EPISODE 8: How to Say NO to Your Guests, Dealing with Influencers, and the Checkout List From HELL

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4 Ways to Say NO to Guests

1. Say yes, but with a different offering

   • For example, if a guest books 5 nights and asks for a discount, and your discount kicks in after 7 days, you can say, “Yes, we would love to offer a length of stay discount of 10% that will automatically be applied to all reservations of 7 nights or longer.” If you can offer something positive without saying no first, try this method!

2. Buy yourself some time.

   • If a guests asks for a late checkout, let them know you’ll check with your cleaner and see if you can accommodate a late checkout. It takes the pressure and blame off of you and shows the guest you really tried to make things work. Confession: sometimes I don’t even ask my cleaner. If I know that we absolutely cannot make it work for that day, I still let the guest know I’ll ask to show some effort, wait 30 minutes and then inform them that we unfortunately cannot accommodate a late checkout.

3. Defer back to Airbnb

   • For example, if a guest cancels within the timeframe where they can’t get a full refund, I just let the guest know to call Airbnb and try to dispute for a full refund. Make sure you know Airbnb’s policies before having your guests call Airbnb.

4. Flat out say no

   • Sometimes strictly saying no is better than giving an explanation. I’ve found that when I try to explain the reasoning behind my no, guests find a way to poke holes in my argument and try and negotiate. If a guest asks to waive our cleaning fee, I just flat out say, “our cleaning fee is non-negotiable.”

Airbnb Quick Tip:

Having these 4 items will qualify you as a safe listing on Airbnb.

1. Smoke alarm

2. Carbon monoxide alarm

3. Fire extinguisher

4. First aid kit

Free Smoke/CO Alarm | First aid kit

Question of the Week: How do I feel about influencers staying at my Airbnb in exchange for exposure?

Let’s say someone reaches out to you stating they are influencers with X number of followers asking to stay for free in exchange for exposure. First, you want to ensure they’re legit. Ask them to send you their brand kit, media kit, or press kit (sometimes goes by different names, but if they are really an influencer, they will know what this is). This brand kit will tell you various things about their following and engagement statistics, and most importantly, who their audience is. Asking for this media kit will automatically weed out illegitimate influencers. Their audience is the most important for us, as Airbnb hosts, because if there’s an influencer with millions of followers and their content is mainly pranks or TikTok dances, their audience demographic is probably made up of high schoolers or primarily Gen Z. This is not the demographic of guests that will book my place. Now, if there was a local food blogger, from Orange County with 20,000 followers, I would much rather give a free stay to them. If they stayed and wrote a blog about the best restaurants in Big Bear, then that is more likely to convert to reservations.

Once you’ve confirmed they are legitimate, you want to be clear in writing what their deliverables are. They must film two TikToks/Reels, you must approve of content before publishing, etc.

Lastly, do not have the influencer stay on a weekend, busy day or holiday.

Am I the Airbnb-hole?

This week we react to a host staying in another Airbnb that had a checkout list from HELL.