Holidaylets.net and holidaylettings.co.uk?

[la vache!]

Its interesting what Paolo says about the conversion rates from an enquiry to booking being increased by phoning! It is something I just cannot do, unless they specifically ask me to, or phone me in the first place. But then I am not a salesperson by nature, if I get an enquiry, I respond, usually within hours at most during the day, if I then hear nothing else, I leave it, I wouldn't dream of contacting them again.
Does it pay to be more pushy than this?

[alexia s.]

On an annual basis, I am very happy with Holidaylettings.co.uk
I have had no enquiries for a few months (!) but had enough bookings through them earlier for this not to be an issue. I will definitely be renewing.

[paolo]

I've moved the posts about phoning in response to an enquiry to this thread:

viewtopic.php?p=9021

[magsw]

I agree with Red Devil. If I made an enquiry through the web I would not want someone phoning me, especially within minutes of my enquiry. It would make them sound desperate to me. I did telephone someone last year when I was unsure that my e-mail response had got through, and she didn't sound very pleased to hear from me.

I seem to be bucking the trend this year with bookings - have advertised with Owners in France for four years now and this is my best to date. Just as well, as French Connections are doing nothing for me this year, after a good first year of advertising with them last year. Fortunately I seem to get a good conversion rate and I am more than happy with the level of bookings this year. I think the fact that I let a town-centre gite in a medieval town really helps,even though we are about 45 mins. from the Morbihan coast.

[paolo]

This has been emailed to me by Ross Hugo at holidaylets.net. He is on holiday in Turkey and doesn't remember his log-in details. I don't have access to anyone else's password so I can't post it in his name, but here it is:

I have noted with interest the ongoing discussion
about the effectiveness of www.holidaylets.net.

I am always interested by what people think of the
site and always try to act on positive and
constructive criticism. With that in mind, I would
like to address some of the points raised. The first
point however, questioning the integrity of
the way the site is run, I shall ignore.

With regards the rest of the comments, it is fair to
say that everything we do at holidaylets is geared
around generating additional enquiries for the owners
on the site. We therefore spend considerable
resources, both time and money on this activity. Not
only do we advertise in national press, magazines and
google adwords, we also spend a significant amount of
time on enhancing our organic listing in the Google
search engine. The current traffic of in excess of
200,000 visits per month to the site suggests it is
working quite well. Not good enough for me, so we
continue to work harder and improve the situation.

With regards the free trial, I am not absolutely
convinced this is the right thing for us to offer.
One of the most important things about a particular
property doing well is if that property page has been
indexed by google. If it has, then it does much
better in the search engine. However, it often takes
longer than 3 months, the period of the free trial,
for google to spider the page. We find that those
people who stay on for the full year do better than
those on the free trial. This is born out by a
resubscription rate for fully paid up members
significantly higher than that for free trialists. (
greater than twice).

Hopefully this addresses some of the questions raised,
I will respond more fully on my return when I haven,t
got a Turkisk keyboard to content with.

Regards, Ross

[paolo]

I would just pick up on this assertion:

This is born out by a resubscription rate for fully paid up members significantly higher than that for free trialists. (greater than twice).

I wouldn't agree with that conclusion, as people who have paid for a year are by definition more pre-disposed towards the site than free triallists who are presumably mostly just taking advantage of a freebie. I can shamelessly say that I use the free trial for myself and friends' homes because it is there, and it gives me enquiries, but I don't (yet) intend to go on and advertise.

However, I don't question the fact that a year's ad will be more Google-tastic than a 3-month-only page.

[alexia s.]

W'e have advertised our 2 properties on several free sites, one of which gave us fantastic results: for one of the properties we had more rental income this year than from HR for the same property! This was a 3 month free rental period. Each site works differently for different properties; VRBO, e.g., is fantsatic for 1 of our properties but this year gave us zero bookings for the second. Same quality accommodation, situation, pricing, photos, copy, owner response - go figure.

[judyc]

I also spend hours trawling through the search engines looking for new places to advertise and will have a go at any free listing offer. Some are a complete waste of time and some produce results.

In the case of holidaylets.net they generate a number of enquiries and in the last two years I have had several bookings through them. At £140 per year, one booking covers more than the cost of advertising and in my opinion is therefore worth it. Further bookings are not unlikely.

One family who booked through holidaylets.net two years ago has just been back for a repeat visit. One succesful booking can generate several others so must be seen in that context. More than 50% of our business is through either repeat or referral.

Our experience has been that with the wide use of internet we will get many enquiries, the vast majority of whom will not be heard from again. If there is a phone number I will call because I think that in most cases this is more personal and it seems to convert more enquiries to bookings that just replying by e-mail.

Internet generates what I call 'window shoppers' who will click on numerous properties and then can't even remember who you are when you write/ring back. One lady I phoned asked if I was the property in Spain (I am in France, so she didn't even know what country she was heading for!) but we got chatting and she booked.

The days when we advertised solely in Chez Nous and expected a conversion rate of one booking per 3-5 enquries has long gone and we have to expect numerous enquiries to generate a booking. That means I get onto as many sites as possible and look for the best value for my money.

PS When I get unsolicited mail inviting me to advertise on a website at a cost, I will always ask for a free trial period...and just ocasionally it works!

[Linda Freese]

I notice no one has come back about the holidaylettings site which is very similar - dead pretty but zilch response level. I think I paid about £30 for the year which will run out next May.

Hi Memes

I have used Holidaylettings! I also paid a low amount for the first year and although I got very few enquiries in the first year, I converted two to bookings which more than paid for my initial outlay so I renewed for a further 12 months. Again few enquiries but a couple of conversions. I have decided not to renew this year as the enquiries were generally all for weeks that I was easily filling with my holiday rentals and costa vacations adverts.

Linda

[B1athome]

I have decided not to renew this year as the enquiries were generally all for weeks that I was easily filling with my holiday rentals and costa vacations adverts.

I have just added up our total enquiries for this year and so far we have had 124 enquiries with the majority of them coming from the two websites mentioned holidaylets.net and holidaylettings.co.uk - 2 of the holidaylettings converted to bookings, we joined holidaylets rather later in the year when most of the peak weeks were already booked so unable to compare further but overall we have been very pleased with the results from both.

I have to admit most of the enquiries are asking for the peak weeks July/August - hence the dilema now which is to update the calendars or not !! I have always, perhaps wrongly thought it better to have people enquire and then have a knowledge of how many enquiries the sites are generating. What do others think. The other question is how do you attract visitors outside of peak times - is there some magic formula out there.

On a positive note we already have 7 weeks booked for next year (5 weeks are repeat bookings from this year) which is fantastic.

[Clive in Abruzzo]

Hi everyone,
I've only just found this excellent website and forum - thanks Paolo. We only finished our apartment about three months ago and I'm am completely new to this whole business. However I signed up to holidaylettings and shortly after the holidaylets.net trial which is obviously about to expire.

The only other thing I did was to sign up to Google AdWords. Anyway we have had lots of enquiries through all three mediums with the most through holidaylets.net I am very pleased with the conversion rate so far - about 40% I think. I had to turn down lots of people for September and October because my darling wife had given weeks to all her friends Oh well - first year and all that.

Although saying all that this month everything has gone completely dead!

Being new to this game I'm hoping that it's just seasonal and that interest will pick up in January. I had an enquiry for Christmas which I had to turn-down because we are returning to England then.

One thing to note, at least in my opinion, the calendar on holidaylettings is very good and I do use it, on the other hand the user input system for the calendar for holidaylets.net is pants!

Am I right in thinking that interest should next pick up in January? Looking forwasrd to reading the rest of the posts.

Ciao for now!

[alexia s.]

Clive,
Interest should pick up in December. Good luck!

[paolo]

Welcome to the forum, Clive!

It's normal that things are quiet now and will pick up in the winter as people plan their holidays for 2006. Although with the internet the traditional holiday-planning time, which was concentrated around Xmas-January, has been spread out so that you can still get enquiries for August in July.

Inexplicable lulls also occur through the year, but I wouldn't worry - if you are turning people away for October, your fundamental offering must be sound.

[Linda]

Hello All

Just to say that I signed up for the 3 month free trial with holidaylets.net. It generated one booking and a winter let enquiry. I did get a lot of people looking. I have now paid for the year as I think the site is very good and I am willing to give it a year to see how many bookngs we do get in comparison to another site we are also now with.

As an aside, our cottage wasn't ready to let until this summer so we couldn't start advertising until June this year. We sold 4 weeks in August on ebay (catching late bookers I think) and could have sold the first 2 weeks in August twice over. We put it on as a Buy It Now for each week. Has anyone else done this and with what success?

Linda

[Clive in Abruzzo]

Linda,
That's just pure genius. Bless your cotton socks. I have a free week in December and shall see if I can work out the e-bay system. The last time I looked at selling something it seemed as though I had to jump through a lot of hoops. I'll have another look.

Thanks again.