From updating prices through communicating with guests to keeping the property guest-ready, as a host, you have a lot of responsibilities to ensure that your Airbnb business runs smoothly. As a result, you are constantly busy and don’t have enough time to focus on strategic aspects of your business that are critical for staying competitive.
Finding more efficient ways to handle recurring tasks can make hosting easier. Many successful Airbnb hosts take advantage of technology to automate their business. They can streamline time-consuming tasks, increase productivity, and minimize costs.
Airbnb automation software can help you cope with the workload and save 70% of your time on your routine operations and tasks. Here are five handy tips on using Airbnb automation to maximize your efficiency and create a better customer experience for your guests.
5 Steps to Simplify Your Airbnb Management
Many tools and software solutions can take care of running different daily operations so that you no longer need to spend your precious time doing them yourself. Here is how you can use such tools to automate almost every aspect of your short-term rental business.
Automate Guest Communication
Automating communication with guests is an easy way to boost the efficiency of your Airbnb business
Effective communication with guests is one of the critical elements of building a successful rental business on Airbnb. But it’s a very time-consuming task that can take up to 75% of your time daily.
It’s critical to promptly answer all booking inquiries from travelers with helpful messages because they can win you more reservations. And after your guests have booked their stay, you should proactively communicate with them to make them feel cared for. Then they are more likely to leave you 5-star reviews.
A tremendous time-saving tactic for busy hosts is automating guest communication using short-term rental software. Such tools offer helpful features that can take your guest messaging to a new level and ensure excellent customer service 24/7.
They allow you to automate most of your guest conversations using message templates and sending messages on preset dates and times. You can also apply shortcodes and other smart elements like conditions and triggers to achieve a high level of personalization. Some tools can detect guest questions on common topics in their messages and instantly send personalized responses.
Use Automation to Grow the Number of Positive Guest Reviews
Positive guest reviews add credibility to your listing, help you rank higher, and attract more travelers. But guests may be reluctant to leave a review after their stay, so you should encourage them to do so.
You need to send follow-up messages to your guest to remind them to write a review. Moreover, posting reviews for your guests will help you get a review in return. You can “delegate” both tasks to your short-term rental software. You only have to set a few review templates. Some tools can even help you manage bad reviews from guests as well.
Protect Yourself from Double Bookings
Managing your listings on multiple OTA platforms can be challenging, especially if you manually update your calendars, pricing, and availability. The thought that you can fail to do it properly can make you anxious because there’s always a risk of receiving a double booking. It could cost you unhappy guests and seriously damage your reputation.
Rental software with an Airbnb channel manager feature allows hosts to connect multiple accounts and listings and manage them from a single dashboard. Such tools can protect you from double bookings by instantly synchronizing your calendars across platforms. They also feature integrations with Airbnb dynamic pricing tools that allow you to push smart pricing to all your channels, adapting it to the channel’s markup.
Automate Cleaning and Team Management
No matter what type of accommodation you offer on Airbnb, you need to keep it clean to the highest standards. You should also take care of your rental property maintenance to keep it in good condition. That means you’ll need to hire a team to help you clean and maintain your property and regularly notify them about new tasks.
Vacation rental software can help you automate these routine operations and optimize how you interact with cleaners and other team members. You’ll be able to set rules for assigning tasks to your team members, and the system will notify them about new jobs coming up automatically via email or text messages.
Manage Direct Bookings
A direct booking website is a great way to build a thriving brand and enjoy better margins while offering a better customer experience and maintaining long-term relationships with your guests. It’s extra work, but it can help you attract direct bookings and have more control over your business. You’ll have a place to market your rental property and build brand loyalty in the process.
It’s rather expensive to hire a website developer to build a custom direct booking site from scratch. Moreover, many things may go south if you don’t have experience managing website development projects.
But some vacation rental management tools come with a direct booking website builder feature. If you opt for this route, you’ll be able to create your own fully functional website in just a few clicks. And the best thing is that you don’t need any coding skills for it.
The software will take care of keeping your calendars synced with OTAs, automating communication with your guests, billing them, and creating invoices. You’ll also have access to other features that the tool offers.
A direct booking website takes a little effort to maintain if you use software with a channel manager feature. And it’s really worth it, considering the additional revenue it can bring in.
Put Your Business on Autopilot with All-in-one Vacation Rental Software
Vacation rental software solutions allow hosts to work more efficiently, eliminating the number of repetitive tasks and freeing up time to focus on scaling their Airbnb business. If you want to get the best value for your money, it’s better to invest in an all-in-one vacation rental software with a comprehensive set of features. Besides, you should look for tools that are easy to use and integrate with other smart software systems.
This guest post has been contributed by our friends at Hospitable.com.