell 

 

Speaking of Rule sets, the current design gives me a carpal syndrome. So many unnecessary clicks and scrolls. Why???

 

To set just 1 new rule for 1 day on 1 listing we need to click-scroll at least 18 or more times. Here is an example:

 

CLICK on the  "calendar"
CLICK on the day on the calendar you want to add a rule set for
SCROLL down the form on the right side of the screen
CLICK on the "Rule-sets" arrow
CLICK on "add rule set" from the drop-down menu ( now the pop-up window will open and cover your calendar, so if you forgot what day of the week the particular date is then you have to close the popup window, look at your calendar again, and repeat all previous steps )
TYPE the rule set name (unnecessary, should be optional, not required)
CHOOSE the color of the rule set (unnecessary, should be optional, not required)
SCROLL down to "check-in and check-out days"
CLICK on it
SCROLL down to the day of the week you want to block for check-in/out
CLICK on the day you want to customize
SCROLL down to the "save" button
CLICK to check off the "save to reuse..." option
CLICK on the "save" button to close the pop-up window
SCROLL down the form on the right side of the screen
CLICK on "Add private note"
TYPE the note
CLICK on "Save"

GO to the fridge, get some ice and put it on your wrist

... and then repeat everything again to set it for another date/s

 

The first version of the "Rule sets" design a few years ago was way more user-friendly, I don't understand why and who decided to change it?

Quincy
Community Manager
Community Manager
London, United Kingdom

Hi @Branka-and-Silvia0, Thanks for sharing your thoughts about rule-sets and asking your question.

 

At the moment, we are not taking further questions, but thanks for sharing your feedback with us. Have you also added this feedback through the early access?

 

To provide feedback, please follow the below steps:

- Select a feature from the list.

- Tap or click Share feedback.

- Add your feedback and tap or click Submit feedback.

 

Quincy

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Please follow the Community Guidelines // Volg de communityrichtlijnen

Till-and-Jutta0
Host Advisory Board Alumni
Stuttgart, Germany

I like the way our feedback is responded to - thanks for the personal answers, @Catherine-Powell  !

 

It shows how well the dialogue with us hosts works, and which possibilities (e.g. via the CC or the Homesharing Clubs) we have to participate constructively in the development process of new functionalities.

 

As you can see in the new calendar, everything has its two sides: In order to keep the single calendar clear, certain functions (like rules) had to be moved to the multi-calendar. But this will also work itself out.

Quincy
Community Manager
Community Manager
London, United Kingdom

Hi Everyone,

As we conclude this Q&A session, I wanted to express my heartfelt gratitude to each and every one of you who participated in Catherine's Q&A session. Your thoughtful questions and valuable contributions have made this discussion really constructive and insightful. And I hope the answers provided in this thread add value for our Hosts.


We would like to extend a special thanks to all our Hosts who took the time to ask their questions that resonated with our wider audience. Remember that the conversation doesn't have to end here, and our Community Center is always open for constructive and meaningful discussions. If you have anything to share further, you can always share more comments by starting a new conversation.

We look forward to bringing more such Q&A sessions and learning opportunities for our Community Center.

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Please follow the Community Guidelines // Volg de communityrichtlijnen