Facebook bookings?

[Nemo]

I post less frequently than I used to - simply no time, but a few times a week is fine and won't upset anyone.

[jenboyle1959]

I get the occasional "unlike" , but it's steadily increasing. My guess is people don't want to be bombarded with available dates, prices etc, but like (in my case, anyway) photos of the scenery, and local news. I tell people the Facebook page is there when I send out their final receipt, and find they often Like it then.

[Nemo]

The rule of thumb always used to be no more than one sale pitch in every five posts. Whether that's still accurate is another matter, but it's fairly obvious that people don't want to be sold to directly, they want to fall in love with your property, the area, the places to go and more. Variety is the key.

I can't say I look at my unlikes or insights much. I get a steady flow of likes, several posts have mediocre reach as I expect as fb won't dish them up to everyone unless I pay. However every few posts I get one with really great reach; now 2000 views and above on a page with about 1500 likes.

PS just had my first wow moment of the day. I just checked my recent post, which has been shared and the reach is 7680 views. That is categorically my all time high!

[Cymraes]

I know I know. Sykes has a bad reputation? However, I have to say they have been way better than two other agents I've thought about employing and met up with. I am forewarned and forearmed as have read lots about them on here. I am giving them an ultimatum re my pricing and if they don't like that then I won't go with them.

We went with Sykes and I'm not unhappy. Most of the agencies seem to be terrible.

We were late to the market and they were able to get us photographed and listed within 2 weeks so we hit the start of the school holidays. The first bookings arrived within 48 hours and we were fully booked until the end of Sept very rapidly. These are bookings and income that we would not have had without their marketing power.

In contrast I also asked for info from 4 other agencies. One insisted on items of furniture that wouldn't physically fit in a cottage and a quite ridiculous level of kitchen equipment (Kitchen Aid anyone?).

Sykes and one other came around to see the cottage. I got all the info I wanted from Sykes within a day or two of the meeting. I'm still waiting for the other one to answer my commission question.

The other 2 finally responded to my requests for information which were made in June. One at the end of July and one in mid August. We'd have missed the entire summer season with them and if that is the level of their responsiveness then heaven help their owners.

I'm going to be negotiating a few adjustments to our agreement with Sykes for next summer but I'm not getting the website traffic yet that I need to go it alone just yet.