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It’s difficult to overstate the meteoric rise of Airbnb over the years. We remember when Airbnb was the new kid on the block in 2014. Back then, vacation rental industry pros speculated whether listing on the platform was even worth it. Now, its name is nearly synonymous with short-term rentals.
Plus, since their IPO in December 2020, we’ve learned more about Airbnb’s financials and how their platform has grown… and the numbers are truly staggering.
Even in the middle of a global pandemic in 2020, Airbnb pulled in 2.52 billion of top-line revenue—and 2021 will be even better. Granted, other companies in the short-term rental space like Tripadvisors’ Flipkey and Expedia’s Vrbo have seen growth this year, too, but not quite like Airbnb.
Airbnb’s own marketing strategy is a topic for another post. But their focus on design, brand messaging and community identification for hosts (and guests) has catapulted its brand awareness among not just vacation rental brands, or travel brands, but all brands.
Co-founder Brian Chesky has talked about the symbiotic business model of Airbnb many times: they need hosts, and hosts need Airbnb. Memorable taglines like “Belong Anywhere”, “Live Like A Local” and “Live There” create a sense that Airbnb is much more than just an e-commerce site or OTA.
That’s great for Airbnb, right? Lots of demand, huge brand recognition, and more inventory than ever. But as a host or property manager, you have to wonder: how can I get my share of all those bookings?!
In this guide, we’ll focus on creating a winning Airbnb marketing strategy for your properties so you can grow your attention, traffic and conversions on Airbnb.
It’s no surprise that great reviews from guests are a difference-maker for your business’s success. Hence, the 5/5/55 rule, which is: aim to get five 5-star reviews within the first 55 days of opening your doors to guests.
We’ve developed this concept after a recent study by short-term rental industry data aggregator Transparent, the 5/5/55 rule recognizes the importance of those early reviews. In fact, Airbnb doesn’t even show your star rating on your listing until you’ve collected your first three reviews.
But, importantly, 5/5/55 is not over-reaching, either. It’s a reasonable goal.
These days, review automation has turned into something like “review farming,” or focusing on getting as many reviews as possible—whether by offering incentives for reviews (not allowed, technically) or by reminding your guests about it until they relent.
The problem is, the reviews you get when using these aggressive methods may not be as good as they could be. The real secret is offering a five-star worthy experience that guests want to rave about. Do that by communicating in a friendly helpful way to each of the first 15 bookings in each property and word as hard as you can to earn those 5-star reviews.
Of course, every host wants to get the highest nightly rate possible. It makes sense, with all the hard work that goes into setting up and running a short-term rental.
However, depending on how new your listing listing is (and where you’re located), conceding a bit on rates may be the smartest marketing strategy you’ve got in a crowded market.
At least, that is, until you have enough Airbnb business and five-star reviews to justify a higher rate.
Take a look around at your competition—specifically the properties that are getting top-of-the-market rents. Then take a look at the number of reviews and stays at those places, whether they’re a Superhost, etc.
Likely, those top performers not brand new but have rather done their due diligence to work up to that rate.
The good news is, once you’ve hit a certain level, your success builds on itself and you can sustain those higher rates… yep, even during a pandemic. If you work on improving the customer experience, creating professional marketing (more on that later) and cultivating word-of-mouth referrals, you’ll soon be able to charge a nightly rate you can feel great about.
A note on pricing software. Tools like Beyond and Airbnb’s pricing tool can take the guesswork out of setting your nightly price. These tools use algorithms to determine best-performing rates, and they vary across seasons and take into account supply/demand.
Our clients have had mixed reviews using Airbnb’s pricing tool, which sometimes suggests rates that are much too low. Those clients that went higher than Airbnb’s suggested rates (and believed in their offering) were often able to get those higher rates, especially once they hit that 5/5/55 number mentioned above!
When you’re just starting out, it makes sense to pour most of your energy into the listing sites. Might as well leverage all that heavy lifting that Airbnb has already done on marketing!
It’s what Matt Landau famously called “giving it a go“: earning as much as you can from the top listing sites (like Airbnb) before you jump whole-hog into your own marketing strategy. (That advanced strategy includes things like your own website, email marketing, social media and so on. We’ll touch on that below.)
When you take it slow and focus on just your online listing (view more on the best way to improve your listing here), you can learn a LOT about your target guest profile. Meanwhile, you can continually hone the guest experience and your offering.
But that doesn’t mean you should act like a casual fisherman who drops a line in the water (throws up a listing) and then expects hungry fish (potential guests) to chomp down.
The top performing hosts don’t just wait around; they find ways to get their Airbnb listing in front of as many people as possible. And stand out from the crowd.
Simple ways to do that include:
Now we’re getting to the big guns.
One of the most common next steps for more experienced Airbnb hosts is to create your own website that is capable of taking bookings off-platform.
This allows you to “leave the nest,” so to speak, and begin to take greater control of your vacation rental business. However, it also opens up a whole new world of content marketing, influencer campaigns, SEO, paid search, retargeting, etc. that would overwhelm even experienced marketers.
We recommend focusing on high-leverage but low-cost marketing solutions at first, to further drive awareness for your Airbnb listing.
These include:
Now we’re getting to the big guns.
One of the most common next steps for more experienced Airbnb hosts is to create your own website that is capable of taking bookings off-platform.
This allows you to “leave the nest,” so to speak, and begin to take greater control of your vacation rental business. However, it also opens up a whole new world of content marketing, influencer campaigns, SEO, paid search, retargeting, etc. that would overwhelm even experienced marketers.
We recommend focusing on high-leverage but low-cost marketing solutions at first, to further drive awareness for your Airbnb listing.
These include:
Airbnb might have you thinking that once you’ve achieved Superhost status on their platform, you never need to look anywhere else for bookings. We disagree with that premise.
The Airbnb experience can be great for hosts and guests, but a lot can go wrong if you decide to build your entire business on the platform. Your listing could earn bad reviews. Airbnb may remove you from the platform—sometimes with no explanation (we’ve seen it happen!). Or, now that they’re public and beholden to stakeholders, they may raise fees to such a level that it won’t be profitable enough for you.
Regardless of the reason, it’s worth moving some of your eggs from the Airbnb basket!
It is true that the Airbnb algorithm does favor hosts who earn lots of bookings through their platform. Which means that if you’re getting bookings from multiple sources like Vrbo, Booking.com, your own website, etc., you may not be as highly visible on Airbnb.
But, once you’re well established and out of the “give it a go” phase, it’s important to develop a strategy that extends beyond the platform to ensure the sustainability of your business.
Do you need help building a strategy and plan to promote your properties? Get in touch with us to build a plan.
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