Hi guys, I am new to the vacation rental business. Recently discovered the advanced priced setting website. Has anyone tried these websites? How do you think of it? what is better beyondprice VS wheelhouse? I mean better is like more spot on.
Thank you.
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I imagine this is going to start an interesting discussion! I know that there are members here who use BeyondPricing so hopefully theyâll recount their experiences.
Over the years, Iâve looked at and demoed several services and decided not to use them. The reason for this is simple (others will probably disagree) but I feel that I know our rental and our own area better than any service.
I know when there are special events, including minor localised ones. I know what conferences are happening in our area to attract business guests. I know what our rental is worth per night - not because of the number of people it sleeps or its location or its amenities but because I know every inch of the place (whatâs good and whatâs not so good) and exactly whatâs going on locally.
I know which shows are coming into town from Broadway and that people working on the show need accommodation, for example. I really donât think that any automated service has the knowledge that I do about our rental.
When I demoed Beyond Pricing it suggested our minimum price should be $74!
I find that Airbnbâs Smart Pricing does a great job in updating the calendar every day and its prices are good once the minimum and maximum have been set. I adjust it manually for events etc.
Furthermore, I donât want to pay a service that has less knowledge than I do.
The ball is rolling â discuss 
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I used Everbooked for awhile but didnât feel like it really justified the cost for the same reasons @jaquo stated. I know my pricing and can set it manually if needed, or rely on Airbnbâs smart pricing (so long as you set the appropriate minimum price, otherwise it is way too low). It was just an extra expense that I didnât really need.
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Full disclosure: Iâm a Product Manager at Wheelhouse. 
You both bring up great points. Why pay extra for a tool that just slaps prices on your calendar and calls them âsmartâ?
We fully believe that any good pricing strategy MUST be personalized to your rental and your business goals. Our competitors unfortunately believe that âone size fits allâ when it comes to dynamic pricing.
A good pricing strategy should also leverage the numerous data points that are constantly changing every day: local demand, hotel prices and availability, vacation rental prices and availability, flight demand, other vacation rentals being added to the marketplace, events that youâve never heard of, the âcontagion effectâ of events that may be seemingly too far from your rentalâŚto name a few.
We donât pretend to know more about your unique rental and nuanced business needs than you do, but we do give you the tools and data to empower (not âpowerâ) you to make more money than ever before. And if you donât make more money with Wheelhouse, you wonât pay a cent!
If you have a listing on Airbnb, HomeAway, VRBO, or TripAdvisor (and soon Booking.com), you canât afford not to use Wheelhouse! 
PLUS, if you come to our website in the next week, start a chat in the lower right corner and mention AIRHOSTSFORUM, then weâll hook you up with the lowest rate out there. Guaranteed!
Cheers,
Quinn
This is my point exactly. 
I see no point in paying for a service that âslaps prices on the calendarâ. I know my rental and my area better than any service. So I still donât understand why anyone would pay for something that I can do better myself.
Please explain this!
We donât pretend to know more about your unique rental and nuanced business needs than you do, but we do give you the tools and data to empower you to make more money than ever before.
We are launching a suite of new personalization features that let you customize last minute discounts, weekend adjustments, and seasonality adjustments, so that you are always in control of your pricing strategy.
Weâre pretty confident you will make at least 10-40% more revenue with Wheelhouse. And if you donât make more money with Wheelhouse, you wonât pay a cent!
This is why I was asking for more details about your service. Why can we not afford to use it?
I would love you to explain this too. If you can help me make more money, thatâs great but I need to know a lot more first.(Youâre only âpretty confidentâ?)
For example, how does this differ from the tools that are already provided by Airbnb? Please let me know. Thanks!
You canât afford not to use Wheelhouse Pricing because you will make at least 10-40% more revenue with us and pay less than 1% of managed revenue (if you use the AIRHOSTSFORUM keyword). 
Airbnb Smart Pricing doesnât let you create custom last minute discount tiers, or make seasonality / weekend adjustments (coming soon) like we do. To see this in action, create a free account and see for yourself!
Check out www.usewheelhouse.com/personalize for more info about how you can personalize your pricing strategy.
Yes, you already said this. But you havenât yet convinced me why.
Yes, I can change the pricing whenever I want to to reflect any adjustments I need. It takes only a few seconds. Iâd love to think that your system is great but youâre truly not doing a very good job of convincing me. Please let me have more details. Thank you.
It sounds like I canât convince you to try Wheelhouse even though we have a free trial! 
But thatâs ok. We have plenty of users that have complained to us about Airbnbâs Smart Pricing tool, and how it doesnât actually help them maximize revenue. But if Airbnb Smart Pricing works for you, then thatâs great! If itâs not broke, donât fix it. If itâs broke, use Wheelhouse!
No, you can if you try
Anything that makes more money is good for me. But I need to know your history, your experience, your background and exactly how you can help before I commit (or even use a free trial).
So many people are leaping onto the STR business so how would I know that youâre legit?
All I ask is that you sell yourself.
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Fair enough! We are the best pricing tool in the space for many reasons:
- We help people sell inventory on multiple channels â Airbnb, HomeAway, VRBO and TripAdvisor.
- Wheelhouse was chosen by both HomeAway and TripAdvisor for exclusive partnerships, after doing a thorough analysis of pricing teams.
- Our platform has the broadest range of functionality on our site and, as I already mentioned, are launching a set of tools that will allow you to âpersonalizeâ your pricing strategy in many different fashions (i.e. we give you control of some very powerful data science).
- Our competitors (Beyond, Everbooked, Airbnb Smart Pricing) all have a â1 size fits allâ approach.
-
We have 4 Ph.D Data Scientists on our team⌠which is 4 more than anyone else in the space
- Weâre also a team of Airbnb hosts, former hotel revenue managers, ex-hedge fund engineers, and product specialists from Google, Facebook, and AmazonâŚso this isnât our first rodeo.
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A team of Airbnb hosts etc, isnât really going to cut it though, is it?
Truly, Iâm still waiting to be sold on the idea.
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I created a Wheelhouse account but havenât synched them and probably wonât. In my case theyâre suggesting I raise my prices for events happening nowhere near my location that arenât big enough to have a âtrickle downâ impact effect, yet they donât mention events close by that might impact us. I am one of those that likes to tinker with my calendar. I think Iâll just continue doing as Iâve been doing which is adjust manually.
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Hey @Arlene_Larsson great question, and thanks for creating an account!
In short, just because you donât see the name of an event near you doesnât mean it isnât impacting your prices. Allow me to explain:
Our data-driven algorithms are able to track the signal & noise when events are taking place near you and impacting local accommodations (e.g. local hotels & vacation rentals are getting above-average bookings, occupancy is lower than usual, flight prices may be increasing, and other demand-driven factors have been triggered).
However, our algorithms can only see the impact of events, not the specific names. For that we integrate with a 3rd-party event analytics company called PredictHQ that can pull event info all over the world. Their product is always improving, and some areas still arenât perfect. Anyhow, weâll be sure to share this feedback with them!
Me too! Please tell us why you are different than BP and Everbooked, and not just with reports, but with actual pricing. While I get a âfree trialâ is the best way to really understand your product, unfortunately, I donât have the patience to sign up for ANOTHER pricing service just to see.
@ianmchenry @dordal someoneâs giving you guys a run for your money! 
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When allâs said and done, our businesses as hosts are all about selling and marketing. Our listings are our first sales opportunity. When a potential guest enquires, thatâs the next sales opp. The way we reply to a booking is our next chance to sell and make sure that the guests have a great time.
When we do the house tour when guests arrive, we are selling. During their stay, all our interactions with guests are still sales opportunities - hoping for a great review and repeat business.
So because we are in a business that is so sales-oriented I have dubious feelings about services that claim to be able to âhelpâ us but nevertheless have little ability to sell themselves. The logic is, that if they canât effectively sell their own services, how can they sell ours?
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Thanks for responding. Iâm still playing around with it and havenât decided one way or the other. What does ârate period smoothingâ mean? Whatever it is itâs driving your suggested prices for my property up, but I have no idea what it means. I guess I have trouble taking a blind leap of faith with something that I donât comprehend.
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Great question! âRate period smoothingâ is a new feature that weâve been trying out. Rather than have consecutive days be a few dollars different (e.g. $267, $265, $271), we wait until there is at least a certain % difference between consecutive days before changing them. The result is still dynamic pricing, but the rates look a bit better when consecutive days have similar prices. Your rates will still be very dynamic!
Iâm not sure Iâll ever be able to convince you of the benefits of dynamic pricing on a forum (see above messages about why we think weâre the best pricing tool in the space) 
but I would love to have a 10-minute convo with you over the phone. It would be much more efficient, and you can tell me all about why you donât believe in dynamic pricing services! DM me if youâre interestedâŚ