Rentalo is pleased to introduce EZ Calling, our new cutting edge phone technology service that will get vacation rental seekers from the web to your phone in just one click! You will not only get more calls from vacationers interested on your vacation rental; you will also be able to track these calls and receive automated messages that will guarantee a better service and boost your conversions. Sign Up Here.
Closing the Gap between Property Owners and Travelers
The idea behind EZ Calling is to increase online conversions by closing the communication gap between property owners and travelers. This is possible thanks to EZ Calling’s three powerful tools, Click-to-Call, Inquiry-to-Phone and the Toll Free and Tracking feature.
Click-to-Call: With this tool travelers interested in your vacation rental will have the opportunity to directly connect with you through the click of a button embedded on your property listing. You will:
• Receive INSTANT calls from travelers browsing your listing.
• Get more calls from interested travelers. (Calls from travelers convert 47% more than e-mail inquiries).
• Track your click to call activity.
Inquiry-to-Phone: The Inquiry-to-Phone is an optional tool that allows you to receive automated phone messages each time your vacation rental gets an inquiry. Inquiry-to-Phone will allow you to:
• Receive INSTANT automated phone messages each time your property gets an inquiry.
• Reply immediately with an offer to the interested traveler.
• Track your inquiry to phone activity.
Toll Free and Call Tracking: This tool makes it easier for travelers to contact you by providing a toll free number. It will allow you to:
• Keep your number private. EZ Calling: Cutting Edge Phone Technology
• Get detailed call activity reports. (Call tracking captures data on missed calls. If a prospective renter calls after hours or hangs up before the call is completed, why let this lead get away? Receive an e-mail with the caller’s phone number and generate additional bookings by returning these calls).
According to a study by TMP Directional Marketing and comScore, the two most common activities following an online local search are a visit or a phone call to a local store; and calls from travelers result in more bookings than e-mail inquiries. By incorporating this easy, cost-effective means to connect with vacation rental seekers you will be able to answer their questions immediately, beat your competition and guide them through a successful booking experience. Don’t miss this opportunity to dramatically increase your online bookings! Sign up now at: http://rentalo.com/ezcalling.html.
With all the social networking sites emerging, I'm sure you heard of Facebook. If you are already subscribed and have your network of "friends", I'm sure you are getting tons of emails daily from SpeedDate, Likeness and other applications you might have installed... Annoying? Yes. Engaging? Also.
I've heard that a lot of young people have Facebook applications in their BlackBerries to receive notifications in the real time. They are the first to know who broke up with whom, whose photos have been tagged or what the latest status of somebody they like is. So, what do YOU do on Facebook? Catching up with old friends, sharing your photos with the world or gossiping just for the sake of it? Although we might question Facebook's usefulness at times, we still check it out and log in occasionally to see "what's new out there".
Now, let's look at Facebook from the other perspective, as marketers. Imagine 175 million online users and more than 8 billion minutes spent on Facebook each day worldwide and you will realize what kind of audience you are dealing with. It's not only about numbers though. On Facebook we can not only target a specific kind of user by knowing his profile, network behavior and demographic info but we can also interact with him on many levels boosting our brand recognition.
How does that apply to vacation rental business? Facebook claims the majority of its users are people of 25 years old or older and I can bet that a very high percent of $175 million is interested in travel. What matters more than a product or service we offer is our out-of-the-box approach and smart ways to interact with our potential clients. How can you start up? Here are a couple of ideas:
1. Introduce yourself
- Create your own profile with pictures – let people see who is the owner of this gorgeous vacation house
- Write a note about your vacation property and your offer
- Add and share albums with photos of your vacation property where others can post comments
2. Create your own community
- Invite your family and friends. They will share their opinions about your place and recommend you to others within their network. Once word of mouth spreads, friends of your friends will begin to add you and you can add them as well.
3. Interact with others
- Create discussion boards or post questions about travel that you think will encourage debates and interactions
- Add pages promoting your destination with links to articles you wrote about your beautiful location on your website or blog. People will be able to "join" your page by becoming its "fans". Once you have some fans, they can post comments and interact between each other.
- Come up with special offers/promotions/discounts and post them on your profile and pages you created to attract more friends, fans and potential clients.
- Join groups related to travel and your destinations and contribute to them by posting comments and asking questions. Once people see you brought in some value, they might want to add you as a friend.
When creating your profile, inviting friends and joining new groups as a business person, remember that people are in Facebook for fun and they don't want to be bombarded by advertisers trying to sell them their product. Just try to create trust and represent value to new people you meet and if they like you, they might become your customer in the future.
Already in Facebook? Look for "Rentalo Rentals" and join us!
Although I already had a similar post on my vacation rental blog in the past, the topic of vacation rental pictures is never off the table. I’ve been looking at our Rentalo vacation homes lately wanting to select high quality pictures to show as examples but unfortunately I ran into hundreds of very low quality photos. It only assured me that I should write about this subject again and try to include more tips this time.
When browsing through our inventory I saw really bad pictures and I’m not only talking about low quality, pixeled and scanned old photographs, but also pictures of a messy kitchen with dirty dishes, pools with towels and guest stuff lying around, dark hallways and many others. Only one question always popped to my mind. How do owners of these properties think they will book their homes?
I have a suspicion that many owners take things for granted. They think that their properties will rent just because they have great attributes, such as oceanfront or mountain views and because they’ve had many guests over the last few years. Well, the times have slightly changed and facing the economic crisis we all have to try a little harder. The competition is fiercer than ever and we have to fight for customers more than before.
I would like to encourage you to take a look at your property listings as if you were a traveler looking for a perfect place. Try to get into their shoes and think what you would like to see if you were the one looking for accommodation. I think everyone will agree with me that pictures are one of the most important elements of a good property listing. High quality and attractive photos represent your property and help travelers picture it. Our directory allows you to upload unlimited amount of photos. You can also describe them so that travelers know what can be seen on a particular picture.
I also gathered some tips on what to do and what to avoid when taking pictures of your property. It’s never a bad time to change your listing photos. Even though it’s cold and snowy where some of you have their properties, seasonal pictures appeal even better to travelers. You should always try to change your pictures when the season changes and emphasize different property attributes. For example hot tub and fireplace in the winter and pool or a large deck in the summer.
Here is what you SHOULD do:
- Take photographs of all parts of your property, not only bedrooms
- Turn on all the lights in your vacation property. It gives your house a special warm atmosphere
- Wait for a sunny weather or a nice sunset to take pictures of your property from the outside
- Put flowers, candles, nice sheets and fresh fruit in your house. Those look lovely on pictures!
- Try to use a tripod to avoid blurry pictures
Here is what you should NOT do:
- Do not use scanned and low resolution (pixeled) photographs
- Try not to include people in your pictures
- Clean your property before taking pictures not to capture a messy kitchen or swimming pool with guest stuff by it
- Do not take pictures of dark rooms against the light
- Avoid uploading pictures of hallways, narrow spaces and nothing specific
- Try not to include badly cropped or zoomed photographs
- Do not place pictures of nearby activities as your main photo. Travelers want to see your property first
You can find the original post on my blog for owners.
Marta
Easily accessible economic cameras and video phones have recently replaced camcorders and film roles from the last century. With these new products, entertainment and businesses stepped into the new multimedia dimension. What’s the impact? If the picture says more than a thousand words, video without doubt says more than a thousand pictures.
From movie trailers and interviews to “home-made” cooking tutorials, all this and everything else imaginable can be found on YouTube. During the past three years this powerful broadcasting website created a community of 200 million unique users and has the 6th largest audience on the Internet. With the audience that closely mirrors the demographic of the US online population and with monthly unique visitors of 71 million on YouTube, you don’t have to be a genius to figure out that opportunities for advertisers are just enormous.
The best of all is that YouTube makes room for everybody, from amateurs to video gurus. You don’t need a professional footage to draw visitors to your YouTube profile. For you - property owners, it can be a pretty useful channel to target travelers. From our internal research we know that the majority of travelers that visit our vacation rental directory are between 25 and 34 years old and over 55. Main YouTube’s audience belongs to the similar age groups as well.
Uploading a video to YouTube is simple and doesn’t require any special skills. The most important thing to remember is to assign as many tags as possible to your video (tags are keywords people use in their search). You should also include keywords in the description of your video. When writing a compelling description, you can refer to my previous post about how to create a copy that sells.
Your opportunities with YouTube, however, go far beyond uploading a video of your vacation rental. There is always a larger picture and here it’s about using YouTube as a great tool to build your own community. There are countless videos of users who share their own tutorials, travel guides or hidden talents. Some of them have built huge communities just by catering to the right audience with the right product. They encourage comments, invite subscribers, belong to certain circles and what’s the bottom line, they link to their private websites where they usually sell their products or services. Great example of a successful “you-tuber” is your fellow property owner from Amsterdam ” PhilDutch.
As YouTube says, “Online Video isn’t the future, it’s the present”. The fact that 75% of Americans watched a video online last month is enough information for you to act! We decided to go with this fast-growing trend last year when we introduced a video inclusion option. Since that time property owners can link a property video to their online listing for free.
We also prepared a mini tutorial for owners providing technical tips, giving advice on what to capture and finally teaching how to upload a video to YouTube and then include a link in their listings. If you have a video of your vacation rental, it’s about time you shared it with our audience. If you don’t have one yet, you definitely should think of making one. Video can be as simple as a slideshow of your finest pictures put together by a Windows Movie Maker (a program that every computer has). You can also add music and put subtitles. There is one important thing though. If your video is of a very low quality, recorded with shaky hand or has blurry images, it can actually have the opposite effect!
Just one last thought. Remember that today consumers have turned into Trysumers, people who enjoy full access to information and reviews and who like unconventional ways of “trying” new services. They want to taste and “touch” a product before they purchase it. Do you think video will influence their decision about booking your place? I think that chances are pretty high.
Marta
The original post is available on my blog for property owners.
For the past years I've been working closely with customer service department and knew property owners' complaints by heart. Many of them said they haven't been getting desired amount of bookings. When I looked at their property listings, however, a huge number of them had very poor information provided. So I just kept on repeating: "a complete property listing with a high quality description, prices and photos is absolutely necessary for you to receive booking inquiries". Although it may seem trivial, our internal analysis showed that a good number of our property owners do not have the minimum information provided in their property listings!
In today’s world we business people and service providers have to deal with extremely demanding clients. In fact a group of brilliant trend spotters called our economy “an economy that is inhabited by well-informed and experienced consumers who have a long list of high expectations that they apply to each and every good, service and experience on offer”. Those new-age consumers don’t have time to waste and they DEMAND high quality information as soon as possible in order to purchase a product.
As a response to this new trend, countless services appeared to help consumers compare offers. Looking for good flight fares? Visit seatguru.com. Want to buy a cheap digital camera? Try pricegrabber.com. Examples go on and on and every day include more and more services and products. Today we can become experts and find the best offer available within couple of clicks. Obviously we will choose the best described product with good pictures, reviews and additional information.
Now imagine an average traveler, a young woman between the age 25 and 34. She logged on to a lodging website to find the best deals in vacation rentals and wants to leave knowing which is going to be her next vacation home. This young traveler doesn’t have time to look at each and every property we have in particular location. She will refine her search and choose those vacation rentals that have the best description, high quality pictures, prices and updated availability calendar.
For those of you who have low quality photos, poor description, no prices and empty availability calendar (and believe me when I say, it’s the case of many), do you really think you can compete with owners who have fully-edited property listing, rich in information? As I mentioned before, in our business it’s all about good content. If your website, or in this case, property listing doesn’t have a high quality content, then do not count on good results.
Even though you pay a subscription fee on many lodging sites you advertise with, you shouldn’t expect your vacation rental to rent by itself. Vacation rental directories provide you with the best tools to promote your property online. But to make sure you rent your property, it’s essential for you to provide the best possible pictures, informative and sophisticated descriptions, catchy titles and complete pricing information, not to mention special offers, excellent customer service and much more. Ask yourself: How do I keep my property booked? Make sure you provide your potential customers with complete and useful information! As simple as that.
Marta
The original post can be read here.
Life is about decisions. From everyday ones that do not involve any risk, to the more meaningful ones that make us wonder if we just made the right investment. In the vacation rental industry decisions can revolve around whether or not to install the Internet or if it is a good idea to invest in a swimming pool.
Once we already invested in all the features and extras that make our vacation rental more competitive, then comes the biggest question of all: where should we advertise to get a desired return on investment? Some would say it’s a matter of trust and they would go with the companies they have been referred to or ran into on Google. But in marketing however, there is no space for guessing, it is all about facts.
We can find these facts easily on the Internet. We read testimonials, we do our research in search engines by keywords to see which directories come up; but once we have a good number of alternative scenarios to spend our marketing dollars, how do we know which way to go?
This is where we can help. We have prepared an extensive market study where we tried to answer these two core questions:
- How much to spend on advertising online?
- What are the main marketing Internet sources in the lodging industry?
For this analysis we used Hitwise, the top online measurement company that provides great insights on how Internet users interact with websites. After watching closely consumer behaviors in the lodging industry and after running several reports, we are now able to invite you to read the full marketing study.
In this marketing study you will find out about the main players in the lodging industry and about their market shares. We also provide you with a list of the top ten sites in the industry that receive the highest traffic and explain what the most prominent sources of Internet traffic for vacation rental directories are.
I hope you will find this study useful!
Marta
The original blog post can be found here.
There are several small grocery shops on my street. All of them have very similar assortment of products and prices, however, only one of them, the shop on the corner has a long line of people every time I pass by. Many ask themselves, why is that? The answer is very simple. It all comes down to an excellent customer service. Owners of this lovely place know the names of each customer, are extremely nice and always have smiles on their faces. Why should I go next door, if here they know exactly what I want to buy and will make my day by having a nice chat with me?
I always repeat to people that no matter how many competitors their business has, they will always be on top of everyone else as long as they provide their clients with the best service there can be. It may sound as cliché, but I believe it’s true what they say that “good customer service is the bread and butter of any business“.
So, once you already got your bookings for the season, your job is to make sure your clients will absolutely love your vacation rental and will want to come back. As your “first buyers” come, you only have one chance to make a good impression on them. How to build a database of loyal customers who will return to your vacation rental?
In our business the key is in details and providing guests with an additional service that they cannot get anywhere else. Little touches can make a huge difference and distinguish your property from your competition. Here are some details that can make your vacation home stand out above others:
- Warm welcome. Be at your vacation home when your guests arrive. Help them with the luggage and show them around. It would be nice if you knew their names so that you can greet them personally. If you cannot welcome your guests personally, have someone you trust to do it or leave a hand written welcome note.
- Be their home away from home. Make sure all the appliances are working well (coffee maker, BBQ, TV etc) and offer as much as you can to keep their packing of the car to a minimum ( e. x.: pillows, bedding, towels). Offer a fully-equipped kitchen with spices and condiments, your guests might want to cook something sophisticated at times.
- Offer Extras. Be prepared for every kind of weather. Raining? Prepare board games, puzzles, books and DVD movies. Leave a bag of microwave popcorn in the kitchen as well. Time for the beach? Chairs, soft drinks in the fridge and beach towels are some ideas. Let your guests know what you offer.
- Show them around. Make a list of things to do in your area and share this information with your guests. Be sure to have itinerary of any special events happening in your area that your guests might want to take part in. Also, provide them with restaurant recommendations, maps and transportation information.
- Cater to all kinds of guests. Guests with children and large families? Be prepared and offer high chairs for kids, a cradle, even beach toys as well as big picnic tables with extra chairs for family meals.
- Go an extra mile. Keep a register of all your guests and send them a nice message before the next season starts. There is large room for creativity here. You can offer special promotions and discounts as well as send your guests Christmas wishes.
How can you know your guests enjoyed their stay and found everything perfect? At the end of their stay, it’s an ideal time to ask for feedback. If you do not have a guestbook yet, make sure you start one and have guests write down their experiences. It’s a good thing to make it easily accessible for guests to leave comments at anytime and not to pressure anyone. If they are satisfied, you will hear about it for sure. Make sure to let your guests know their review might be posted online to help other travelers.
Finally, when you send your guests away happy, they will most likely pass positive feedback along to others and WILL come back next year.
Although great customer service is supposed to be part of every business, it is really hard to come across unrivalled services these days! The clue is wanting to go that extra mile. Can you?
Marta
You can see the original blog post here.
Even though the autumn is looming, you have to step into the scary
low season fully armed with powerful marketing strategies which will
help you attract travelers and keep your vacation rentals booked.
I
believe one of the most important things to think about is your main
audience during October, November and December. You need to answer
yourself the following questions: Who are they? What are they looking for? And how can we meet their needs?
The “who question” is fairly easy as it’s proven that this slower travel season belongs to savvy travelers who love bargains, special deals and discounts. There can also be families with little children who want to avoid crowds and are not tied with any school schedules yet. You may also expect outdoor enthusiasts who find autumn the best season for hiking, hunting or fishing.
Knowing
who you should cater for will help you define your marketing and action
plan. So how can you entice all these audiences and make them want to
spend vacation in your rental, even if it’s gloomy and rainy outside?
First try to think about possible upgrades of your amenities or new features
that are especially great in autumn/winter time. It could be a hot tub
or a Jacuzzi - travelers will love spending time with friends enjoying
your beautiful mountain views. You could also offer a wide movie
collection for long evenings. Ideas are simply infinite.
It is also equally important to communicate all those attributes to travelers. Remember to update your property listings. There are several options you could change.
- Change your photos. Add seasonal pictures of your vacation rental during fall. Your house surely looks different covered in colorful leafs.
- Update your property description.
Highlight all the unique features of your place such as fireplace,
central heating, cozy living room with DVD player, Jacuzzi and more.
- Promote cultural events. Inform travelers about special events and festivals going on during this time of year.
- Give them what they want.
Make sure savvy travelers fishing for great deals find your property so
add special offers to your property listings. Maybe you could also run
specials for families with young children.
- Lure outdoor fans. Introduce travelers to your area at this time of year. Talk about great hiking trails, fishing ponds and golf courses.
- Target history enthusiasts. Inform them about interesting sites in your area that are ideal for fall season such as museums and galleries.
- Use upcoming festivities. Talk about Thanksgiving and Christmas to lure those who are planning their trip during this holiday.
I
think there is a large room for creativity here and it’s actually fun
to plan all this. It takes your mind off the fact it’s not the best
time of year for bookings and keeps you focused on the best results. If
you have any other ideas on how to prepare yourself for the low season,
I would love to hear your suggestions as well!
Marta
You can view the original blog post here.
Trial and Error or Advice
Recently I was booking a hostel in Barcelona for one weekend of November. I visited many websites, saw countless hostels but after a while they all seemed exactly the same and I still had no idea which one to choose. All I wanted was a clean place in a central location, but all of them stated they were close to the center and extra clean. So which one to choose? Then I noticed one great feature of one of the websites – guest comments! According to others, a hostel I was thinking of choosing was not very clean and located near a very noisy street! Of course, I ended up booking the one which had the highest number of positive guest comments.
They Judge, we Buy
Opinions, comments and reviews have become omnipresent elements of the purchasing process. We prefer to buy products with high ratings and recommendations, the ones other people used and had experience with. It eliminates disappointment and gives us guarantee that a product we just bought will be working perfectly, just like it did for others. What’s more, we don’t need trusted experts to tell us their opinion anymore. We can simply listen to other consumers, real people just like us.
Guest Comments and Vacation Rentals
Today’s marketplace is full of well educated customers, who enjoy comparing products and make informed buying decisions. That’s why opinions and guest comments are essential also in a vacation rental industry. Travelers want to trust property owners when they say their house is perfect, but to be really able to book with confidence, they obviously prefer to relate to experience of others.
Being a Good Listener
So how can you encourage your guests to write a review of your vacation rental? I think there is only one recipe. If you provide your guests with an excellent service and go the extra mile to make them feel at home, you will surely hear about it. Also, let your guests know that you always strive to meet their needs and value their opinions. It only shows you care and are committed to maintaining high standards. Where can guests write their reviews? Here are some examples:
- Guestbooks. Keep a guestbook book in a visible place in your vacation rental and ask travelers to write about their favorite experiences. If they do so, ask them for a permission to include those on your website or listings on the other sites.
- Internet. Encourage your guests to post comments and feedback on your private website or listings. Such real testimonials are very valuable for travelers.
- Welcome letters. Leaving your guests a welcome letter is a nice detail and at the end of such letter you can have a space for comments and feedback.
Two Sides of the Coin – You Always Win
However you gather comments about your vacation home, always listen to what guests have to say and value their feedback. Whether the review you received is positive or negative, either way you can only learn. Good reviews are like a reward for you and only assure you, you are doing your job the best you can. Bad reviews though, are even more useful than the positive ones because a constructive criticism can only help you become a master. If you are afraid of bad reviews, it means there is probably something you should improve.
I really encourage you to gather feedback and include travelers’ comments in your property descriptions. After all, it can only complete information about your rental and create more trust of your potential clients.
Marta
You can view the original post here.
In the online industry it is all about content. High quality and relevant content that entices readers and makes them visit our website and buy our product. This simple rule also applies to the vacation rental industry where the more captivating description of your property you provide, the more attention you will get.
The first step to get visitors to your property listing is by uploading high quality and professional pictures. We all judge by the cover, so you should make sure your “cover” sells. After viewing your photo gallery, travelers usually want to find out more about your place by reading your description.
How to make them read it all and how to convince them to book your property? It all starts with a powerful title that just cannot be missed. Take some time to look at the competition in your location and make sure your title is original and stands out. Try to avoid generic titles and think of features that distinguish your vacation rental from others (For ex.: Affordable Beachfront Italy Villa Ideal for Family Getaways).
Now comes the toughest part, writing a compelling description. I gathered some tips that might be useful for you during the process. Remember to aim for 400 words or more, it’s the optimal length for a description.
1. Think of unique features of your place and use them as your most powerful weapon. Is your villa waterfront and offers gorgeous sunsets? Is it spacious and sleeps large parties? Write down all the attributes and elaborate on them in separate paragraphs.
2. Use details. Travelers like to picture their future vacation house and plan what to pack and what to leave behind, so be specific and provide a short description of each bedroom, amenities and extras (ex.: beach towels, bikes, linens).
3. Write about nearby attractions as well. Most travelers like to plan their vacation activities and they greatly appreciate such information. Provide them with a mini guide of things to do in the area. How close it is to the beach/hiking trail? What other great attractions can be found nearby? (Ex.: Amusement Parks, nature trails, museums and art galleries).
4. Add a personal touch to your description. Don’t be afraid to show emotion and inject a little feeling to your text. Let travelers know who you are and how long you own the house. Also, relate to the experience of your previous guests, for ex. “Our guests love watching sunsets from our lakefront deck and watching movies from our wide DVD collection”. Emotion sells.
5. Last but definitely not least. Keywords, keywords, keywords! Think of the keywords that travelers use to search for vacation home in your area. What would you put in search box when looking for a vacation rental? You can also use numerous keyword research tools that are available on the internet for free. Make your list and try to insert keywords to every paragraph of your description. This will help travelers find your property better in search engines. Examples of keywords are: Orlando vacation rentals, Orlando condos, Orlando accommodations.
I hope that you found my mini guide useful. Remember that the bottom line is to convince travelers that your place is the one they are looking for. With this in mind, the creativity will follow.
Marta Olszewska
View my original blog post here