EP181: Hospitality Insights from a Superhost and Co-Founder of GuestBook
Summary
This article discusses revenue management strategies for short-term rentals, highlighting the importance of scheduled pricing routines, analyzing booking data, and understanding market trends. Hosts should implement a daily and weekly pricing review process to optimize revenue and stay ahead of market changes. The article also touches upon CEO strategies for STR businesses and contrasts STR revenue management with hotel revenue management.
Key Insights
- •STR pricing is dramatically harder than hotel pricing due to product uniqueness, booking windows, and operational constraints.
- •Early bookings can indicate underpricing or upcoming events. Last-minute inventory reveals demand and visibility. Weekend demand requires different attention than weekdays.
Action Items
- ✓Review every booking to reveal pricing and demand signals. Spot mistakes in minimum stays and pricing settings.Effort: lowImpact: medium
- ✓Consider the impact of the FIFA World Cup on specific cities when setting pricing, especially in cities like Kansas City, Boston, Seattle, and Philadelphia.Effort: lowImpact: medium
Tools & Resources
- →Freewyld Foundry: Learn more about Freewyld Foundry
- →Freewyld Foundry: Get a Free Revenue Review from Freewyld Foundry
Watch Out For
- ⚠STR operators may underprice their listings or fail to prepare for the booking surge.
- ⚠Most hosts underperform not because they lack tools, but because they don’t know what to look at, when to look at it, or how to interpret booking behavior.
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