Smashing your goals with Holiday Rental Software: Maximise your channel bookings

  • Episode 2
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Get more bookings through your channel with holiday rental software

In this episode, we cover how holiday rental software can help you attract guest bookings through your connection with channels like Airbnb. 

In the Podcast Pointer, we look at the Yield Management tool designed to help you attract last minute bookings. 

For more information on how Bookster holiday rental software can help your business, check out https://www.booksterhq.com/

The important bits

● [00:00] Intro 

● [01:14] Channel names

● [02:23] Getting started with channel

● [03:52] How software communicates with channels

● [06:20] Support with setting up and maintaining your channels

● [07:38] Regular updates on your channels

● [10:01] Yield Management tool

● [10:59] Ending

Key takeaways

● There are a lot of different names for the place online where a guest can make a booking for your property, eg Airbnb. At Bookster we call them channels, but you may also hear Online Travel Agents, or OTAs, web based marketplaces, platforms, portals or websites.

● Holiday Rental Software will help you be seen by more guests by maximising the impact of your listings on channels. 

● Many holiday rental owners start with Airbnb because it has been designed to be easy to manage, and user friendly for property owners and guests.

● When you work with multiple channels and your own website it helps to connect them together. A holiday rental software can provide these tools so your channels communicate with each other about new bookings, even when you're sleeping.

● Your holiday rental software can provide you with human and online support to maximise your booking results and guest satisfaction.

● Your holiday rental software can help you make regular updates to your listings, which will help you be seen by more potential guests. 

● Yield Management helps you encourage last minute bookings when you still have availability, by making these dates more financially attractive to late booking guests.

Next Episode

In the next episode we'll cover how holiday rental software can help with attracting repeat guests.

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Transcript

How can holiday rental software help to attract bookings to your holiday rentals through channels like Airbnb and booking.com.

For some property owners using marketing channels or websites like Airbnb is a vital technique to attract guests.

But did you know that there are tools built into the holiday rental software that will maximise the impact
Minute 1
of your holiday homes through these channels? But what are the pitfalls of doing it wrong and the key steps you should follow? That's what we're going to discuss today on smashing your goals with holiday rental software.

But before we get started, I'd like to share with you an article that will help if you are not using a holiday rental software yet or you're thinking of changing software for your short let business, on our website Booksterhq.com you can sign up for free for the article with questions to ask during a holiday rental software demo, an essential document if you're considering making any change.

But now on with a show.

Let's start today's session with a little background on channels.

Firstly, to clear up political confusion, let's talk names.

There is a surplus of names in this industry generally referring to the same thing, the place online
Minute 2
where a guest can make a booking for your property.

So I'm talking booking.com or Airbnb, vrbo.

In Bookster, we refer to them as channels, so that's what I'll call them today.

But depending on who you are speaking with, they may also be called online travel agents or OTAs for short, web-based marketplaces, platforms, portals, or simply just websites.

To get the best results on channels you need to get set up correctly, update your property regularly and manage your guests with professionalism.

Your holiday rental software can help.

And this is a huge topic.

So today I'm just gonna look at three areas and I'll come back to this topic in the future.

When holiday rental owners first get started, they often just work with a single channel.

Perhaps this is you, perhaps you are just working
Minute 3
with one channel right now, and more often than not, the channel that people choose is Airbnb.

There is a good reason for that.

Airbnb has been beautifully designed to be really self-service.

It's so easy to get set up.

It's really easy to manage, and it's very user-friendly for both property owners and guests.

But time passes and people change.

Perhaps you've gained more confidence in how to attract guests.

Perhaps you are looking to try something new.

So let's assume that you now want to work with booking.com too.

You'll need to connect your Airbnb booking calendar to your booking.com booking calendar so that if a booking is made in one of the channels, let's say it's on Airbnb, Airbnb will tell booking.com so you don't get another booking for the same date.

It is possible to connect the Airbnb and booking.com calendars together,
Minute 4
and that can work really well.

But let's assume that time passes and you want to try something else.

Perhaps you want to run your own website or perhaps you want to work with a different channel.

Perhaps your properties are really well suited to Vrbo, for example, and it's all starting to get a bit complicated.

So this is the first way that software can help it's communication.

Your software is gonna do the talking between the channels in general.

There are two ways that channels and the software typically speak with each other.

IAL and API.

IAL stands for internet calendar, and this is a nifty little tool that shares the book dates in an online calendar with another online calendar.

It's basic, but it's pretty effective and lots of people use these.

Another way that a software can speak to a channel is using an API, which is called
Minute 5
an application programming interface.

If you are anything like me, that name is really off-putting, so let's forget what it's called for now.

The thing that you need to know is that an API shares lots more information than the I cal, and in your case, that could be sharing your property descriptions, the rates, your photographs, lots of other details.

The other very cool thing is that the API allows more of a like a two-way flow of information from the software to the channel and the channel back to the software.

Now, when I first started working in the industry, an API was a bit overwhelming for me, but I read a description of an API that really helped me understand it.

Let's assume you are making a cake at your house, but you've left the recipe at your friend's house up the road.

You ask your child, let's say, to run up
Minute 6
to your friend's house, get the recipe and bring it back.

In this instance, your child is the API.

You are telling this child to go to a specific place to get specific information, it goes, gets it, and brings it back to you.

It's really not so complicated.

So although an API is much more sophisticated than iCal, they both still have value, and it really depends on what you need for your business to which one you choose.

So when you use software to do the talking, this means you don't have to.

It will update your property information in multiple places at the same time, even while you are sleeping, and that is a huge benefit of using software.

Let's consider a different angle.

Let's think about support because life as a holiday rental owner or a holiday rental manager can be quite solitary.

But good support can ensure that the data
Minute 7
that you provide in the channel is correct for your property.

The information and support provided by channels can vary wildly from non-existent black holes saying no names here to really responsive and helpful account managers, but your whole due rental software can provide you with human support, online support to walk you through your connection process, ensuring that you've completed everything that you need to to maximise your booking results and guest satisfaction.

My recommendation is to talk with your software.

Ask them what supports will they provide you to help you get set up on these channels, and what are their recommendations on how you can improve your results And talking with your software, I've said it before, this should be a regular thing in particular because connections to channels change.

They add new buttons, they add new functionality.

There are new things that they require you to do
Minute 8
and you'll need to keep up with those changes.

The third aspect to look at today is helping guests find you on the channels.

Some channels, not all, but some work in a similar way to the search engines like Google.

They have their own internal rules that will define how high up the page that they're going to display your property to your potential guests.

The key to being seen by more people is to understand the rules.

What is it that each channel values? We'll dig into this in more detail in future, but let's look at one small part today.

Frequency of updates in the simplest of terms, some channels are going to reward you for making regular updates to your property listing.

So in your regular account meetings with your software company, they'll recommend that you make changes.

Those changes could be adding new photographs to your listing.

Minute 9
It could be the way that you describe your listing, maybe trying to change the appeal that it has maybe appealing to a new market or a bigger market, or perhaps attracting guests at a different part of the year by using different language.

When you make those changes, the software company is going to push them out to all the channels at one time.

The channel in turn rewards you for making these updates, and it'll push your property higher up the page so you'll be seen by more people, which can lead to more bookings.

If you don't use software, then you'll need to remember that you should be making regular updates on each and every channel that's relying on your knowledge, it's relying on your patience and it's gonna take up your time.

So software can really help here.

Let's take a moment here.

I'd like to remind you that if you'd like
Minute 10
to try out Bookster and the tools that we offer, you can register on Booksterhq.com for free, and you can check out some of the great tools that will help you run your short Let business.

Moving on back to the second part of the podcast pointer.

Each session we'll look at one solution to help you overcome a problem.

Today, the Bookster team has voted for a pointer on the yield management tool.

The goal of yield management is to help you encourage last minute bookings when you still have availability so you can earn revenue from your property.

By making these dates more financially attractive to late booking guests Bookster achieves this by automatically reducing the price as the check-in date approaches, you can set up Bookster to incrementally reduce your nightly prices over time.

Minute 11
According to your rules, you can set how many days before the arrival date to start reducing prices and set the maximum reduction and your software will automatically reduce the prices on your website and on all those channels that you use until you get that last minute booking.

Thank you so much for listening to this episode of Smashing Your Goals with Haldy Rental Software.

If you liked the episode or you know someone in the holiday rental industry that would enjoy it, please leave a review on pod- chaser.com, apple Podcasts or wherever you download and listen to your podcast.

If you've got any questions, please do get in touch.

You can contact us on our Facebook page, which is Booksterhq, or you can contact us through our website
Minute 12
and there's more information there, and you can ask for a demo on how Bookster can help you at Booksterhq.com.

And remember, we believe that experiences matter.

So whenever you are choosing a software service, make sure you choose one that considers your needs and the needs of your team and your guests.

More Episodes of Smashing your goals with Holiday Rental Software

  • Episode 2 - Attract bookings on channels like Airbnb with holiday rental software - Text "Attract bookings on channels like Airbnb with holiday rental software", and 'Episode 2' with a Bookster logo.

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