If done right, a real estate business can grow immensely. Yes, the pandemic has shown real estate its true rock bottom – similar to every other industry and business. However, while some real estate owners are considering leaving the industry altogether, others are understanding the importance of smart work – including every stage of running a real estate business. This brings us to one of the most overlooked yet important aspects of a real estate renting business: branding.
Adding to the same, tiny steps towards branding your rental business will not only give returns in terms of better relationships with customers, but will also turn out to be profitable when you move towards investing in your property by aligning it with the vacation rental giant, Airbnb.
Related: How (And Why) to Get Started in Real Estate
With Airbnb hosting rentals in more than 220 countries and 100,000 cities, it is turning into one of the fastest-growing investment strategies for real estate owners. As the platform is extensively enjoyed by users as a result of being encouraged through combining affordability and quality, it is a given that the approach is here to stay. On top of that, there are certain economical benefits for customers as well as real estate owners.
Role of Branding in Effective Rental Strategies
Along with growth, comes competition. As buying a property is one of the high-returning investment options, many people are giving a shot at it. Therefore, in order to succeed and stand apart from the crowd, it has become important to pick up the untapped market through impactful branding. And for creating impactful branding strategies, the need for creativity walks hand-in-hand with constructive branding.
Branding and Marketing for Users
The end-user, a tenant, is your long-term epicenter to build a pyramid of branding around the same.
- One of the ways to attract more customers is by telling them that you are one of them – and you have an entire community around them. This could be done by being authentic – okay, that is a bit generic. Storytelling is a more specific approach for real estate owners to connect with their potential customers. You could tell them about your struggle concerning renting a place, highlight the importance of quality in your life, or anything else in between. Though, authenticity is the key. From the stories of your employees to your fireplace, a real story, and transparency can go a long way in supporting your credibility.
- With the extent of digitization in today’s world, no activity can be entirely effective without leveraging social media. Now, most of you must have created your social media calendars with a plan to consider, but to take it up a notch, I’d suggest showcasing your rental property through videography. As you will enter the domain, you will discover various ways concerning video-based branding; from short animated videos to customer reviews, feel free to explore them all and select the ones that work best. Regardless of the type of video or social media content, it is important to ensure your branding material does any or all of the following: adds value, provides crucial information to the user, shares a story that resonates with them.
Read more: Video Marketing: The Only Guide You’ll Ever Need
Branding for Real Estate Agents
As the technology has seeped in quite well, not many of us turn to a real estate agent to help us with the rental services. While it is important to adopt newer approaches to reach the customers, ruling out the traditional ones is simply unaffordable. Thus, instead of being confused between the modern, technological approaches and traditional, yet tested approaches, let’s combine the two.
As a real estate owner aspiring to invite better clients, you could provide your agent with the tools that work specifically for your brand. For perspective, you could provide the agents with a virtual tour, which they can share with the end-users, and it becomes a win-win situation for all the parties involved.
Getting Started with Airbnb
Airbnb is beyond just a name of a company where you look for ‘Airbnb near me’ and book a place. It is a verb, “She Airbnb-ed her apartment,” an adjective, “That hotel promises an Airbnb experience.” It goes without saying, you will be reaping the sweet benefits in no time. As an average Airbnb host in most U.S. cities, you could earn more than $20,000 annually – the number speaks for itself.
Why List Your Property on Airbnb
With rental properties being one of the least volatile and high-return investments, people not merely rent but purchase properties specifically for listing them on Airbnb.
Preferred Due to Convenience
This is – for the most part – a result of vacation rentals becoming a more winsome and less expensive option in contrast to long-term houses on rent or extravaganza hotels for individuals searching for convenience. Considering this fact, and giving your best while relying on the same, can help you pull in a high number of guests, and make them come back. Notwithstanding, if you are planning to purchase, you should get an Airbnb investment property in a decent real estate market that can ensure a high Airbnb inhabitants rate.
Flexible for Everyone
Yes, Airbnb is flexible for the users. However, the business model made sure it is the same for the property owners as well. By listing your property on Airbnb, you get the opportunity to choose the price of the investment properties as you see fit.
For instance, if there is an appeal during the night, you can boost benefits by increasing the rental rates. You can likewise bring down the rental rate during the offseason to draw in more visitors and maintain a strategic distance from vacant rooms. Thus, in contrast to customary rentals, transforming your property into an Airbnb investment property permits you to control your month-to-month rental payment. With sufficient effort put into analyzing the housing market near your property, you can ensure your Airbnb property does not lead to any loss.
Now that we have tapped on the Airbnb experience and benefits, let us see what you as a real estate owner can do to make your property more appealing to individuals.
How to Start Listing Your Property on Airbnb
While listing your property on Airbnb may seem easy and quick, to begin with, a lot of overlooked aspects follow later if left unchecked. However, before we dive deep into that checklist, let us clear out the basics and understand the steps involved in listing the property on Airbnb.
- As you log in, you will be asked to provide property details such as type of property, the number of guests allowed, area you will be renting (example: entire place or one room), and the city.
- For the second step, please keep photos and descriptions of the property handy. Also, ensure 35 characters given for the title are as high-quality and engaging as the property photos.
- Moving ahead, you will receive a booking ID, options to update calendars for the people willing to rent, and the pricing of the same.
Voila, your listing is published.
Read more: How to Create an Outstanding Airbnb Listing
While the Airbnb Logo is quite a measure to attract millions of individuals. It is always better to take matters into your own hands to ensure you stand apart from the crowd. Therefore, I have hand-picked some tested measures for helping real estate owners in creating an effective Airbnb rental strategy that enhances the Airbnb experience for the users.
Get Help
Hosting an Airbnb experience requires you to take care of a lot of elements. While the Airbnb logo could be one of them, it will not matter if you have a broken chair or a splinter-filled bookshelf. And as much as you would want to deny, you cannot take care of all these factors all by yourself.
With regards to Airbnb rentals, make certain to take advantage of your ability to delegate. If you are not good at selecting furniture, rethink that project, and hand it over to a professional interior designer. Or if you cannot fix a flawed tap, hire a professional plumber. As an investor, time is the most important resource. So when you assign, you’re simply making it effortless and beneficial for yourself and your property.
Approach to Help
Of course, the house, its decorations, its photos, and everything else in between plays an essential role for people renting the place. However, a hidden aspect – even for your users – is how the overall Airbnb experience made them feel. Therefore, offering extra services is always going to revert, as the customers take the experience with them. Most of the time an Airbnb is rented by tourists or business professionals, in both cases, convenience matters. You could help them by offering contacts, places to visit, or a cabinet of medicines. You will be surprised to see how these little things unfold.
All in all, investing in an Airbnb rental business is promising in the long-run – if you know how to reach the potential users and make sure they benefit from it. I hope this article brought you a step closer to achieving the same.
Besides having grown up in the design Industry, Christiaan has advised some of the world’s largest companies on their branding & packaging designs. Has been the resident judge for design awards, and has spoken at numerous global design & marketing events. Christiaan founded the London office of the award-winning Cartils agency, and has founded the DesignBro.com platform.
