4 THINGS YOU NEED TO KNOW WHEN STARTING AIRBNB
One of my Airbnb units in Philadelphia used to be a butcher shop. You can still see the refrigerator door frame, it was left it up just to keep the apartment looking fun. Now its going to be an Airbnb space. Today we are going to walk through four tips if you're starting your hosting journey. If you have one property you're generally new at this there's a lot of you out there so I’m going to help make you a better Airbnb host by giving you some rules of the road.
Clean your own Airbnb’s
The first tip I want to give you is that if at all possible, you should clean your own Airbnb’s. If you're a full time professional and you have a housekeeping team or housekeeping person, you're going to hire to do most of your cleaning, that may be what works for you. If you have a team, I’d recommend you sneak out on the weekends or sneak out on a lunch and show up at these properties to work with your housekeepers. Take note, this is really important for a few reasons. Not only do you need to know how difficult it is to do a good job to manage people effectively you need to know what their job is and how hard it is. You're going to have to write the rules of the road for your business you're going to be writing what we would call protocols or standard operating procedures. There's a lot to this business that can go wrong or that can just happen and there are a lot of moving pieces. The housekeepers are truly the one most important part of your operation.Housekeepers show up after every guest and they start cleaning. If anything is missing, anything is broken or the guest isn't checking out on time, the housekeeper is the one that runs into these problems.
You need to have solutions for these problems that occur between reservations. That's really at the heart of this: every time that you have a problem I want you to journal it. I want you to write it down put it in yourphone. I want you to solve it and work out the best solution from your experience. From there, write out what I would call a standard operating procedure. Doing that, you're going to teach your housekeepers how to handle specific situations. If you want to hire a professional like a housekeeping company most likely they'renot going to have short-term rental management experience. Cleaning a short-term rental is more than just cleaning. It's making sure that all the guests are vacating the unit on time, they keys are secure, guest supplies are stocked, nothing is broken or damanaged, and the unit is secure before they leave. There are many aspects of cleaning and Airbnb that require you to train a housekeeping professional. You're going tohave to train them on your business model.
I highly recommend that you learn how to clean also and you come up with a standard protocol for cleaning That way you can hire your own internal people by the hour which will lower your cleaning costs dramatically.Until you do that you're going to hire a professional. When I first started I was paying around$60 per cleaning per studio. I eventually negotiated that down to like $45 per clean with one company. I eventually was able to build an in-house team. I started hiring people at $12 an hour which was a huge drop in cost. Our average cleaning cost now is about $20 per turnover because of studios don't really take that long to clean. Larger properties take more but it doesn't nearly the amount you will pay with a professional cleaning company. You might find it costs you $100 with your internal team, but you will pay or more for your larger homes.
Learn how to clean. Write your own training program. Document specific details on how to clean each of your units and then give the details to an employee or a contractor. If you pay that employee or contractor $12 an hour, you’re going to significantly cut your costs which will put you ahead of your competition. That moneyyou are saving is really going to make an impact on your profit.
at the end of the day that's that saved money is truly all profit at the end because otherwise if you're profiting 400 paying 60 of cleaning your profit 400 plus your cost reduction if you hire in-house so that's why you should clean first is really get a grip so that way you can manage people well and in-house.
Manage Guests Expectations
The second important thing to know when starting you Airbnb is to manage your guests expectations. Thisone is a great tip because Airbnb actually covered this themselves. Recently, Airbnb interviewed a couple on how to be super hosts and how to get five-star reviews. To summarize what they said is to manage guestsexpectations that's the key to a five-star review. Don’t oversell your unit and give your guests an accurate, realistic idea of what they should expect.
Be honest about details that might be unfavorable
Sometimes, as hosts we might not realize the small details we should mention to our guests in our listing. Ifyou have a house that you’ve been hosting for 5 or 10 years, it’s the best house and you’ve worked really hard to make it a great Airbnb. You might not rezlie this, but there could be some relevant details that you have overlooked that you should be mentioning to your guests.
Examples of small details you need to pay attention to and fix if you can:
• Creaky floors
• Squeaky doors
• Something doesn’t close all the way
If you cannot fix the above items or other small details, make sure you call them out in your listing
• Road noise nearby
• Identify which rooms have curtains and which don’t (privacy)
• Any operational issues with the home that can’t be solved right now
• Decribing noticeable signs of wear
• If parking is difficult, clearly describing what the situation is and how guests can park
These are things that people should know manage people's expectations of your home. Make sure that you identify all the things that someone could be disappointed by. When you sell your space I the description of your listing, make sure deliver this information in a positive optimistic light. Include the important details so you are not over selling your space.
Overselling your amenities
In addition to making sure you do not omit details that would be important to guests, make sure you do not overembellish the positive things about your listing. For example, I see a lot of hosts who say that they are “next door” to a popular attraction like a stadi or other popular place. Keep in mind, next door to the stadimeans you're literally next door to the stadi not six blocks away. Guests might see that you are “net door” to something and think they can walk to it. Guests will then show up to a home expecting one thing because you oversold it and they're getting by far less than they thought they were getting.
Let's say you have ten beds listed in your home but for them our air mattresses. You didn't disclose thatyou're going to have some upset people because sleeping on an air mattress is not fun. At my company, we're actually switching away from air mattresses. We are even sometimes switching away from sleeper sofasbecause getting good ones can be tough. We're actually moving into the rollaway beds kind of like the cots at hotels have. There are new memory foam rollaway beds we’ve done really well with. I will indicate I the description that we have memory foam rollaway beds. They are actually really nice, but you have to find a way to store them in an effective way. Using these nicer rollaway beds is one way to solve that bed problem and not oversell your unit. By not overselling your space you're letting people know exactly the value of the home. Some people try to include weird embellishments or exaggerate details and guests forget that they are actually booking a home.
You're going to be surprised a lot of people who book on Airbnb understand that it's a home expecting a five-star Hilton stay. They want to stay in a home. If your kitchen has some kitchen supplies talk about exactly what you have. That way, it if it's a little under stocked, an ambitious chef isn’t going to be disappointed when they want to cook big meals.
Not everyone has expectations that are too high, though. Many people are going to be ok with the floors creaking or squeaking a little bit, a unit that's slightly drafty or the water takes a while to turn on. People oftenlove the charm of a home, that's why they're booking on Airbnb. Trust people to accept you for who you are. Social media has ruined us and now has ruined our ability to be honest about our home.
Another important thing when selling your property is to have great photos. If you want good honestrepresentation of your home, professional photos are absolutely essential. That way people see exactly your home exactly the way it is. is Your copywriting or your creative writing when you write your descriptions and is also important. I think it's important to write fun easy to read welcoming copyright for your listings. Fill out all the boxes too because that's good for SEO.
Let’s talk about a couple important points about photos. Professional photos are probably the best way have pictures done for your listing. Good lighting is important. You should also stage your listing for photos. Set the stove, put the pots and pans up top and set the table with place settings. Stage the unit so that when youtake the photos people can imagine the use of the space. That's how to sell your space you don't sell yourspace by lying about how close you are popular attractions and places.
Number three is to not get defensive when you get feedback from your guests. If I was going to rephrase that it would be to accept criticism from your guests. The reason why this matters is because your ratings are important. When you have a five-star reservation, you need a lot of them. If you didn't listen to number two you won't get five-star reservations you'll get 3 star and 4 star reservations. Then your ranking will go down and you'll make less money because you oversold your space or disappointed guests. Let's say you have some lower ratings because you failed. Maybe you didn’t take good, accurate photos or you oversold your space. Maybe you're bad at customer service or you're bad at housekeeping. You might screw something up, and that's ok we all make mistakes. It happens, and it’s not the end of the world. But guests will speak up and sometimes guests won't be nice about it because this is their trip. They are not going to be nice, they expect you to have your stuff together. You're a professional and they are paying you. Guests are going to breathe down your neck sometimes. My point here is that no matter how they come at you, you need to recognize that they are giving you feedback. They could be hot red fighting mad, but you need to listen. I want you to listen for your areas of improvement.
If someone gives you a passive 3 star review and doesn't tell you why I want you to contact them. Reach out, let them know, “I’m sorry that we let you down. I see you only left us a three star review we are really bummedthat we couldn't give you a five star experience. Could I ask you what we could improve upon? You didn't write it in the review and I would like to improve the experience for future guests.” Please write to your guests. It gives you a chance to save that relationship. Maybe he'll think that's super stand-up of you and they'll book with you again just to see if you listened. People like to tell you what you're doing wrong they like to exercise that authority. Let them. Your key here is to learn from these mistakes and improve your business as you go. Failure is the best teacher. Time and failure will make you better. The only way to move towards excellence is through that iterative practice of doing something over and over again. I did a painting video and I got roasted. I did a video to prove to people that you can make your own artwork for your space if you wanted to color-coordinated you couldn't find a big piece of artwork. For mine, it was blue and yellow I couldn't findsomething that fit my space, so I did my own piece of artwork. Professionals who watched the video tore me apart. They told me my work was trash. Other people respoded with positive feedback telling me I did didsuch a good job. Art is not subjective but you don't have to be good at everything. I’m not the best painter and if you want to watch me not be a good painter, there is a video on my Youtube channel. My point is, every time you have a new reservation there's a chance for improvement. I want you to look for areas of improvement with every guest.
For our guests, we have a survey card for them to fill out at the end of their stay. The survey card where weask people how their experience was and where the areas improvements are. Then we have a rating system on the card and that way guests can fill it out just like a hotel. You want that guest feedback. It will drive your improvements and without it, without good communication, you're shooting in the dark. This actually leadsinto number four because how guests come to you about their problems with you may not be kind and you need to not take it personally. You need to just shut up and take it.
You are in the Hospitality business
If there's any one thing I can teach you in this section, this is the most important thing. You are now in hospitality business. You're now in the travel industry. You are now letting people into your home and into many of your homes. This matters to people. You may only see it as money. We had a manager in Houstonthat we had to retrain for this very reason. Hosting can be tough: cleaning everyday, you can have bad guests, they could just be angry for no good reason, they wear you down they wear down, your customerservice and you can lose your heart for people. If you're in hospitality like this there's a person in our host group that said you have to be a glutton for punishment if you want to be an Airbnb host. In a way it's kind of true.
People don't travel much people don't travel enough in my opinion. Some people may not even travel every year. Maybe they only travel one week a year. Two weeks is generous for vacation time and a lot of jobs. Because of this, people can get really high-strung. They're super wound up so if they're ever going to lose their cool it's going to be during a trip. This is how it can happen: if someone's luggage gets lost and their flight is delayed and then they have a problem getting into their Airbnb, they are could really come after you. They could already be so put off that they're going to be mean to you. Unfortunately, there will be nothing you can do about it and you need to just put up, shut up and let them be mean. You have to let it happen you have to let it roll off your back. You also need to be on their and not just take the feedback. I want you to be on their side about it. You let them down. They were expecting the place to be clean when they arrived, they were expecting to be able to check in right away without any issues, they were expecting the TV to work.Whatever you told them that they should have with their AirBnb, they were expecting it. They were expecting more than two towels or something like that and you let them down.
Let me tell you a story about how I had to retrain that manager in Houston. I had to get them to somehow understand, that even though this manager is super strong and she could take all the stress in the world and she can pretty much go through anything. She was the rough and tumble of being an Airbnb host she canhandle it all. But when the places weren't clean on time like she would just let it roll off her back like it's not a big deal. If we had to move a guest because a guest stole a TV or broke a couch or something we had tomove the guest she responded with “It’s not a big deal we'll just handle it was make the guest deal with it.”She could solve problems, but she started to put the problem on the guest. She started to make the next guest take the full brunt of the problem, so we had a bad guest and the next guest was victimized twice: they had a bad experience and our host was giving no love.
I sent this manager a message. I said:
“Hey I need you to sit down read this message I want you to not do anything else and I want you to speak quiet for five minutes after you read it don't message me back. I want you to just listen to this text message read it out loud and think. I want you to imagine a guest that we're about to have this guest is visiting Houston because their mother is at MD Anderson for treatment for cancer she has terminalstage 4 cancer of some sort and this is going to be the last time that our Airbnb guest is going to see their mother. Let's say we had to move that guest because something went wrong with the property we knew this a couple days ago but we didn't get around to moving her or getting ahead of the problemthis guest arrives and we let her down. We were not in control of the situation. She saw shows up to a place that she cannot check into and now she's trying to get a hold of you but you're unavailablebecause you're handing another problem. You didn't get ahead of this one so now she's waiting two orthree hours to try to find out what she's supposed to do to get into her Airbnb. By the time she's able to get to her Airbnb and because she's taking a taxi with three things of luggage her visitation hours of the hospital have expired. She cannot go visit her mother that day which was her plan. Before the next daycomes her mom is gone. I don't wish for you ever to be in that situation.
Let me warn you right now that we are dealing with people's lives here. I want you to treat every guest as if they're coming to see their mother for the last time. Because we let another guest down and it's on you. If this happens, you're not going to want to hear from me about it.
Take five minutes don't respond immediately. I’m going to ask you later if you really understand what I just texted you. I want you to treat guests the same way and consider that in some ways their life for the next few days is in your hands. Accept responsibility as a host. You're changing people's lives and you better make sure it's for the better.
