In short-term rentals, the past few years have seen a rise in competition. This means you have hundreds and thousands of properties available for rental, and effective marketing is what will keep you ahead of the curve. One strategy that is presently in vogue is employing influencer marketing. In this blog, we shall talk about how to use influencers for better rental visibility, attract more guests, along with higher revenue and better short term rental management.
What is Influencer Marketing?
In simple words, influencer marketing is a business collaboration with popular personalities having a good fan following on various social media platforms. It is believed that they can influence their fans’ opinions and encourage them to change, making them partners indispensable for your marketing efforts.
How Does Influencer Marketing Work?
- Trust and Authenticity
An influencer tends to get in very personal contact with a follower, so the word sounds much more authentic.
- Reach on Target Audience
They allow you to reach an influencer’s following that represents your target audience.
- Visual Power
Travel and hospitality influencers are great at creating powerful visual content that appeals to your rental.
How to Identify the Right Influencers
Before you start influencer marketing, choose which one would be best for your short term rental management. Here is how you do it:
- Know Your Target Audience
Determine who are the ideal guests. Know what age they are, their interests, how they travel, and what budget they have.
- Find Influencers in Social Media Sites
Look for influencers on Instagram, TikTok or YouTube based on the popularity of each site to your niche audience. You may also check the influencers who specialize in travel, lifestyle, and even home decoration sites.
- Never Judge from the Number of Followers
Notice engagement-like count, comment count, and even shares. They usually are those typical influencers who have a responsive audience.
- Content Check-Up
Check if their style will suit your brand or not. Their content has to be in tune with the aesthetic and feel of your rental property and its values.
- Authentic Audience Influencer Check
Make sure he or she has a great rapport with his audience and is not posting sponsored content that does not feel authentic to them.
Attractive Offer
After having narrowed down some influencer prospects, the time has come to propose an offer in the best form possible for better short term rental management.
- Personalized Outreach
Ask why you love their work and how a collaboration will be mutually beneficial, personalized message.
- Free Stays or Discounts
There should be a person testing your rental for social media posts or a blog review so that the stay of such a person will have been studded with unique experiences that they can share with their audience.
- Commission Incentive
You should start an affiliate program wherein you will pay the influencer for each and every booking generated by putting up a referral link.
- Creative Freedom
Give influencers the creative freedom to create your kind of authentic content since one well-crafted piece may outperform one awkward, overly scripted promotion.
Content Creation Strategies
Once you have collaborated with them, you also need to focus on good content creation that puts your rental property in its best light:
- Visual Storytelling
Instruct the influencers to capture the exclusive atmosphere of your place, or in other words, ambience, décor, and location. Quality images and videos will have a luring appeal for guests.
- Promote Local Experience
Influencers can also promote your rental and a couple of attractions, restaurants, and activities within the neighborhood. These infuse extra value to the content created for your property and make it more attractive.
- Emotional Captions
Ask the influencer to level up and share his experiences about his stay. This is how they create an emotional bond with their audience.
- Customer Content
Take it one step ahead by asking your guests to share their experience and tag your property, thereby creating a community-like feeling and further promoting your rental.
Amplifying Shared Content
But now you have a mammoth task: to multiply its reach for better output and short term rental management.
- Share on Your Channels
Share the content of the influencer on all your social media, on your website, and in your newsletters. This is marketing for the influencer and gives you new, created content.
- Relate to the People
Reply to the comments and messages of the followers who want to buy the house. Engagements may raise the viewable impressions.
- Hashtags and Tags
The social media post has all the relevant hashtags, as well as tagging the influencer, so it has a lot of chance of getting discovered. It will appeal to potential visitors looking for inspiration about travelling.
- Paid Social Media Ads Promotions
Share the paid social media ad with a bigger audience if the organic post is performing well.
Measuring Success
How effective is your influencer marketing? Well, that can be quantified by looking at these KPIs:
- Engagement Metrics
Like, comment, share, and save on posts of an influencer.
- Website Traffic
Track for spikes during and after the campaign by using Google Analytics, etc.
- Booking Conversions
Keep track of the number of bookings generated out of the campaign because of the influencer. A unique link or code will help in the measurement of the conversion.
- Social Media Growth
Track how fast you are growing on your own social media and engagement rates. A successful campaign might help extend the reach of your property.
Long-Term Relationships
The greatest potential of influencer marketing is in the long term. The following are some techniques for long-term relationships with an influencer:
- Engage with Their Content
Like, comment, and share their posts to patronize work. This creates goodwill and deepens ties.
- Invite Them Back
In case the collaboration was effective, invite the influencer again to stay, especially when updating your property or introducing new experiences.
- Expand Network
Introduce them to other influencers, partners, or businesses that support your business since all these contacts help you and the influencer.
Conclusion
A good choice of influencers, design to attract them, or attractive content will increase the chances of increasing visibility and appeal at your short-term rental property with better short term rental management. Influencer collaborations may well lead to higher bookings and better experiences for your guests, and, ultimately, an exploding rental business.