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As you know, Airbnb doesn’t have a loyalty program, and we don’t expect that they are going to launch this anytime soon.
My friends and I would like to change this by launching a loyalty program within Airbnb but we need your help. It will be a big family of handpicked Airbnb hosts who are not competing with each other (different locations, pricing, etc). Hosts will win the competition and users will get bonuses/points/perks.
Please let me know if you are interested in taking part in the loyalty program, if yes then:
what are key things important for you to say ‘yes’?
what kind of bonus are you ready to provide to users? 5/10/15% of the total price or fixed amounts?
would you like to take part in the program whole year OR only low-occupancy seasons?
I don’t understand how this will work. Can you clearly articulate the benefits for hosts taking part. What do you mean by ‘hosts will win the competition’
Are you expect hosts to pay you to be part of this programme?
It will be a network of good rated Airbnb hosts from all over the world. Users book apartments/rooms from this network and receive 5% (just for example) of the total price as points. As soon as they earn 100 points ($) then they can use these points on booking from this network of hosts. Users save money on booking. Hosts are more attractive for users and increase own occupancy rate.
I don’t get this at all. Do you mean we as hosts, if we use Airbnb, we choose to stay at one of these specially picked places and we get …what? Or rather, who pays whom this extra %.
E.g. users book room from hosts who are taking part in the loyalty program, and get back 5% of their booking price to their balance on Loyalty program as points. This 5% is paid back by the host. As soon as the user earns enough points then the user can use this points to book a room from any host who is taking part in the loyalty program.
In other words, hosts provide 5% discount for the room, because this 5% amount will be spent in booking from this network of hosts.
No, the host will be always paid. The guest always pays the full amount of the booking. The host sends 5% of this amount to the Loyalty Program. As soon as the guest collects enough points then the Loyalty Program pays on the next booking of this guest, of course, from this network of hosts. What do you think?
Don’t understand what’s in it at all for a host. Good hosts will be booked up and won’t need to offer discounts or already offer them for weeks or longer.
How will you monetise this. How are you going to promote this programme. You will have to have a substantial marketing traffic to drive traffic to it.
Do you really think guests will go to your site rather than BNB’s where they can choose from thousands of properties for the sake of a small discount.
I’m not comfortable sending $$ (5%) to someone I don’t know. Will the $$ be put into some kind of trust?
Who’s in charge of picking the “handpicked” hosts?
How can you ensure each of the “handpicked” hosts are solid and represent the loyalty program well?
Since this program encourages use of certain “handpicked” hosts, will the program (you) be responsible for any legal issues that may arise since it was facilitated by the program? I can’t see Airbnb getting behind this or am I wrong?
If a program like this were profitable, don’t you think Airbnb would already be doing it?
Marketing is an expensive endeavor for any enterprise. Will the marketing budget be taken from the 5% or some other fund, where are the marketing $$ coming from, the hosts or the program facilitator? No marketing = no success. Please explain.
I’m not comfortable sending $$ (5%) to someone I don’t know. Will the $$ be put into some kind of trust?
Who’s in charge of picking the “handpicked” hosts?
How can you ensure each of the “handpicked” hosts are solid and represent the loyalty program well?
Since this program encourages use of certain “handpicked” hosts, will the program (you) be responsible for any legal issues that may arise since it was facilitated by the program? I can’t see Airbnb getting behind this or am I wrong?
If a program like this were profitable, don’t you think Airbnb would already be doing it?
Marketing is an expensive endeavor for any enterprise. Will the marketing budget be taken from the 5% or some other fund, where are the marketing $$ coming from, the hosts or the program facilitator? No marketing = no success. Please explain.
If I am understanding this correctly - it would be like a traveler who earns points each time they book a room at the Holiday Inn. So basically the incentive is for the traveler to always use the Holiday Inn, versus staying at the Ramada Inn. Holiday Inn receives a loyal customer and benefits because the traveler is likely to book one of their rooms every time they travel.
The difference here is that each Airbnb host is not sharing in the profits. When someone books a night at DCmooney’s place in Washington DC, then that won’t “benefit” host Kona in Hawaii. There is no incentive for them to give away 5% of their revenue.
Another difference here is that a Holiday Inn may have 100 rooms to sell for the night. Most Airbnb hosts have 1 room to sell for the night. So…the Holiday Inn is not giving away 5% of the total revenue they brought in that day. They are only giving up 5% of 1/100th of their revenue. Plus, they will benefit later when the traveler books at one of their many, many locations. If the Holiday Inn had 1 room to sell, they would never sell it someone who gets a 5% discount.
Most Airbnb hosts don’t have repeat guests. And during peak season, the last thing you want to do is give discounts.
Have you thought about approaching it slightly differently and approaching companies to see if they’d be willing to offer a group of hosts that you pulled together exclusive discounts?
If you got enough sign up no doubt you’d be in a strong position to negotiate. But no hosts aren’t going to give up even 1% of their income.
I’m sure you can think of some other ideas that bank off Airbnb which are a little more sensical. What areas of the Airbnb industry haven’t been addressed yet?
