calendar

The reservation system benefit

The typical vacation rental owner puts a lot into his business. He decorates and renovates and generally speaking really want to make the customer feel at home. Hey, that's what make his place so special.
What make it so unique is that the owner are real people and not some Hilton management the short term rental and furnished apartment industry is a stick it to the man industry :-)
What the owners are not usually is business savvy, this is why a system that help run the day to day operation of their business could be useful. A system that will enable the owner to manage their reservations, take credit card, manage their customer relations, enter data, photos and prices about their apartments and pull reports. A system that will enable all of that will let the owner to manage even a single apartment like a Hilton and will give security to the traveller.

Use this system right here, www.guesthousenetwork.com

And,
Travel

New city

So,
I was contacted by an owner of a short term rental in Amsterdam and he wanted to know what is the best way to market his business. well, that is the million dollar questions :-)
First try to understand the competition. Let's face it there are not many vacation rental experts in each city. You can lern a lot by watching what they do.
Than think to yourself, what do you want ? You canoutsource marketing and work with a local real estate guy, you can work with vacation rental website, some of them offer free posting and some charege per reservation. You can build your own website or let some one do it for you
Think about the best way to get the best Return On Investment and see if it falls with what you want to do.

Please check this cool furnished apartment in Barcelona

Travel !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

conversion rate

Well,
It is very simple, and it is the entire marketing philosophy in one sentence
The average conversion rate for a hotel/hospitality is around 1% meaning 1 out of every hundred actually book. Well, than it is simple, get 1,000 and get 10 bookings, that is easy to say.
Each website has a different conversion rate but never the less the math stay the same.
So now the big question is how do we drive more people to the website? So you told all your friends to visit it, now what.
You need to buy those customers and the cheaper the better. For example for London short term rental you can just advertise in web pages that talk about London short term rentals but many other will compete for that spot and if you pay to much to get there you will get the customer but loose money. So, if you are on a tight budget you should think about way around it for example go for the exact neighborhood that your apartment is located in, like furnished apartment in soho or short term furnished apartments in the upper east side in NYC. Try to play with it till you get that silver bullet :-)

That is our tip for today, comments are welcome

Go to http://www.guesthousenetwork.com/ and travel !!!

The Calendar problem

The Calendar..........
There is a difference between the guy who runs the hotel/Guesthouse and the guy that market it. Well, the owner can have many distribution channels. It is just to hard for him to manage all the online marketing.
Sure, many people will like to market it but they won't do it for free. But in order to assure a reservation the broker/marketer has to contact the owner and ask him if the place is vacant for those days.
This is the reason it is so important for the owner to keep an updated online calendar and let the different brokers or users the option to take a look at it
Guesthouse Network provide the owner a free on line reservation system and an online calendar. they let the owner manage his calender like he manage his keys :-) he has the last word weather to accept or decline a reservation. The travellers or brokers can try to book online if they see that the dates are free.
One small step for the owner one big step for the short term industry

For example, let's say you want to rent a Paris short term rental/apartment all you have to do is check the Guesthouse Network website, find a room that you like and just see if the dates are open ....... and book

So,,,,,,,,,,, Boooooooook

Take care

Travel !!!!

What is my city vacation all about

Well,
How do one start?
in this blog I will like to share with you my experience in trying to bring together vacation rental owners in big cities around the world under one branded network. I will share with you the marketing challenges I face with those apartment owners and the challenges in getting the customers to the owners that have signed in.
I will talk about the different marketing situation in each city, I will inform you which marketing platform attracted more customers and I will keep you posted on the success that we have in each city.
In my next post I will tell you about the company that I run, the Guesthouse Network. Mean while check our website at www.guesthousenetwork.com
Till the next time

TRAVEL !!!