It was the underlying message behind Airbnb's marketing campaign Don't Go There . Airbnb segmentation, targeting and positioning . Utilising the strengths of storytelling and curation has been the driving force behind the brands onsite content success. Does your company or brand have a community or do community marketing? So what can we learn from Airbnbs referral program? Do you remember these designs? Like you go out to an unknown place, where food options are limited. This ramble has probably given away the fact that Im a huge fan of Airbnb and have used it frequently, but this just goes to show the power of differentiation. So, based on the same principles as inviting guests, what does the recipient receive this time if theyre invited to become a host? Why go through such trouble if not for SEO? Design is in our DNA and it's embedded in everything . You could argue as to why Airbnb havent made referring hosts even more prominent on the page due to the importance of making sure demand doesnt outweigh supply. They also follow best practice by attempting to resolve the complaint out of the public eye and moving it to a personal message Can you please send us a PM with your email address. We did note from our research that the keywords the Neighbourhoods section are appearing in top positions for are all relatively low volume searches, and not high volume opportunities that would assist Airbnb with greater growth. They are so well researched and highly educational. Both Optus and Telstra use it for support and to answer any questions their customers may have Telstras bio states, Were here 247 to provide customer support and answer any Telstra questions you might have. But as a marketer, you never want to discount the impact of SEO and keywords. It is clear that Airbnb is becoming one of the most popular online-booking.. There is an inconsistent breadcrumb structure implemented on the Airbnb website, which could also be impacting the websites organic performance. Airbnb is new to the Corporate Responsibility scene but is quickly distinguishing itself as an emerging player the CSR community. Airbnb has removed the search bar in the header and there arent any buttons or links to guide users to take another step. Some of the effective pricing strategies are: Maximum full rate strategy: Businesses follow competitors' pricing strategies. The mobile experience doesnt include email due to the obvious reason that the UX just wont be the same as desktop. The strange thing is, Im on the Australian domain so you would assume they at least have it personalised there. Innovation is at the core of how we operate at Webprofits, always looking for a smarter + better way of helping our clients drive record-breaking growth through digital marketing. Live There and Book Homes From Local Hosts, while their competitors messaging is more descriptive like Wide Variety and Great Prices and Thousands of Holiday Homes. Users are engaged and enticed to keep following up friends who havent joined the platform. About us. How does it help them acquire new users & retain existing travellers? Oooof, this was loooong and pure gold Very nice effort! From this email Airbnb are trying to get me back to their website. Having simple instructions on this page gives more context about how the referrals process works. Ive chosen to analyse Airbnb property pages as I feel these are the closest thing they have to products. Every home is verified through in-person quality inspection to ensure quality and design. Every day, Hosts offer unique stays and experiences that make it possible for guests to connect with . I think this section really goes to show their commitment to providing the user with relevant information as much as possible. Some people appreciate the luxury of staying in a hotel, knowing youll receive a professional service, including a properly maintained room. Were ready when you are, Generate awareness of becoming a host / prospecting, Helping with the consideration phase of the host journey through remarketing, Theres a fairly high number of Australians on Facebook, with around, It doesnt rely on search intent, which means its more scalable. The home owner would then spread the word about this new booking platform. Instagram Stories offer brands a great opportunity to get creative, but the trick is keeping your audience engaged enough to keep clicking through, rather than swiping to the next Story in their feed. SEO: How do Airbnb ensure they appear in relevant search results to drive organic traffic to the site? They are known for creating great online user experiences, but they also excel in experiential and live-event marketing. Precisely speaking, the success of Airbnb leans on the variety of suppliers ranging from small rooms to A-listed buildings ( Airbnb, n.d.). As Jacqui mentioned in her search analysis, wed recommend taking a much more aggressive content marketing strategy to drive organic search traffic for branded and non-branded keywords to really ramp up search growth. Book a real home in [Location] for less than a hotel room . Its now that we see the other options of sharing referral via different channels such as messenger and email. My pet peeve here is that Im still not signed in and have no browsing history for Airbnb, so how are these locations recommended for me? One thing I did notice in my research is that many of the listings they share in posts do not feature people (see Feed example above) theres lots of empty chairs, empty beds, and generally untouched settings. Privacy Policy. Airbnb could double down on this strategy to lower the barrier to entry and improve retention with a stronger content-driven approach to educate and raise awareness on becoming a host and building your Airbnb business. Storytelling is the bedrock of a quality content marketing strategy, and Airbnb has understood this from the beginning. I get directed to a page where a modal instantly pops-up. But I wont just look at the personalised elements, Ill also share insights on their messaging, imagery, layout, and more. And most of all, they provide a large amount of content for relevant destinations on their side, giving them a huge organic backlink strategy. How cool is that? But this expansion has also put the spotlight on content and localisation, both for guests and also for hosts using the platform. If you havent built a community before nor done community marketing, youre not alone. The idea then evolved into a website where others could do the same, and travellers could get a cheaper option than a hotel. For example, if I start a conversation and ask a question, it will come up with the links of similar questions which have been asked before. In 2018, a Sensis social media report found that 19% of Australian social media users accessed Twitter this was compared to the 91% who had used Facebook. We know customer-advocacy is a big part of their success with referrals, but how does Airbnb nurture a community that can get users to not only invite friends to the platform via sharing referral links, but also help existing users and in turn new users via a dedicated community forum? Check!). Airbnb partnered with local photographers to really capture the essence of the area from a native perspective, inspire viewers, and create a connection to the locale. But why are they so important? Business Strategy Consultant, Design Thinker. Of note, this has been changing with the introduction of the new Experiences and Restaurants sections of the Airbnb website. Ive seen many websites where the image looks wonderful but affects the functionality of the website, and I think its criminal. Each of the pages do have 2 consistent UX features like the homepage, including: Highlighting top contributors serves to show the wider community that numerous community members will help with answering any questions or queries that come their way. Building upon this trust, Airbnb is one of the rare sharing economy companies that . This company is known for making changes to how it runs to benefit the business in the future. Usually, this strategy is followed when businesses are in a more demanding state. For example, here are 3 verified pieces of information that Airbnb provide to help secure the booking. As we predicted, it has now become a core pillar of Airbnb's strategy. Many of the ads they use feature video, which is positive, but they dont feature real Australians talking about their experiences with being an Airbnb host. By commoditizing trust between property owners and short-term renters, Airbnb has become one of the most recognized companies in the hospitality industry. Curated like a blog feed of suburbs within a chosen city, Neighbourhoods is a more visual version of an old fashioned street directory. They also seem to have this automated, as they share many of the exact same photos and captions on Twitter posts as they do on Facebook. As a digital platform, Airbnb rely almost entirely on their website to make bookings and sales. Targeting the consideration phase of the customer journey, the stories leave readers daydreaming about how their life could be changed from their next Airbnb. Lets pick up where we left off, So, about [Paris], when are we booking? In addition, even if the content was promoted to an audience in order to drive traffic from a social or email platform (which I presume is the primary source of traffic currently), the lack of CRO elements on the pages means theres no further action encouraged to be taken, such as moving users from consideration to a sale. The layout and the functionality of the site is what makes it so easy to use. We designed Airbnb to have 100 homes in a city. If you like to travel, you've certainly heard of or used Airbnb's . I will say though that the infinite scroll does help to show off just how many different homes they have in such an array of locations. I love this case study and the rest of your case studies too. The focused differentiation strategy aims to concentrate efforts on the narrow and specific market segment. 2. Outside of their sponsored Page posts and Dynamic Ads, the rest of Airbnbs ads strategy currently focuses on one thing signing up hosts. Each time a listing was made in their area on Craigslist, they would email the home owner and ask if they would like to list on Airbnb. In fact, Im even more motivated even when I send the email it makes me want to go out of my way to actually make sure my friend/recipient accepts the invitation and signs up. Interestingly, direct links to the homes featured on Facebook arent included, instead a link to all properties in that location is provided. Slide through the gallery to get some impressions of AirBnB's working culture (the image shows AirbnB's SF headquarter). For Lectures -mmshah8@gmail.com https://www.linkedin.com/in/shahmm. Note: While this will not help them rank for the [location] accommodation] keywords that have been the focus to date, it has assisted with growing the size of the Airbnb AU website and backlink profile. For example, the search term canberra accommodation has an average 40,500 searches per month, with the rankings as: Airbnb seems to be cognisant of their low organic positioning for generic [location] accommodation terms, and so acts to ensure they are in position 1 of ad placements for high volume targets. I can see its about me and what I can earn if I become a host. Among . The campaign was subsequently rolled out in 80 countries, and managed to generate an incredible global impact. Brand strategy examples. Great job. browse homes. Airbnb fees and room pricing. Differentiation strategy examples: Coca Cola. They use previous bookings and keyword searches to curate their Facebook content. They created an upsell opportunity by providing a higher tier property that had been manually vetted to ensure the highest possible quality. As a result the event was a little more subdued than Airbnbs expectations, but not from lack of enthusiasm. At this stage, as I havent put in any dates, Airbnb only need a couple of details to make sure its available, so thats all they ask for. While reducing factors like prices & safety, Airbnb created a ubiquitous availability of home-like experiences. Now, it makes sense why some threads seem large with the amount of comments. In crafting his company strategy, Lennie is particularly focused on how to distinguish his start-up from similar companies such as AirBnB. Competitors such as Booking.com and Wotif.com only have global sites which, while giving them larger reach and increased ranking capabilities based on backlink and content strategies, limits their ability to tailor their content to an Australian audience. Airbnbs timeline is varied in terms of post content and types. For example, when they share an image separately instead of using the Link Preview option, I see this as counterproductive to the objective at hand, which is to drive people to a website, and Link Previews have been created by Facebook to provide Page owners with the easiest, most conversion-focused way of doing this. Its amazing what theyve been able to achieve over the years since they first introduced referrals into their platform in 2011. The Growth Team at Airbnb have 3 main Philosophies when it comes to growth: Its no secret in the growth marketing world that one of Airbnbs key ingredients to product growth success was referrals. The research had transformed Airbnb's website and differentiated it from competitors. Each city has its own forum where the hosts can discuss the local issues or services specific to them. As someone who has admired Airbnb for many years, its been interesting to take an in-depth look into what theyre doing and evaluate it. Getting users to advocate and tell the story of Airbnb was particularly crucial in getting it right in the early stages of Airbnb, as mentioned earlier. Im now shown a ranked list of recommendations with comments from Airbnb hosts and a Google Map with pins corresponding to each place. 92% of consumers trust recommendations from friends, only 33% trust online ads (Nielsen). They allow them to not only keep their brand front of mind but the exact location/s someone has been browsing for their next trip what better way to drive a sale? Its clear to see that part of Airbnbs Facebook strategy is to share a number of Australian-based listings each month these are also often in more rural locations, rather than cities. Hosts also pay a service fee of around 3%, which Airbnb . Sell Documents . This makes sense given how closely it aligns to their service offering, but they dont rest on their laurels. One thing that is noticeable however is how low the engagement on this section is compared to the previous one. And not every Airbnb experience Ive heard about is an overwhelmingly positive one. From a practicality point of view, I also like that it allows the navigation bar at the top to be read very clearly. Ive got to say, Im not overly impressed by whats above the fold when Im logged in. It keeps it consistent for the user to know where key pages are. Lets start with the layout of the referral page. Though in my experience, nobody has picked a location based solely on the accommodation. Im not 100% sure. Airbnb Model can also pursue differentiation strategy based on the industry forces description in casename case study. Methods of analysis include Strategic Position & Action Evaluation (SPACE) Matrix, and Grand Strategy Selection Matrix as well as . Created for the curious ties in quite well with the main header above the fold, people looking for a unique experience. This marketing case study on Airbnb focuses on explaining the 4Ps of the marketing mix, the marketing strategy it undertakes to market itself and its digital presence. In the process, Airbnb not only helped give artists an opportunity to create beautiful works of art, but give travelers a vibrant and accurate sense of their destinations. directed towards developing technology or strategies to differentiate Airbnb from its competitors. The content gives instant value that there is content for hosts wanting extra support through toolkits or webinars which help with their hosting experience. For some people, the host can be an important aspect of the trip. Heavy investment in marketing, advertisement and celebrity . I think they would benefit from providing that information on the home page itself. Even the button with the CTA of explore homes is just a bit dull. Guidelines and tips. For example, Wotif.com currently has approx. Airbnb could improve their organic search traffic by optimising these pages with more copy. Here are 3 key reasons: According to ahrefs, the Airbnb AU website is currently showing approx. As to how people are arriving at this section of the site, this is likely through organic search, email traffic, and social promotion. People go onto Airbnb to look for cheap properties and luxurious properties, in busy cities and remote countrysides. Download Free PDF. In the next section, Suggested for You, this is content that specifically addresses the needs of hosts. Using the Phlanx Instagram Engagement calculator, I can see that from their 4.1 million followers, Airbnb get around 26.7k Likes per post, 283 comments, and have an overall average engagement rate of 0.65%. When it comes to landing pages, they mostly feature local imagery to help provide a more relevant result, and it would seem they are testing short form pages against longer ones to see which converts better. 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