Understanding the most common mistakes hosts make can help you improve your vacation rental listings. When you know which mistakes to look for, you’ll be one step closer to getting more bookings.
Misleading or incorrect listing information
Not being upfront about your listing will get you bad reviews. You want your guests to know exactly what to expect from your space. Let them know all of your rooms (including details like bed sizes), amenities and perks. Don’t be afraid to set some boundaries, though. For example, if guests are allowed to bring visitors or not, if there are any off-limit areas in the house, etc.
Having poor quality photos
Customers say the quality of the product image is very important for them to select and book a Vacation Rental. Make sure you showcase your vacation home to give your guests an idea of what to expect.
Tips for taking your own pictures:
- Take pictures with high resolution: They should be at least 1024 x 683px, but if you’re not sure of the size, go for the biggest photo size in your camera settings.
- Activity and neighbourhood photos: If one of the best aspects of your listing is the location, your customers are going to want to know what they could do around the area – think amazing views, beaches, theme parks and tourist locations.
- Hide anything that look like clutter: Do you really need to show them overflowing kitchen garbage in your photos? Show your guests how they’re going to find your place when they get there; clean and perfect!
- Get the light right: Turn on the lights or open the blinds, just make sure your place looks bright!
- Create inspirational photo captions: Forget about factual captions and write a sentence that explains the experience your guests can have in your rental. E.g. instead of just naming the photo of the balcony as “Balcony”, you could say “Relax and have a glass of wine on our balcony after a long day of sightseeing”.
A lack of pricing strategy
Your pricing strategy has to take into consideration the demand for your listing throughout the year.
Switch your prices up based on:
- Competition: The first thing you have to do is study your competitors; start off by searching for properties in your area that have the best reviews and are similar to your own vacation rental. Study their prices and availability and create a table to compare them and estimate the maximum annual revenue for your listing.
- Special events: Festivals, marathons, conferences… special events will potentially bring you more guests and you can charge up to 5x your average daily rate. Make sure you research special events at the beginning of the year and plan ahead. You can also increase prices a week before special events for last minute planners – they usually have the most money to spend!
- Weekdays vs. Weekends: It’s a fact that hotels are fully aware of: guests travel more during the weekends and prices should be a bit higher to reflect this demand.
- Seasonality: Adjust your pricing based on high or low season in your area to maximize profits throughout the year.
Thanks for reading the article! We hope you have greater understanding of the topic discussed above.
If you would like to find out more about our Premium Airbnb Management London Services please visit our homepage and fill out our free property revenue calculator to see how much you could earn on the short-let market today.
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