Early listings are sort of an introductory hosting course for new hosts. I would not bluntly tell them to read, but use the more polite approach noted in other responses. I do state “please read our description thoroughly to insure that our listing mets all your needs”. It has helped a little. My pet peeve is the potential guest who asks me about distances to various places rather than using an easy online program like MapQuest. I list all the more common distance questions in the listing, but they don’t look at them.
Two seperate things. The earlier post the host made a mistake and booked too cheaply, and was clearly uncomfortable…
RR
Gut feelings can be based on valid data; they can also be based on cognitive bias (bad for Airbnb). Even after 5+years/800 stays I don’t feel I have enough consistent data on which to base hosting decisions. I know 90% of my problems have been with older male (over 50) guests. However I know that’s only 3 people. I’ve host hundreds of older male guests so I have no real basis on which to be wary of older male guests.
A brand new host or listing just getting their first reviews, or a host struggling to stay at 4.8 or above has a different calculation to make than I do. I trust $$ more than I trust my “gut” though.
Off topic…I’ve been looking for a way to find out how many completed reservations I have had. I can’t find it anywhere, other than going through the reservations and manually counting. (I’m trying to figure out what percentage of people are leaving reviews, for my own knowledge.)
I had to count them but I did it by going to reservations, then completed. There are forty per page except the last page so I had 40x17 plus the last page with 31. I also have some direct bookings but I’m not sure how many, I had a bunch from two dentists most of last fall that aren’t on Airbnb records at all. So my guess is at least 800 stays.
I can also guess based on how many reviews I have. I’ve always gotten 80+% to review. Airbnb used to measure that for us, now they don’t but when I calculate it myself it’s always over 80%. So I currently have 588 reviews; if I add 21% it’s 711 (the number of stays I’ve had. )
I may be doing it the hard way. I don’t know of another cumulative measure and I don’t keep my own spreadsheet of all my stays. That’s what a top notch pro would do, but I’m not one.
Ahhhh thank you. That was my mistake for not filtering for that so I was seeing all the cancels (my filter actually says “confirmed” not “completed”, but accomplishes about the same thing)
Several months ago I was at 91% of people reviewing…now I’m down to 78%. (133 reviews/171 stays anywhere from 1-30 days, not including direct bookings)
I guess I need to go back to leaving my personalized yet boiler plate check out message. It basically thanked them for their stay, told them not to strip the bed, leave towels and used robes on the hooks, etc. then talked briefly on the importance of reviews. Really the check out instructions and personalized portion were just a vehicle for getting in the bit about 5 star reviews. I don’t really care what guests do for check out, aside from not stripping the bed!
I stopped leaving this b/c I was starting to feel bossy (and to be honest a bit lazy) but I think I’m going start leaving it again to get my reviews back in line. Also, since I stopped leaving the “check-out letter” I received two 4 star reviews. Prior to that I had 100% 5 star. Sad but true, the pandering for reviews works! 
I’m mostly kidding here, the brief section on reviews I wrote was tastefully done. It was cobbled together from many many posts/suggestions on this very forum!
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I’m using the app right now, but doesn’t the desktop version have your total on the dashboard, top right hand corner?
Caveat! I’m thinking about the European version of the site.
JF
I don’t see it. It would be a nice and easy thing for them to provide.
My dashboard home page (US) looks like this:
Totally different. Mine is in English (UK).
JF
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No, not un the U.S. site that I’m on. Also, the numbers they have displayed for my “compliments” are wayyyy off (low), but that is for another topic!
That’s weird. Mine looks totally different than that!
And below that is a list of reviews to do and a list of upcoming reservations.
Has yours changed recently? BTW I’m on Windows and using Chrome. And do you have the total count like John does?
No. It’s looked like this for as long as I can remember. I’m on a Mac on Chrome, but it looks the same on Firefox and Safari as well.
I never have that “Requests” or the “Tips” section on there like you do. The requests come up under the “Notifications” heading that I have.
I’m surprised that they look so different.
That “set up a team” bit is new this week and keeps coming back even though I’ve dismissed 100 times. Unfortunately, I don’t have a team. lol
Do you have compliments numbers on your dashboard?
No, sorry, that comment was a bit off topic. These are displayed under my “Progress” tab and now, also on my listing. Both are inaccurate numbers.
So, did you count up all the compliments from each review and then compare the numbers? Or is there some other way to figure that out. I can’t imagine counting them all up.
I counted all the “sparkling cleans” and the number was way off, so I can tell by that number that the others were off as well. If someone gives me one compliment they generally tic off most or all of the others. I did not have the energy to go back through and count all of them. Once was enough! I kind of want to call airbnb and ask about this since they are now being posted on our listing, but I assume everyone else’s are also lower than actual so I haven’t bothered.
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Maybe due to multiple listings?
I guess, maybe, but it’s only 3 listings. The business thing doesn’t start until 6 listings, I think. It’s odd. And you actually seem to have more information on yours. Who knows 
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Airbnb sems to cap the number of “compliments” in each category at about 20. This was reported on the CC forum. No one has ever seen a number higher than 20, even though they had many more guests than that that would have left those compliments. It’s altogether weird and unexplainable.