How to Get More Bookings on Airbnb

How much money you make from Airbnb depends mostly on how many bookings you get on the platform.

Your vacation rental is of no use if it sits vacant most of the time and generates little to no revenue while incurring various ongoing costs like maintenance, taxes, and insurance.

Thus, in this article, we will provide hosts and property managers with 15 actionable tips on how to get more bookings on Airbnb. Importantly, none of these tips requires lowering your daily rates below what makes sense for your listing in order to boost your Airbnb occupancy rate.

With these strategies, you can strike the perfect balance between pricing and bookings to maximize your rental income and increase your ROI in vacation rental investing.

Table of Contents

1. 15 Tips to Increase Your Bookings on Airbnb
2. How to Get Your First Airbnb Bookings for a New Airbnb Listing
3. How to Get More Bookings on Airbnb in Off-Seasons

15 Tips to Increase Your Bookings on Airbnb

Beginner Airbnb hosts and property managers frequently experience high vacancies because they don’t know how to make their listings more attractive to the Airbnb SEO algorithm and potential guests.

However, even experienced hosts and managers sometimes face low occupancy rates as their listing details and marketing strategies become outdated over time.

Here are 15 proven tips that will help both new and experienced vacation rental owners and property managers start getting more Airbnb bookings:

1. Optimize Your Listing for Airbnb SEO

From a guest’s point of view, the Airbnb platform works very much like Google, in the sense that it is a search engine that aims to provide them with the best options based on their requirements.

From a host perspective, this means that a major part of listing on Airbnb is cracking the Airbnb SEO algorithm. Lucky for you, this might be much easier than you can imagine.

Following are a few specific Airbnb listing optimization tasks that will help your rental property rank high in guest searches:

• Complete your host profile on the platform
• Write an attractive listing title that clearly explains your property
• Provide a listing description that is transparent, well-organized, and scannable and that uses keywords that target guests’ search in your area
• Have a call to action (CTA) at the end of your Airbnb listing description
• Upload professional photos of your rental that highlight all its best features and characteristics
• Include all amenities that your property offers
• Offer a guest guidebook with relevant information about the property and the surrounding area
• Have flexible policies including a low minimum stay (one night) and a high maximum stay (several months)
• Price your listing competitively (more details on this in the next section)
• Automate the approval of bookings (that meet certain criteria) through the Airbnb Instant Book feature or another vacation rental software tool
• Work on a high average rating for your listing based on multiple reviews (more details on this follow in a subsequent section)

If you follow these simple Airbnb SEO tips, your rental will rank better on the platform, attract more attention from guests, and attract more reservations.

2. Apply Airbnb Dynamic Pricing

Second on our list of Airbnb tips for hosts to boost bookings is to price your short term rental property dynamically.

The vacation rental market is very active, with the average Airbnb price in a location changing daily. To be competitive and generate reservations, you need to stay aligned with trends in your local market.

However, continuously adjusting your Airbnb daily rate to match demand requires ongoing detailed vacation rental market analysis. This entails collecting data from reliable sources, organizing the data, and calculating the rates that make sense for your property before entering these rates on the Airbnb platform.

With the Mashvisor Airbnb Dynamic Pricing feature, you can optimize your listing’s pricing strategy without any manual work. Mashvisor uses data from actual Airbnb listings in your area to suggest nightly rates that will not only enhance bookings but also maximize revenue and return on investment.

This is an important difference between Mashvisor and Airbnb Smart Pricing and other dynamic pricing tools available on the market. While most competitors focus on increasing the occupancy rate, the Mashvisor algorithm ensures that the suggested rates maximize your earnings and profit instead.

Moreover, you can choose whether to manually review and approve daily rates or put your dynamic pricing strategy on autopilot by allowing Mashvisor to post the recommended rates directly to your listing. All you need to do is import your listings to the Mashvisor platform to enjoy optimized passive income from your short term rental investments.

3. Offer Discounts in Special Cases

Another important aspect of a well-designed vacation rental pricing strategy is to provide special discounts in certain situations.

For instance, it’s a great idea to offer a considerable discount for long-term Airbnb stays of one month or more. Long-term stays are highly beneficial for hosts as you don’t have to worry about marketing your property for weeks on end. As your occupancy goes up, so does your rental income as well.

Furthermore, you don’t need to arrange and coordinate cleanings and restockings unless your guests request them, in which case you can charge them an additional fee for the extra services.

Another example of a discount that can attract more bookings on Airbnb is lowering the price during the off-season. If your area does not get many visitors during the week or in the winter, you can offer a discounted rate to attract a few extra reservations. Just make sure that the nightly price is enough to cover the expenses associated with keeping your property occupied and that it brings you positive cash flow.

4. Minimize Additional Fees

In addition to a daily rate, there are a number of other fees that you need to set up when you’re learning how to list on Airbnb.

A few examples include a cleaning fee, a pet fee, and an extra guest fee. While it’s important that these fees are sufficient to pay for the additional services you provide with each, try to keep them to the bare minimum.

Don’t aim to profit from these extra fees as they might discourage guests from booking with you and push them into the hands of the competition. Ensure that additional fees are well-integrated with the rest of your pricing strategies for Airbnb.

5. Maintain an Up-to-Date Booking Calendar

Another way to optimize your Airbnb listing and get more bookings is to keep your calendar always up to date.

On the one hand, you’re missing out on potential reservations if your booking calendar displays that your property is not available for rent when it actually is. This means that it will not appear in guests’ searches for these particular dates.

On the other hand, from a guest’s perspective, there is nothing worse than booking a property for a vacation or work trip only to have it canceled a few days later because the host messed up their calendar. In other words, double bookings and showing your property to be available for rent when it is actually not are big no-nos in Airbnb property management.

There is an easy way to avoid both problems described above and increase your bookings: use the Mashvisor Vacation Rental Channel Manager. This tool helps you sync all your listings, no matter how many platforms you list on—Airbnb, Vrbo, Booking.com, Expedia, Agora, and others.

Meanwhile, the Mashvisor Multi-Calendar offers a comprehensive calendar view of all listings including bookings, modifications, and cancellations.

This helps you ensure accurate listing and booking data at all times through automated synchronization that eliminates the need for manual work while protecting you from missing out on potential reservations as well as double bookings.

6. Speed Up Guest Communication

Another important aspect of getting more bookings on Airbnb is optimizing communication with guests before, during, and after their stays at your property. This is crucial for several reasons.

First, the Airbnb SEO algorithm considers host communication, including both the response rate and the average response time. Airbnb values the host’s availability as a factor in the guest experience and prioritizes owners who are there for their guests when needed.

Second, guests expect their booking requests to be approved quickly and their questions to be answered in a timely manner so that they can book with you, be satisfied with their stay, and write you a 5-star review.

Third, you need to be proactive in communicating with guests by providing them with everything they need for a comfortable and enjoyable stay before check-in. This includes smart codes for accessing the property, instructions for using the rental and the available amenities, and ideas for things to do around the area.

The Mashvisor Unified Inbox can help you centralize guest communication coming from all channels and OTAs in a single place. Moreover, it allows hosts and property managers to automate a great deal of the necessary communication via auto-replies and standard message template responses.

In this way, you can make sure that all messages are responded to on time, no questions are ignored, and guests have all the information they need to enjoy your property and the local area.

7. Collect Positive Guest Reviews

Another way to increase Airbnb visibility and rank higher is to have numerous 5-star guest reviews. Getting hundreds or thousands of reviews requires some time, but certain Airbnb tips can help you speed up the process.

First, positive reviews by guests are significant for two main reasons. The Airbnb platform prioritizes listings with high ratings because this means that the hosts deliver quality services to guests, and Airbnb is all about improving guest experience. Second, as documented in their reviews, guests are more likely to book a property that previous guests have liked and enjoyed.

Then, to gather positive feedback from guests, you need to make sure that your listing description and actual property are perfectly aligned. You should not overpromise in your Airbnb listing in an attempt to get more bookings as this will bite you back in the form of negative reviews.

Furthermore, you have to actively work towards collecting reviews from guests after their stays. All that is needed is to send them a friendly message to follow up and make sure that everything was fine with their stay and that they had a smooth trip back home. In the same message, you can kindly ask them to write you a review. Don’t forget to also give them a review as trustworthy and responsible guests.

That’s one of the many streams of communication that you can automate with the Mashvisor Unified Inbox.

8. Apply a Flexible Cancellation Policy

One of the easiest Airbnb booking tips for hosts and property managers is to enable a flexible cancellation policy on their listings. This means that guests can cancel up to 24 hours before the reservation date and receive a full refund, while the host receives zero payment.

Needless to say, this is not without negative repercussions as your property might be suddenly left vacant with little time to find another guest. However, if combined with a discounted rate for last-minute reservations, this can be an effective way to get more bookings on Airbnb.

You should keep in mind that most guests are serious about their travel plans and actually mean to come to your property when they book it. In other words, cancellations are not that common. However, guests appreciate having the opportunity to cancel and get a refund should any unexpected circumstances arise.

9. Allow Pets

When setting up your property, you need to decide whether you would like to host pets and what types of pets. Pets are associated with more wear and tear as well as the need to clean more intensely between guests.

However, having a pet-friendly vacation rental might make your space more attractive than competitors’ and become a deciding factor in attracting more reservations.

Additionally, you can charge your guests an extra pet cleaning fee, and your Airbnb insurance is likely to cover many incidents related to having pets on site. So, the extra cost is negligible, while the benefits are multiple.

10. Find Your Niche Guest Category

Many hosts and property managers can boost reservations by catering to the needs of a specific type of guest. Your niche is largely dictated by your market and property specifications.

For instance, if you own a condo or apartment in the center of a busy city, you might easily attract digital nomads or business travelers. Conversely, if you own a beach house in a resort town, there will be plenty of couples and families on vacation looking for short term rentals in the area.

So, once you identify the right niche for your vacation rental property, you need to furnish it accordingly and then market it accordingly. Remember that you don’t need to go overboard with the furnishing. Adding a small home office in the living room equipped with a desk and an office chair might suffice to attract bookings from guests working remotely.

Meanwhile, make sure to add these amenities to your Airbnb listing and phrase the title and description of your rental to appeal to your niche audience.

11. Furnish and Stock Your Property Comfortably

Before you even get to care about Airbnb listing tips, you need to take care of furnishing your short term rental. There are plenty of interior design websites dedicated to the needs of Airbnb hosts and property managers where you can find ideas on how to furnish and design your property for a comfortable stay.

When it comes to furnishing an Airbnb, there are a few key things to keep in mind:

• Don’t go for expensive furniture as you’ll face significant wear and tear.
• Go for durable, cost-effective furniture items.
• Choose classic, timeless designs so that your property doesn’t look outdated in a few years.
• Go for lighter, neutral colors to create a sense of more space and to be able to replace items as they get worn out.
• Don’t overstuff your property with unnecessary furniture that makes it feel clustered.
• Furnish your Airbnb to suit the needs of your niche guest group.
• Clean and maintain furniture so that your listing photos don’t look totally disconnected from reality.

Once you’ve furnished your property in line with the needs of a short term rental, take professional photos that highlight the comfortable options that guests can enjoy.

12. Create Pleasant Experiences for Guests

To increase your Airbnb bookings, you must work hard to provide positive guest experiences. This starts with offering a well-furnished, adequately maintained, and thoroughly cleaned property but goes beyond these hospitality industry basics.

For your listing to stand out and attract more reservations, you need to offer experiences that other hosts don’t. For example, you can partner with local businesses and attractions to supply special discounts and promotions to your guests. You can also offer exceptional welcoming baskets and personal local tours.

Meanwhile, you need to make sure that you are always available to answer any questions that your guests have.

13. Become an Airbnb Superhost

As soon as you list your property on Airbnb, you should start working on obtaining the Airbnb Superhost status. This is a special badge that’s awarded to exceptional hosts who have proven themselves over the years. In return, their listings rank higher in Airbnb SEO.

Keep in mind that becoming a Superhost takes time as you need to meet the following requirements:

• Completing a minimum of 10 trips or 3 reservations for a total of 100 nights or more
• Maintaining a 90%+ response rate
• Retaining a cancellation rate of 1% or less
• Having a 4.8 rating or higher

This means you have to work on attracting guests to complete the required nights, keep your calendar up to date, communicate effectively, and seek guest reviews.

14. Develop a Comprehensive Vacation Rental Marketing Plan

While optimizing your listing on the Airbnb platform is crucial, it’s not enough to maximize reservations. You should put together a detailed vacation rental marketing strategy that includes a direct booking website, social media, email marketing, and word-of-mouth marketing.

After all, not all vacation rental guests book their stays through Airbnb. Thus, you can capture more reservations if you market your listing outside the listing website.

For instance, you can share your Airbnb listing on your social media accounts or even create its own pages. You can also collect the emails of previous guests and invite them to come back to enjoy special discounts for repeat customers.

15. Keep Your Property in Top Shape

Last but not least, your short term rental needs to be impeccable to bring more and more guests.

To begin with, potential guests will take a detailed look through the gallery of photos of your listing before booking it, and they will choose competitors in case they find something wrong with your property.

Furthermore, they will mention any discrepancies between the photos and the current condition of your property in their reviews, just as they will make a note in case everything is as expected and as advertised.

So, you need to conduct regular property inspections to ensure that the property looks well, the furniture is fine, and the appliances are working.

How to Get Your First Bookings for a New Airbnb Listing

As you have probably noticed, some of the tips provided above require running an Airbnb business for a while before they can take effect. Specifically, you need time to gather 5-star reviews and become a Superhost.

But there are other things you can do as soon as you list your property on the platform to get your first few bookings:

• Make your property stand out from the competition with nice furniture and additional guest experiences.
• Make your listing more attractive with flexible cancellations, high-quality photos, and a detailed description.
• Initially, consider offering a lower price than the average Airbnb rate in the area to attract your first few guests.
• Immediately respond to potential guest questions and reservations to get your first bookings.
• Apply a dynamic pricing strategy right away.
• Market your listing on social media.

The more bookings you can get, the easier it will be to attract new reservations, as long as your guests are happy with their experiences and reflect this in their reviews.

How to Get More Bookings on Airbnb in Off-Seasons

As an Airbnb host or property manager, you need to remember that the ease with which you can attract bookings depends largely on the seasonality of your local market. Naturally, some places attract more visitors in the summer and others in the winter. Some destinations are more popular during the week and others over the weekend.

Unless you’ve done exceptional market analysis and found a location that bustles with guests year-round, you’re likely to face significant changes in demand throughout the year.

This needs to be reflected in your pricing strategy. In specific, it’s important to lower daily rates as much as possible during the off-season—without risking negative cash flow—to continue attracting bookings and generating revenue.

Additionally, you should adjust your listing title and listing description to highlight the benefits that your property offers off-peak. Maybe you have a hot tub that can be used in the winter or an exceptional cooling system that keeps your property pleasant in the summer. Make sure these are explicitly mentioned in your off-season listings.

How to Get More Bookings on Airbnb: Final Words

Attracting more reservations and boosting your Airbnb property’s occupancy rate is not mission impossible. On the contrary, getting more bookings on Airbnb is quite feasible and even easy with the 15 actionable tips outlined above.

All in all, you have to optimize your listing for the Airbnb SEO algorithm, price your property right, and create good experiences for your guests. That’s at the core of the hospitality business. Your efforts are guaranteed to be rewarded with positive reviews, high rankings, and enhanced revenue, which in turn lead to more reservations from new and repeat guests.

In the meantime, remember that the Mashvisor set of vacation rental software tools can help you streamline and automate many of the aspects of managing an Airbnb property for more bookings with fewer efforts.