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Transcript

240. Hosting Hotline: The Surprising Way Airbnb Reviews Can Skyrocket Your Bookings · Thanks For Visiting

• 0:00
  Sarah: Hello.
• 0:00
  Hello.
• 0:00
  Welcome back for the great episode.
• 0:02
  My name is Sarah Karakaian.
• 0:03
  Annette: I am Annette Grant, and together we are--
• 0:05
  Both Sarah and Annette: Thanks Visiting.
• 0:06
  Sarah: And this is the--
• 0:07
  Both Sarah and Annette: Hosting Hotline.
• 0:08
  Sarah: We've got a really, really fun one for you, listeners, today.
• 0:12
  And we promised there is a purpose behind playing this for you right now.
• 0:16
  Questions: How do you manage to be so funny, beautiful,
• 0:20
  interesting, intelligent, successful, all at the same time?
• 0:24
  Annette: We have to admit we might have listened to this a couple of times.
• 0:28
  And yes, it was a nice for the old ego, but here's what we're going to do.
• 0:32
  We're going to parlay this into, first of all, this person that
• 0:35
  called in did not leave their name.
• 0:37
  So it's one of those things, are they being genuine?
• 0:40
  Are they being sarcastic?
• 0:41
  This probably has happened to you in some of your reviews
• 0:44
  that you've gotten from guests.
• 0:46
  There's some of those digs in there and you're like, hmm.
• 0:50
  We want to talk about reviews today.
• 0:52
  But this person, their name was Dove.
• 0:53
  So let me know what you think about that, but thank you, Dove.
• 0:56
  I took it as super positive and then Sarah was like, oh, maybe he's--
• 0:59
  Sarah: No.
• 0:59
  I took it as like he was being sarcastic.
• 1:01
  I was like, Annette, this is a really good opportunity for-- but then
• 1:03
  when we played it, we were like, we felt really good about that.
• 1:05
  He was stroking our ego.
• 1:08
  And so the first thing we want to offer up to you is hosting is hard, right?
• 1:13
  You pour your heart and soul into not only the design and the decor
• 1:17
  and the location and how you speak to your guests, and they're checking.
• 1:21
  And--
• 1:22
  Things are bound to go either wrong or expectations are different
• 1:26
  on both sides of the table there.
• 1:27
  And so you are going to get constructive criticism.
• 1:31
  You're going to get flat out rude, reviews.
• 1:34
  So when you get those awesome ones, because they are the majority and we know
• 1:38
  all of our Thanks for Visiting audience.
• 1:40
  You guys have the majority are glowing reviews.
• 1:43
  Do yourself a favor and print a few out and put them on your bathroom mirror
• 1:47
  or on your bedroom vanity mirror in your office because you're going to
• 1:51
  need those reminders when things get tough that you are a rockstar host.
• 1:54
  Annette: Yeah, like we're going to keep this recording and we're going to play it.
• 1:57
  We might make it into a mix if we need to, but I actually at
• 2:00
  VRMA or Varma, Vacation Rental Management Association.
• 2:03
  I attended one of the seminars and it was about reviews and
• 2:07
  how to deal with bad reviews.
• 2:08
  And this was something that the woman that was leading it said like she has a file
• 2:13
  in her office of all positive reviews.
• 2:16
  So when she's having that day where she's just getting beat up by a
• 2:20
  negative review, she can go into that brag bank and look at those.
• 2:24
  And the other thing that she offered, which I thought was really good, is
• 2:27
  to-- those negative ones, because people in this section, it was awesome.
• 2:31
  They were standing up and they were giving names and almost
• 2:34
  verbatim, the negative reviews.
• 2:36
  They were seating and it might have been a year later, and she was like, I give you
• 2:39
  permission to let that negative review go.
• 2:42
  So we also want to give you permission to let those go.
• 2:45
  They sting, they hurt, but you have to let them go in order to move on.
• 2:50
  I was telling, we get bad reviews on our podcast.
• 2:52
  So if you haven't left us a positive one, feel free.
• 2:55
  That's my plug today, to leave us a positive one.
• 2:57
  But definitely let those negative reviews go.
• 3:00
  But Sarah, what should you do with every single review, positive or negative?
• 3:06
  Sarah: Always respond to every review.
• 3:10
  It is not for the person who left the review.
• 3:13
  It is for the person considering staying with you.
• 3:15
  How you respond to both positive and negative reviews tells so much about
• 3:21
  the business owner and operator.
• 3:23
  And I promise you, you are going to be doing yourself a favor with
• 3:27
  your occupancy if you do that.
• 3:29
  And we do it for every single review that we receive.
• 3:33
  And here's what the team does as well, is every week they will share a positive
• 3:38
  review with the team, with the cleaner.
• 3:40
  And when we do have constructive criticism, because if we get something
• 3:43
  that is just blatantly inappropriate or rude or what have you, we
• 3:47
  honestly just discard those outliers.
• 3:49
  But when you have constructive criticism, take it inhouse with yourself if you are
• 3:53
  running the business, and see how you can spin that to be positive, just like
• 3:58
  we did with Dove's message for us here.
• 4:00
  Annette: I love Dove's review.
• 4:01
  Sarah: No, I do.
• 4:02
  Thank you.
• 4:03
  No, we needed to hear that.
• 4:04
  But also if he came at it from a sarcastic way, it's okay because
• 4:08
  we're choosing to take it and spin it into something positive.
• 4:11
  So when someone leaves you at two stars, because this happened to me,
• 4:14
  I didn't have Kleenex in my rental.
• 4:17
  This is back of the day.
• 4:18
  Annette: Is it Kleenex or tissue?
• 4:20
  Sarah: Tissue paper, but Kleenex.
• 4:22
  When I grew up, my mother was just like, you can use a toilet paper.
• 4:24
  So when I started hosting, I didn't think about it.
• 4:27
  And you better believe we have multiple boxes of tissue throughout our properties.
• 4:32
  You know what I mean?
• 4:32
  Annette: But that was a great constructive, like, you know what?
• 4:36
  One, that was something that a guest wanted.
• 4:39
  ADBREAK
• 4:39
  I got a very negative review meds.
• 4:41
  I'll be honest, I didn't have table lamps on all of my nightstands.
• 4:45
  And this couple, they were vacation rental owners.
• 4:47
  They were big readers.
• 4:49
  They did not want the overhead lights on at night.
• 4:51
  And there are now lamps at every single bedside.
• 4:55
  Sarah: Annette now loves secondary lighting.
• 4:56
  Annette: Yes, I do.
• 4:57
  I actually have two extras.
• 4:58
  I haven't even showed you.
• 4:59
  I just bought two last week at Target because they were so cute.
• 5:02
  I was like, I don't even need these, but I'll buy them for future.
• 5:04
  I need to show them to you.
• 5:05
  They're really cute.
• 5:06
  But copy this stuff out, have the positives there.
• 5:09
  But I love, if you do not leave those reviews, that was something again,
• 5:12
  like, that was an eye-opening moment.
• 5:14
  That was actually inside of our membership.
• 5:16
  We had a huge discussion about that, about leaving all-- reviewing
• 5:20
  every review that is given to you.
• 5:21
  And let's give you a specific, for instance, let's say a pipe froze in
• 5:25
  your house and this guest is leaving a skating review about this one-off
• 5:30
  issue because of Mother Nature.
• 5:33
  You could reply and say, explain what the weather was.
• 5:36
  It's remedied.
• 5:37
  It will not happen again.
• 5:38
  You want to give them the steps out of it.
• 5:40
  Let that future guests know.
• 5:41
  We were there within three hours.
• 5:43
  We did this, we called.
• 5:44
  That's where you would want to give a description to the
• 5:48
  potential guest of what happened.
• 5:51
  They can obviously read that review, but what your rebuttal was, how you
• 5:54
  remedied it, that's exactly what Sarah's talking about, is giving that future
• 5:57
  guest-- you are doing marketing for the future guest that's going to book your
• 6:00
  Sarah: You brought up a good point.
• 6:01
  Now we could have a whole episode on just reviews, but I guess we are--
• 6:03
  Annette: Aren't we?
• 6:04
  Sarah: We are.
• 6:05
  Do not use the opportunity to respond, to review, to vent.
• 6:08
  Annette: No.
• 6:09
  Sarah: Okay.
• 6:10
  Annette: Write it all out.
• 6:11
  Sarah: Yes.
• 6:11
  Call your bestie, vent and then you get on there and you are positive and
• 6:16
  you are constructive and you own up too whether it is mother nature or your fault.
• 6:21
  Annette: And give it some time.
• 6:22
  You always want to give yourself a little buffer time.
• 6:24
  We were actually with host last week and one of the hosts was talking about
• 6:28
  how they go back and forth and they text what their reviews would be and then
• 6:33
  they're like, okay, you need to tone it down, but they just need to get it out.
• 6:35
  So I know people that have a fake email and they send all their feelings to that
• 6:41
  email address so they can press send.
• 6:42
  They want to rage, click send.
• 6:44
  So if you are like that, maybe you have your own Gmail where you send all
• 6:49
  those, just make sure you don't mess up.
• 6:50
  Sarah: But you don't want to let your future hosts know that you are just--
• 6:53
  Annette: Yes.
• 6:54
  Yes.
• 6:54
  Seating.
• 6:55
  Sarah: Yeah.
• 6:55
  So with that, we hope that we've given you permission to let go that
• 6:59
  negative review, celebrate the positive ones, and use every piece of feedback
• 7:03
  as a way to improve your business.
• 7:04
  With that, I am Sarah Karakaian.
• 7:05
  Annette: I'm Annette Grant, and together we--
• 7:07
  Both Sarah and Annette: Thanks for Visiting.
• 7:08
  Sarah: We'll talk to you next time.