Three main ways to IMPROVE your AirBnb Performance: How to be a Superhost
Listing optimization, AI based smart-house manuals, 24/7 virtual front-desk, automated work-orders, dynamic pricing in Houston, Texas
Listing Optimization
- Quality of listing: photographs, description, amenities, pricing-relevance, house-rules and cancellation policies
- Number of reviews & overall rating
- Response-time (AI based smart house manuals and automated keyword based responses)
- Pet-policies (Yes! Even though we DON'T allow pets in any of our units, Bnbs that allow pets rank better!)
- Age of listing
- Keyword analysis: what do your guests search the most?
- Market area demand & supply
Remember: Regardless of your market and its "saturation", if your listing ranks well and performs at a 75th percentile or higher, it will be profitable and give you a good cashflow!
Dynamic Pricing for Revenue Maximization
What's common between paying for gas at a gas-station, flying first-class and staying at a Marriot? Dynamic Pricing!
I am sure as hosts, we understand the significance of dynamic pricing. Would you pay the same to stay a night in Marriot on Thanksgiving eve as you would on just another Monday? Probably not!
That's exactly what we setup for Rice house: dynamic pricing. We did this through one of our technology partners; pricing for the weekends, weekdays and holidays including special discounts for a vacant Wednesdays and only three-day bookings allowed on Weekends!
Automated Guest Communication & Virtual Front Desk
We automated the guest communication for the Rice village house using keyword-based workflow responses and AI based smart-manuals which brought down our response times from 4 hours to under one-hour. This does not mean that it was taking an hour to respond to guest-queries since almost all our responses were almost immediate, however, that's what AirBnb response time shows when you are responding almost immediately.
On the instances that we needed a human-response or guests needed to speak to someone on the phone, while we would be always available, we also had a virtual-front-desk setup to respond to guest and answer the phones 24/7.
Cleaners & Runners
While these guys are the key to your operations and probably one of the most important partners during your short-term rental venture, strategic partnerships with them is all the way more important.
We only work with those who are at the top of their game, just like we are on top of ours! We setup primary, secondary and tertiary cleaners and runners that we use in many of our units. Not that secondary and tertiary cleaners are not the best, but they are primary cleaners for our other units; the point is to create resilience in face of uncertainties!
Furthermore, we streamline all communications with our cleaners and runners using work-order and project-management apps. For example, right when a guest books a short-term rental, we have a cleaner and runner scheduled to take care of cleaning and maintenance during the guest's stay and thorough-and-professional cleaning at the check-out.
Conclusion
When you combine these tactics, you ensure that your short-term rental is performing at its peak. Just starting out as a new listing could be challenging, especially the first two months while your listing performs below 50th percentile and you are barely breaking even after spending several-thousand dollars on furniture and getting the unit ready.
Your goal should be to get your listing above 75th percentile as quickly as possible which was our goal as well for this particular home.
