A lesson in on-line Marketing and PR

How to communicate with your potential renters - how to turn site visitors into enquiries, and enquiries into bookings.
e-richard
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A lesson in on-line Marketing and PR

Post by e-richard »

Carry out a carefully sampled survey of people who love your property and can say exactly what you want them to say, then publish it as a scientific study and get it syndicated by some industry bloggers.

Example1.
Start with a catchy headline:
Online vacation rental industry poised for growth

Introduce the report with PR buzzwords:
According to the survey, the largest traveler concern is property misrepresentation.

Include some facts and figures from questions you have posed in a survey to ensure that the results support your proposition.
The survey also showed that 78 percent of traveler respondents said they would rent vacation homes more often using an online service if their payment was submitted upon booking, but released to the owner only after they arrived and personally verified the property.

Simple !

Now, don't get me wrong, the purveyor of this bit of PR, "DepositGuard" may well have a smart proposition and may indeed be a solution for many homeowners/renters, but I'm somewhat disturbed by the transparency of the so called traveller's "survey".


.. so what do you all think of the idea of DepositGuard anyway ?
** Richard
PIMS: Holiday Rental Management system
They say we learn from our mistakes. That makes me a genius !
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Moliere
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Joined: Thu Mar 08, 2007 10:45 pm
Location: Magalas, Languedoc

Post by Moliere »

Very slick website, captures renters' insecurities nicely.

Given the (admittedly occasional) issues we've all had with stroppy, exploitative or over-demanding guests, I do worry that the prospects for losing money for relatively spurious reasons are quite significant.

On the other hand, our potential guests are perennially being advised by the media to beware of unscrupulous advertisers and to contest terms of payment (tbh, not a problem I've ever faced) - so maybe this could be valuable in some markets and at some times of the year?

Mols
Jumping is just dressage with speed-bumps.
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Windy
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Joined: Tue Oct 02, 2007 8:21 am
Location: Windermere UK

Post by Windy »

OK but why should a renter trust Depositguard? Who TF are they?

Sid Gullible told Express reporter Ron Slime "We booked our holiday in a real property but some internet outfit scammed both us and the owner so we didn't get our holiday after all "
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