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We’ve seen and discussed the new “Compliments” section, but I was unaware that guests were also prompted in answering how well the stay met their expectations. Anyone seen the results of this question show up on their “Progress” page yet? Any idea how this affects our listing?
I was pondering how to answer this question and was wondering if there was a “right” answer AirBnB is expecting hosts to achieve. My stay met my exact expectations because I was careful to find an experienced superhost, and the experience was exactly what was promised. 5-stars all around. However, I have a little nagging in the back of my mind. Does AirBnB expect us to manage expectations accurately, as my experienced host did, or to set and exceed low expectations??
My parents stayed at our house and mentioned a lot of “leading” questions (her words) in the review process that she was uncertain how to answer. I have never stayed thru ABB so I wasn’t sure of any differences. She thought the questions were geared towards a guest only giving a good review, rather than ABB’s expected 5* great reviews.
Got my reply seconds after I reviewed my wonderful host and clicked that my expectations were met. Darn! I hope I didn’t hurt my guest’s listing whenever this data is used for something.
I wonder if they are getting pushback from all the five-star reviews. People book a $29 a night place with 5 star reviews, and then are really disappointed that it isn’t a luxury hotel - after all, it got five stars, right?
I see this as another way to push prices down. People pay a lot for our home, they expect a lot, they get a lot, but they are very, very happy. Their expectations are met. But if I cut the price in half, they’d expect a lot less, and then their stay would exceed expectations.
I thought this was the new wording for the “Overall” rating, not a totally new question. Does anyone know for sure?
They ought to get fewer 5* reviews by asking the question in this way. It’s also a big incentive to hosts to underpromise in the listing and leave more of the listings’ delights for guests’ arrival.
Good surprises = “Much better than expected”
This was my first thought. I’ve always argued against professional photography, for example, because I want our places to look better in ‘real life’ than they do in the listing. I don’t describe extras in the listing either.
With the advent of Plus, I was beginning to doubt my theory - should I get new photographs and use better descriptions in order to compete with these ‘super-properties’?
ABB replied to my follow-up question with a platitude about how they ensure Superhosts are the highest of quality. It wasn’t useful so we didn’t screenshot it.
I can take away that AirBnB is now asking us to undersell and over-deliver. If the CS agent is right (who knows, it’s so hard not to get a canned answer), it WILL hurt us to manage expectations and meet those are expectations.
I feel awful I didn’t check “exceeded expectations” in my review yesterday. Did I just give a wonderful, experienced host the new equivalent of a 3-star review?
My thoughts exactly. My recent stay was great, as expected. So what I am afraid of is that if I hit the ‘as expected’ button it means a 3 overall… so I ended up not reweing. And therefore I understand why fewer guests review (my experience this season).
That has been my experience too. My own mom didn’t review us until she asked me about it bc she wasn’t sure what they were looking for. If family and hosts are questioning it, I can only imagine what a guest must wonder.
Mom also said there were quite other questions and it was pretty tedious, when all she wanted to do was write a good review and pick stars, like she had done in the past.
I can’t see this as an improvement, for exactly the reasons @Xena describes. I too would think carefully before ticking the ‘much better than expected’, unless it really was, and that’s unlikely: I do my research, and I’m delighted to have my very high expectations met. This is only going to detract from the high end places and reward places that weren’t as bad as you feared they were going to be.
This must be one of the most fatuous things I’ve seen on Airbnb (and there have been quite a few …) I agree with @helengray, I do my research carefully, I choose somewhere with great photos, an informative listing, a reasonable price and good communication with the host. If I get all these, what on earth does the poor host have to do for me to write that it was “much better than I expected?”
I exchanged a few more tweets with CS this morning, and they basically said the Superhost has to still go above and beyond my high expectations. It was disappointing, and I think we should raise a ruckus.
I’d be happy to PM my twitter thread to anyone wants to retweet (I don’t want to post my real name here so I’m not sharing the link). I encourage you all to use social media to complain as well.
@LCL what reason would you use the AirBnB platform to host your mother other than to farm more positive reviews? If you charge family to stay, why not just have them pay you directly and save both the fees?
Haha, I agree! I think that was the review that I was the most worried about, especially when she told me that she put all these suggestions in the private message part and then said “At least I hope I put it in the private part, not the public part… I was confused.” Oh boy!
