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457. Solo

Introduction and Host Celebration

Sarah Karakaian: [00:00:00] Hello. Welcome back to another [00:01:00] great episode. My name is Sarah Karakaian.

Annette Grant: I’m Annette Grant, and together we are Thanks for Visiting.

Sarah Karakaian: Let’s start this episode like we do each and every week, and that is celebrating one of you the incredible hosts who are using our are going to STRshare.com to share the information about their short-term rentals so we can share you here on the podcast, on our Instagram account each and every Sunday.

Annette, who are we sharing this week?

Highlighting @CoastalCabana.Fl

Annette Grant: This week we are sharing it @CoastalCabana.Fl and I want to share, please go to their Instagram. Their very first pinned reel is to me just so picture perfect. I wanna book, I wanna stay that pool. Water? Yes. Looks so good. It’s just if you have been wondering about your photos and how they rate just, go to go to their Instagram account, look at the first pinned photo. And that is just like Chef’s Kiss. Yes. And like I [00:02:00] literally wanna go and book right away. So that’s number one. Um, and that is my challenge right now is if you don’t have some photos like this in your arsenal. Let’s get some photos like this in your arsenal. And then another thing that I noticed that I really thought was interesting, I don’t know how it’s working for them, but when you go to their link in bio, they have a section to leave a Google review. And so I’m wondering, A, I think that’s very smart, but B I’m wondering are they guiding guests there, um, during their stay, after their stay?

Um, or if people have already stayed and then they are posting maybe a picture of the place after. I haven’t really seen a host utilize this area for leave a Google review, and I think that is very smart of them because they also have a book direct. Space on their account also well done. And I love their use, um, of emojis. Uh, they have this, the palm tree emoji that they use kind of [00:03:00] throughout, and I just really enjoy that. Well done @CoastalCabana.Fl.

The Importance of Availability

Sarah Karakaian: All right, let’s jump in today’s episode. Content. I cannot tell you how much we’re hearing. I want more bookings. I need more bookings. I’m not quite making the amount of money that I thought I would be making.

And when we dive into y’all’s pricing or to your calendar management, we know why, and that is what today’s episode is all about.

Annette Grant: Airbnb’s algorithm rewards availability.

Sarah Karakaian: Think about it. The OTAs online travel agencies only make money when we get bookings because they get a portion of our bookings.

So they like it when we are available to be booked. If you’re not available because of your minimum stay requirements aren’t making you available, then they’re not gonna favor you. Like it’s pretty [00:04:00] simple. You’re not going to show up. Yeah. For example, if you have a four night minimum stay requirement.

But the traveler in that market wants to book for three nights. You are not even going to show up because you are telling the OTA that you are not available.

Annette Grant: Mm-hmm.

Sarah Karakaian: This means less bookings, lower occupancy, and this is the shocker to a lot of hosts: less money. You think by forcing a four night stay is gonna make you more money, but all you’re doing is appealing to no one out there because they want a three night stay.

Annette Grant: And this we have looked at. So many calendars in the last month, uh, with hosts that are telling us they’re not getting bookings. And when we peel back just one layer, we see that they have outrageous minimums, uh, four night minimums during the week, three night minimums on the weekend, four night minimums on the weekends, and we’re like, well wait. Like, who’s coming to stay? I don’t know about you. I would love to have four day weekends all the time. I [00:05:00] don’t have those. It’s like they are working against themselves with that availability.

Sarah Karakaian: And we’re not just saying this like we think the traveler wants a, as a, for example, right?

They want a three night. Stay, like literally there’s data out there for several years. Mm-hmm. That can tell you how a traveler books and stays in your market.

Annette Grant: And that’s where we were under, when we say we peeled that one layer back, we would go into the host dynamic pricing and see what is the average stay in the market.

And a lot of times, and this data goes back years, it was two or three nights and they had four night minimums. They’re not even available.

Sarah Karakaian: So in a nutshell, Airbnb and other OTs favor hosts who are available for their guests.

Minimum Stays and Booking Gaps

Sarah Karakaian: Minimum stays cause un bookable gaps. All right, so let’s give you an example of what we mean by this. So in our previous chat about the minimum stays in general. This host has a four night minimum that they placed [00:06:00] on their calendar. They get a five night booking. Awesome. Wow. Aren’t I so smart? Forcing a four night stay?

I’m excited. Yeah. No, you feel like you’re winning right now. You feel like you’re winning. But then now there is a two night gap between this five nights stay and this four nights stay. And guess what? You have a four night and minimum. So that two night gap. No one can book it. Mm-hmm. That’s, they’re just like these dates just hanging out there, not bookable because you’ve set these minimums in place.

Annette Grant: Yeah, and what happens is many hosts are not actively managing their calendar. So these nights, two perfectly amazing evenings that could have been booked and profitable are completely non-existent on the OTAs. No one even knows it’s available. Because you’re not actively managing it. And so that is why if you don’t have these minimum stays on, you don’t have to worry about continually going back, checking your calendar, [00:07:00] making sure those dates are open, so if there aren’t minimum stays, this automatically, those, those two dates would have always been opened, always been book like bookable for an amazing guest to come stay at your property. So the takeaway here is that calendar clutter, those parameters that you put in place, they are blocking you from those bookings.

Convenience vs. Profitability

Annette Grant: Convenience versus profitability.

Sarah Karakaian: All right. Now some hosts purposely set these minimum stay requirements. To make it easier on themselves, or maybe they’re cleaner or maybe their inspector, and if that’s truly the goal, less management fine. But if your goal is to make money, then these minimum stay requirements are hurting you from your goals .

Annette Grant: And, what we hear over and over and over and over again is hosts want to make more money and get more [00:08:00] bookings, and this simple thing is blocking ’em. So let’s think about how you can, this is business. This isn’t about convenience. This isn’t about ease. This is about working hard and being profitable. Okay, this isn’t

Sarah Karakaian: Annette, yes!

Annette Grant: This isn’t passive income. It’s like if you are in business, let’s. Be in business to make money and have, you know, the most open, um, calendars possible. So how can we think about, we understand that these might be some large steps that you’re taking. Like, oh my gosh, I’ve always had cleanings on certain days.

I’ve had this certain team. It’s time to grow. If you wanna grow your bottom line, you’ve gotta grow your team. So what we can do here is have a backup cleaner. Wait so many hosts let the cleaner dictate their calendar ’cause they can only clean on certain days or they don’t wanna do back to backs. I’m not letting a team member dictate my business. Okay, so have a backup cleaner. Heck, listen. If you really wanna make more money, get out there and do the cleaning yourself. I have cleaned a lot of toilets, [00:09:00] made a lot of beds, and it’s because I wanted to have my calendar as open as possible. My cleaner needed to go to a doctor’s appointment, needed to do something.

Guess what? I didn’t block the calendar. I just went and did the work myself. So either have a backup cleaner or know how to do it yourself and also have a backup for your backup. Your inspector can’t make it today. You can make it or have a backup inspector. Same with your maintenance and, and you should have backups for all of these people anyways, because life just happens. Life happens, vacations happen, job changes happen. But you are the owner of your business. You’re the CEO, you gotta have backups plan. So we want you to take that profitability over that convenience, or if you choose the convenience over profitability, we don’t wanna hear you whining about you’re not making enough money and you’re not getting that bookings.

Pricing Strategies Over Minimum Stays

Sarah Karakaian: Pricing strategies over minimum stays.

Annette Grant: Common host fear is if I don’t have these minimum stays, [00:10:00] all of my weekends are gonna get booked up, and then I’m gonna have open weekdays. Well, that should be okay. Your weekend pricing is probably too low. I know from firsthand experience, like my weekends. The pricing in the beginning was too low, raised it, and that is where all of the profit came from, and those weekdays were gravy on top.

Let’s still where we are, obviously, depending on your location, seasonality, it’s a lot of differences here, but we’re just, again talking about opening up your calendar. Don’t be fearful that days are gonna be gobbled up. That is where your revenue management strategy has to be dialed in. You have to understand if those days are going to get booked, are you gonna be, are they, will they be profitable?

And you gotta make sure that the, that you have the them priced properly.

Sarah Karakaian: And so it doesn’t matter, like our example is weekends versus weekdays. And if that’s not your market, that’s fine, but it, it really is like business 1 [00:11:00] 0 1, if something is getting gobbled up, it, the price is probably way too low.

Mm-hmm. So don’t use your minimum stay requirements to control your revenue. Use appropriate pricing and pricing strategy to be able to control the calendar to make sure that you’re making the most profit when demand is the most high in a lot of markets. That’s weekends. And then when you get those weekday bookings and make different, uh, pricing strategies for those weekdays, that’s icing on the cake.

Annette Grant: So higher pricing, not restrictive stay rules should control the demand.

Mindset shift the market sets the rules, not your feelings.

Mindset Shift: Market Sets the Rules

Annette Grant: Oh, we’re, we’re gonna go on a rant here for a little bit. Again, as we’re chatting with, not just, we’re not chatting, we’re actually coaching these hosts because they wanna be more profitable and they continually tell us that like their market, their home, [00:12:00] their pricing, they’re this, they’re that.

And it’s like you do not. Set the rules for the traveler.

Sarah Karakaian: Well, it’s interesting ’cause they’ll say that and then we’ll say, great. Show us where the market is telling you. Mm-hmm. That these are facts. Mm-hmm. And they can’t uhhuh. So we get it. Like, you, you are in your market, you live in your community if you, if you host where you live. Um, but that, but you can sometimes look at data and you’ll be like, wow, I never would’ve guessed that. You know what I mean? Like a four nights average. Average. Average. The average guest average is four nights, is the averages. Sometimes it nights, the average is three nights, and you’re over here blocking your calendar for five or six nights.

Annette Grant: Here’s what I love, here’s what I love. Even if your average in your market is a five night, like just because you have yours on one night doesn’t mean you’re not gonna get those five nights stays. That’s where I think there’s some confusion too, of you can always go more, you know, you can always book more nights, right?

More than a minimum for the, for the guests, and this is what I always love to. [00:13:00] Chat with host about, have you ever stayed anywhere for one night?

Sarah Karakaian: Yes.

Annette Grant: They all say yes. Are you an amazing guest? Yes. Have you ever paid a premium for one night’s stay? Yes. Because something was going on in that area, that concert that you had to go to, that graduation, that business meeting that X, Y, Z?

Yes. Yes, and yes. I asked them, have you ever stayed anywhere for two nights? Yes. Have you ever paid a premium? Yes. Are you an awesome guest? Yes. And so they also like really think about yourself and how you travel. There are so many times one night stays, two night stays, maybe three night stays. Like that’s the flexibility.

There are travelers coming to your town and they don’t. Want or need. They, they’re, they’re not even gonna see you if you have those restrictions up.

Sarah Karakaian: Well, and a lot of you out there are really focused on hospitality. We just talked to a host yesterday who she was like, I’m really good at hospitality. I love guests feeling welcome.

Well, how unwelcoming is it to set parameters [00:14:00] on your calendar that the majority of the traveler in your market doesn’t need? Mm-hmm. So if you wanna think of it like that too, like, and here’s the thing, the fear sometimes comes from. Whether it’s not making enough money or a lot of times setting a one night stay, allowing people to stay one night, that fear comes from there will be parties.

Mm-hmm. And here’s the deal, like it if you price it appropriately and you’re in an involved host and you set other parameters in place, restricting your revenue potential based on a fear that’s quite uncommon. Mm-hmm. Is a big miss for you as the host who is trying to make money mm-hmm. In your short term.

Annette Grant: And we’ve seen hosts that have had a one night, say a two night, say, a five, a seven, a nine, a two week, that have all had issues potentially, you know, not the most, uh, wonderful guest, but here’s the deal, the market is gonna determine. The rate you can charge the days that the, the, um, guests are coming, what nights will be in demand.

So you just have to understand that you are not the ruler of the [00:15:00] market demand.

Sarah Karakaian: Right, the market, yeah. Is,

Annette Grant: and guess what You might have minimum, we’re not saying that there, we have minimum nights stays for certain, certain times, so we’re not saying completely, but they are based and backed by data. Again, let me say that again. You absolutely. If you’re gonna have minimum night stays, we want those to be backed by the data and your market data, not just your, uh, data that maybe you got for elsewhere.

Sarah Karakaian: All right, so let’s recap. All the things. This is, this is good. Like please take this and implement it into your business. Or at least make the decision, Nope, I want less management. I want ease for my family. That’s why I got into this. Great. You’re the business owner.

Annette Grant: But also after you’ve looked at the data, please look at the data that’s available to you because it might turn that you might notice that profitability really does for sure outweigh that convenience. And guess what? If you’re making more money. You can maybe have more of a team, right?

Sarah Karakaian: Right. Yeah. There’s all sorts of things to think about.

Annette Grant: Nuances here. [00:16:00]

Sarah Karakaian: But remember, Airbnb rewards, availability. So does vrbo. They all do. They all make money when, when properties get booked. So if you wanna know how to get up on that first page or first page impressions or get clicked, be available. Okay? Calendar gaps. Lead to lost booking. So that four night minimum, you got a five nights stay, but you have this four nights stay over here. So in the middle of these two nights. Now they’re unavailable. That’s some serious calendar management you have to keep doing. Mm-hmm. To make sure you don’t have these straggling dates hanging out on your calendar.

If your goal is revenue, don’t limit guests from booking. Okay. So you’ve gotta re gotta release this need for minimums nights day requirements. If your goal is revenue, use pricing to control demand. Mm-hmm. Not minimum stays and the market decides. Your job is to optimize.

Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Sarah Karakaian: All right, so in conclusion, listen, you are the CEO of your own. [00:17:00] Business. And so you get to make the calls. Just make sure that those calls that you’re making align with your goals, and if they’re not, you’re gonna have to have a conversation with yourself or with your partners because you can’t have it all.

You can’t, you know, whether it’s a succumbing to your cleaner schedule or you’re nervous about you know, a, a certain number of nights, stay with your guests or whatever it might be. We have to tailor our calendar and our pricing to the way the market is traveling.

So we’re hoping this episode at least gets your brain. Thinking, looking, going back into your calendar, look at your pricing, look at your minimum stay requirements and make sure they align with your goals.

Annette Grant: Experiment.

Sarah Karakaian: Experiment. Yeah.

And with that, I am Sarah Karakaian.

I’m Annette Grant, and together we are Thanks for Visiting   [00:18:00]