Lay My Hat

Hi, my name is Ed, I'm based in London and I’d like to speak to Airbnb hosts; I’m currently researching ways in which hosts, and potentially guests, could get a more fulfilling experience out of the service that Airbnb provides, and would like to know more about people’s experience of hosting.

If you could spare ten to fifteen minutes of your time it would be very much appreciated. Please get in touch via the forum; Ideally I would like to speak via Skype, FaceTime, or phone but I’m equally happy to communicate via this forum or however you would feel most comfortable.

Thanks

Ed

And you are.....????

If you check the rules if the forum you have to say very clearly if you are affiliated to any agency.

East Ender? maybe Phil, maybe an older crew?
I agree with the above.

Ed.........Ed....are you there???

Hi

I'm not with an agency. I've recently started a course in Product Management. Link below

https://generalassemb.ly/education/product-management

Part of this course is developing a new feature for a website and taking it through the various stages of development, I've chosen Airbnb and I'm undertaking some customer research. It's academic research (it's for the experience rather than any aim to make money), and I'm definitely not part of any agency, but it would be really good to speak to some people with experience of hosting on Airbnb if anyone can spare a few minutes.

Cheers!

Ed

Having been a Product Manager in a former life, and aware of the course that Ed is undertaking, I can vouch for the legitimacy of his request.

I do encourage forum members to get in touch with him if you feel you can help. Its a long journey from ideas to implementation and occasionally its worthwhile.

I confess that I have not heard of the job description "Product Manager", but then I have been out of the loop for years and years. Having now done a bit of research I can see the importance of the role, and any manufacturer or service provider which wants to get ahead of the game is going to need one. Product managers carry a lot of responsibility on their shoulders. If they succeed, they will get a pay rise; if they fail, all accusing fingers will point to them and they will be out of a job.

In the 1960's I worked for a large manufacturing company. One of its side lines was a paint product. The colour chart for this paint was made up out of the favourite colours of the wives of the company's directors. Product managers didn't exist in those days, but if they did they would have done a better job, I think.

If readers feel uneasy about speaking over the phone or Skype and would prefer to provide some written info then that'd also be much appreciated. If you can, my questions are below.

1. Please give an indication of your age, location and profession (only if you’re comfortable doing so, obviously!)

2. How do you use Airbnb? Host and/or guest? How often? What types of property to you most regularly host / guest.

3. Why do use Airbnb (Why are you motivated to use the online marketplace / hospitality service and why Airbnb in particular?

4. Please explain the events around the last time something went wrong on Airbnb as a host / guest

5. Why do you think Airbnb is as successful as it is?

6. How do you feel about the ratings system on Airbnb

7. Is there anything about Airbnb which frustrates / irritates you, or that could be done better?

Thanks!

Ed

Ed, we do not not use that dreadful portal. So no answer from us.However, A question for you how do you deal with the information? How do you comply with the EU privacy laws?

Oh, for crying out aloud, surely GDPR does not apply to friends having a discussion and asking questions of one another?

Please do not answer the above question as I do not comply with GDPR regulations when asking questions on this forum.


p.s. This is not a personal comment about Ian and Irene. Its a reflection of what GDPR junk news has done to us all.

But whose friend is he? Not of anyone here or there would not be the questions posted above.

OF TOPIC:we hate the GDPR, it means a lot more work and in the end our guests cannot have the information we store about them back due to other national Spanish laws to which we have to comply with. It is crap. But if you wanted to ask for the Information then any forum should be able to supply the relevant information. Some on line newspapers have now shut out IP address from Europe so they do not have to conform to this law.

Back to discussing airbnb, I just got an email from them suggesting that people were booking competitor properties instead of mine because they were cheaper. Thats is very naive.

They go on to say
"Lowering your price could help you get more bookings and actually lead to more earnings over time. As your total bookings increase, your overall earnings can as well."

Now, I am a businessman, and I know that if something costs £80 to produce and you sell it for £100, then your overall earnings are good, but if you sell it for £70, then no matter how many of them you sell, your earnings are not good.

Airbnb still to this day take a remarkably simplistic view of the market based on their history of selling spare sofa space to students who want to crash. It's not that the market has changed; it's that its a different market. When will they learn?

But yes, we do get an occasional good booking from them once or twice a year

Hi everyone

People seem quite reluctant to give any information in reply to my questions. It's understandable, I'm always very careful with my data these days.

All I can do is try to reassure you that I'm not going to use any information for anything other than background on the course I'm taking. If you don't want to leave any personal data (or if you want to give a false name, an age range or something like that) then that's absolutely fine, but it would be very helpful to get a bit of feedback from people with real experience of hosting on Airbnb.

Unless anyone is happy to to respond, this will be my last post on this thread.

Thanks!

Ed

Don't be offended. This is a busy time of year for us gite owners so many just may not have the time at the moment.

We have never used AirB&B so can't help ………… there may be others who, similarly, have no experience to offer - good or bad.

GillianF wrote:Don't be offended. This is a busy time of year for us gite owners so many just may not have the time at the moment.
We have never used AirB&B so can't help ………… there may be others who, similarly, have no experience to offer - good or bad.

+1. Like many of us on LMH, we don't use AB&B. So cannot help.