Most effective listings sites?

[jimadept]

Which listings sites have been the most effective for you this year and last year in terms of hard bookings?

Please indicate whether the site is a paid-ad site or a free listing site.

I'll get the ball rolling. I've only been doing this since February so I haven't a huge amount of data yet:

This year:
(Updated 18/5/05)
1 Spain-Holiday - paid ad - 6 bookings / 7 weeks (20 euros per booking / 17 euros per week)
2 Homelidays - paid ad - 4 bookings / 4 weeks (18.75 euros per booking / week)
3 Spanish-Web - free - 1 booking / 2 weeks
(4 Via friends & family - 2 bookings / 2 weeks)

I'm posting the same thread on the Holiday Rental Owners Forum and will collate the results of the two and publish them on both forums.

cheers, Jim
PS (added 18/5) I got 0 replies on the other forum, so there's nothing to collate, please just read this thread!

[paolo]

I'd like to give you some input, but I use quite a few sites and it would take a while to produce the data. I also don't measure listing sites by bookings, but by enquiries, as discussed elsewhere.

[jimadept]

Well even a guesstimate of everybody's top 3 / 5 / 10 would be useful, especially for owners shopping around for the best sites to advertise with. And enquiries rather than bookings is fine, but bookings data is easier to collate as there are far fewer of them than enquiries. Also bookings are what it's all about, what's wrong with asking people who they get most bookings through?

cheers, Jim

[Clair]

Right, I'll throw my two cents' worth in:

from 2004 onwards, in no particular order:

Chez Nous:cost per enquiry €23.44; cost per booking €135.96
Escape Holiday: €16.43; €115.00
Homelidays: €4.17; €9.38
Holiday Rentals: €56.97; €227.86
The Lady: €105.33; €316.00
Bike-Stay: €30.00: €30.00


Now you see why I'll stick with Homelidays!

[reddevil]

Jim,
I think Paolo may have been saying that he personally doesn't measure the successful sites by bookings. But I am sure he isn't stopping anyone else from posting the info coz other people could find this useful. Go for it.

[Alan Knighting]

Clair,

Would I be correct in saying that a renter has to sign up with Homelidays before being able to see the details of a property? If I was a potential renter I think I would find it a bit off-putting.

I know Paolo doesn't agree but I too think that the true measure of performance is the number of bookings. It's bookings that generate income, not enquiries.

Lots of enquiries and few bookings could well be a reflection on the owner or the property rather than the website. Like Tansy has been intimating elsewhere - the first couple of pictures and some text may paint an attractive picture but when a renter digs a bit deeper everything can change.

That's not pointed at you Paolo, just general comment.

Alan

[jimadept]

Reddevil, I guess you're right, sorry about my tetchy reaction Paolo

Clair, thanks for your complete response, cost per booking is also very insightful. Have you never had any bookings at all through free listings sites or free classified ad sites? I've edited my first post to also reflect cost per booking.

Alan, generally speaking it's a percentages game, so the sites generating the highest number of enquiries will generally also generate the largest number of bookings, but not always of course. Having said that, the majority of my bookings through my 2 paid sites have not been preceded by any sort of enquiry, simply 'I would like to book...', whereas I've had plenty of dead-end enquiries through free sites and free classified ad sites, especially the Spanish ones. People tend not to click through to the website, apparently, or scroll down far enough to see the availability calendar.

Registration as a renter at Homelidays is suggested but optional (AFAIK you can click through to the owner's site without registering), and it doesn't seem to have stopped them from doing so in either my case or Clair's.

cheers, Jim

[Alan Knighting]

Jim,

...generally speaking it's a percentages game, so the sites generating the highest number of enquiries will generally also generate the largest number of bookings, but not always of course.

I am absolutely sure you are right. The job of the website is to get the enquiries and then it is over to the owner to convert them into bookings. My only point is that income only comes from bookings.

I raised the question about Homelidays because I would like to see the detail of what information is required to construct an owner's page before getting involved at all. Actually, I would also like to know how a renter sees full detail of a property he/she might be interested in, again, before getting involved at all. Maybe I am missing the obvious in both cases.

Alan

[jimadept]

It's no more difficult than on any other site. There's a one-month free trial, remember.

Re seeing details on the property, there is a link to your website displayed at no extra charge, plus room for your own description and plenty of photos on the ad page itself.

One thing I don't like about them is if you change your text or update availability, they take your site offline until they've reviewed the changes. Obviously this is positive vis-a-vis the renter, as it gives an extra line of quality control, but as an owner it can be a pain. The thing to avoid is making any changes at the weekend, because your ad stays offline until Monday, but if you change it during office hours it's usually back up within 2 hours.

Someone asked in another thread about translation - there's form information, where you tick boxes to say what facilities are in the property, local activities, etc., and this is all automatically translated for the various languages. The free text boxes, however, such as property description, directions for getting there and local attractions, are not translated, and you can choose to leave them blank in the other languages or get someone to translate them for you. Logical really, as translating 600 words into 5 languages would cost more than the 75 euros annual fee.

Jim

[vrooje]

Jim:

I've finally put this information together. I'm glad you asked, as it's something I've wanted to do anyway!

I've put this in order of decreasing cost-effectiveness per booking. For French Connections, the "8+3" inquiries means that 8 came directly from their inquiry form, and 3 came from my website but said they heard of us from FC (we ask that on our inquiry form). Our direct website inquiries said they heard of us from "internet" or "web search", etc.

Friends or Client Referrals: 3 inquiries, 3 bookings for 3 weeks ($0/$0 each)
Our Website (directly): 11 inquiries, 4 bookings for 4 weeks (US$11.82/US$32.50 each)
French Connections: 11 (8+3) inquiries, 5 bookings for 6 weeks (£13.64/£30 each)
VRBO: 7 inquiries, 3 bookings for 3 weeks in 2005 + 2 months in 2006 (US$28/US$65.33 each)
Holiday-Rentals: 8 inquiries, 3 bookings for 3 weeks (£24.38/£65 each)
Holiday Lets: 3 inquiries, 0 bookings (free trial -- we won't be continuing)

To be fair to VRBO, I joined it about 6 weeks later than joining Holiday-Rentals, so it actually performed pretty well.

For all the complaining I have been doing about French Connections, it actually did well too -- but I'm comparing it to last year, when it literally handled all of our bookings and we were just as full as we are this year. Plus, two of the FC bookings were taken before they released their new site.

I'm pleasantly surprised with the performance of our website -- especially since we haven't yet started a pay-per-click campaign.

[Alan Knighting]

Jim,

I have visited the Homelidays website where it is said:-

“In particular, you can access to a highly efficient multi-criteria search engine to find a full description of accommodations that match your criteria.� and

“Have access to the most detailed description... as if you were already there!�

Wearing my hat as a potential renter I used the following search criteria - Country: France - Region / Area: Lot et Garonne - Destination: Villereal. This produced one property, giving me about 50 words of text and a property reference number but, no detail, no pictures and no link to get detailed information, at least not that I can find.

I suspect that a potential renter has to sign-up before he/she can get any more information. Is that true?

Placing an advertisement is:

no more difficult than on any other site…… plus room for your own description and plenty of photos on the ad page itself

Perhaps so but how is it done and what is needed?

It is said on the website:-

“Your detailed, personalized advertisement is published and automatically translated into French, Spanish, German, Italian and Portuguese.�

The free text boxes, however, such as property description, directions for getting there and local attractions, are not translated

There’s a very large discrepancy here, isn’t there?

I am not knocking the website for its results - I wouldn't know whether they are good or bad - but why am I finding it difficult to get information both as a potential member and as a potential renter? Treat me as being completely thick and please give me the answers in words of one syllable.

Alan

[jimadept]

Re: translation, this does look a bit deceptive, but I do recall understanding before I got started that the free text would not be translated. But that might have something to do with the fact that I'm a translator myself and understand the economics involved.

I think if you would repeat your search for somewhere like the Costa Blanca you'd get many more results and therefore a far better picture of the type of page they provide, and also whether you need to sign up to get more info. I'm not sure if I get automatically logged in when I access the site.

Alternatively, click through directly to my ad.

There are lots of property owners who don't upload photos, despite several warnings that properties without photos get 6 times fewer enquiries as properties with them, or some such figure.

Quote:
Perhaps so but how is it done and what is needed?

IIRC it takes about 20 minutes to fill in the forms, tick all the boxes (they have fairly comprehensive lists of property attributes, contents and local activities, some obviously translated - fairly poorly - from French, and as a result it is not always clear what they mean.)

Then you have 3 fields for free text - property description, how to get there and local attractions, and you either write or copy and paste your text into these fields. Alongside each of these are the six flags of the various languages available. Click on the flag and a new empty field appears, and if you have text already in those languages - from your own website for example - you can copy and paste them as before.

When you go back to edit the text, obviously whatever you'd typed in in the various languages is retrieved when you click on the appropriate flags.

And that's about it, AFAIR. Again, there's a 1-month free trial, and in my first month I got 3 bookings through them, so I would say give it a go and you can report back and let me know how good or bad my memory is.

HTH, cheers, Jim

[Alan Knighting]

Jim,

Thanks for all of that.

I deliberately kept my search very narrow so that it returned the minimum number. My concern is not the type or range of properties available - it is the look and feel of the site itself.

I note that your link takes me through to your "full description". If I were a potential renter, how do I get there when I go through the site itself? By registering as a potential renter?

You say it takes about 20 minutes to fill in the forms and that seems fair enough. How do I get to see those forms? By registering as a potential advertiser?

Can I use the property reference number to go directly from the Homelidays home page to a "full description" page?

I am pursuing these points because I am interested in using the site myself but I have no wish to register with Homelidays at all at the moment.

Alan

[Clair]

One thing I don't like about Homelidays is if you change your text or update availability, they take your site offline until they've reviewed the changes. Obviously this is positive vis-a-vis the renter, as it gives an extra line of quality control, but as an owner it can be a pain. The thing to avoid is making any changes at the weekend, because your ad stays offline until Monday, but if you change it during office hours it's usually back up within 2 hours.

As previously mentioned, I use Homelidays.
The listing is not taken ofline when I update availabilty, but it is taken offline after I make any change to the description or any of the pictures. I do avoid changes before a weekend, but I have had my listing back online within the same day as I made changes.
Re registration of renters and translation: the points have been addressed in another thread (viewtopic.php?t=188)
and maybe we're getting off at a tangent here, but if you do a search as a potential renter, you have a choice of searching in any of 7 languages, then you get a shortlist of properties matching your search criteria from which you can select any number of them to view their details (description, photos if any and availability calendar as well as link to owner's website if shown). You only have to register if you want to contact the owner.
As an owner, I had to register (as you have to with any listing I believe) and once that was done, I just clicked boxes matching my property description re bedrooms, kitchen, pool, local facilities... (boxes description is translated in 7 languages) and I added a fre optional personalised description in French and in English. Up to 5 pictures are allowed (uploaded from my PC) within the cost (more if you wan to but for extra €) and I can change them anytime I want (see offline point above).

Wearing my hat as a potential renter I used the following search criteria - Country: France - Region / Area: Lot et Garonne - Destination: Villereal. This produced one property, giving me about 50 words of text and a property reference number but, no detail, no pictures and no link to get detailed information, at least not that I can find.

That happened because you did a narrow search on a town or village and only 1 property happens to be listed for that specific town or village. Pictures and links are down to the owner...
Most people would search on an area and for some facilities, unless they wanted to stay in a specific town/village:
if you did a wider search (France/Lot/5 people) I bet you'll see a llot more properties and mine should hopefully be there!

It is said on the website:-
“Your detailed, personalized advertisement is published and automatically translated into French, Spanish, German, Italian and Portuguese". The free text boxes, however, such as property description, directions for getting there and local attractions, are not translated
There’s a very large discrepancy here, isn’t there?

No discrepancy at all. The use of free text boxes is free and optional: the owner chooses (or not) to use them in whatever languages suits him or her (French and English in my case)

You say it takes about 20 minutes to fill in the forms and that seems fair enough. How do I get to see those forms? By registering as a potential advertiser?

Yes

Can I use the property reference number to go directly from the Homelidays home page to a "full description" page?

Not as far I can see, but I have a "Homelidays" email signature in French, English and Spanish (and any other available languages if I wanted!), which give a direct link to my property listing and includes my property number. For the sake of argument, this is it:
French : homelidays.com/location32394
English : homelidays.com/rental32394
German : homelidays.com/Vermietung32394
Italian : homelidays.com/locazione32394
Spanish : homelidays.com/alquiler32394
Portuguese : homelidays.com/aluger32394

To get back to the point of this thread, I have included a cost of enquiry, because I want to know what ratio of enquiries is translated to bookings for which listing. It also helps me to know how much postage (if any) I have spent on enquiries...I have a spreadsheet where I code each advert (paying and free), and refer each enquiry to its source and I can easily calculate the return for each ad...
I have never had a booking and very few enquiries from free sites .

generally speaking it's a percentages game, so the sites generating the highest number of enquiries will generally also generate the largest number of bookings...

This was not the case for my ad in Chez Nous last year: very costly, many enquiries, few bookings in return.
I achieved the same ratio for a lot less dosh with Homelidays in fewer months and from a much wider range of nationalities.
Yes I am a Homelidays fan, but only because it works for me!

[paolo]

Although I don't use bookings as the primary measure of a site's effectiveness, because I think enquiries are more important, it is not a completely level playing field.

A site like homelidays, where the enquirer has to register, will give you fewer enquiries than it might, because some people won't want to register. But those enquiries you do get are likelier to convert to bookings, because they liked your house well enough to go through the registration process and contact you.