Moriya Rockman, Founder and CMO, Smiling House Luxury

There is a reason why the vacation rental industry landscape has been a hotbed of acquisition activity all of 2021. As soon as they were able to, people began to travel, and with unmatched enthusiasm, trying to make up for the lost time. Consequently, demand exploded, with booking pace up 700% for some vacation rental managers. What followed was an urgent need for vacation rental managers to step up to meet this demand.

A lot of big players saw themselves consolidating their property management businesses to meet this demand. Perhaps the most talked-about example of this was Vacasa’s acquisition of over 160 property management companies, including Wyndham Turnkey Vacation Rentals, which added 6,000 properties to its gargantuan portfolio.

This demand, however, is not only for the biggest players. Independent vacation rental managers stand to profit from it just the same. Their core challenge is the same, too, although perhaps at a different scale. They must find a way to meet spiking demand head-on by growing their inventory quickly, and efficiently, to keep both revenues and profitability high.

We turned to 8 industry professionals to help answer this question and received responses that make it clear that while the idea of vacation rental inventory growth might seem simple enough, it is crucial to do it with consideration of your unique business to make it work profitably for you. Some highlights from the responses:

Cultivate focus on your niche and create opportunities and tools to attract players within it.

The vacation rental industry based on platforms and technology is existing for more than a decade. But the Luxury segment within the STR space is one of the last to join.

Smiling House Luxury took the mission to gather both homeowners and property managers focusing on hosting luxury homes around the globe. In order to extend our portfolio, we took the following actions :

– Focus: the leisure market is symbolised by expensive homes, longer stays, but with limited seasons (summer and/or winter). Usually around 10 to 20 weeks of rentals a year. These specific criteria led us to approach actively to owners and managers based on regions with different seasonality. Our message to them was that High Net Worth Individuals looking for a luxury ski-in Chalet in winter are the same ones looking for a private beach villa in summer. As Smiling House is a niche channel for luxury, guests can focus on their desired destination and hosts can be sure they are targeting the right crowd. So focusing on luxury and ultra-luxury offers only, is a key to extend the portfolio and create demand rather than marketing.

– Technology: Lately Smiling House Luxury became an official channel. It’s now possible for every property manager to connect to us through their PMS and BookingPal within a click. Since the whole platform is based on requests to book, property managers know that they can accept or decline any booking request. This fact together with the concierge attitude of the platform makes sure that every request is handled at the highest level. This way of working together hand in hand with property managers gives them the trustand comfort they are seeking. Technology is definitely key for extending your portfolio and let other professionals/homeowners join your activity.

– Recognising trends in the market: At Smiling House, we are very busy with new trends that affect the way people travel and consume. The latest trends of workation, staycation, together with the fact that a lot of our clients are independent business owners that traveled throughout the pandemic, made us change and adapt to these trends. This has to do with local marketing for the staycation needs, switching rooms into offices with high-speed internet for workation needs, and adding amenities needed for longer stays.

– Additional distribution channels: One of the last year’s conclusions of many Property Managers was not to put their eggs in one basket. What we recognised was the need for professionals from the travel industry to reach out and find a solution for their clientele. And on the other hand, many guests reached out to get information about vacation homes that are for sale. We didn’t waste time and created 2 platforms to answer these needs. The first one is a B2B platform for travel designers, concierge companies, and others to offer luxury and ultra-luxury homes in our collection. The second one is exposing vacation rental homes for sale within our collection to private investors and family offices. By creating these platforms, we made it possible for more homeowners and property managers to share their properties with us, even if the target is to sell them. Also, working with the B2B professionals is giving property managers and homeowners the possibility to get a high budget booking (70.000.- USD average) and to be exposed to a whole new demand outside of the OTA space.

Question for Moriya Rockman, Chief of Marketing, Smiling House Luxury Global

Question for Our Hotel Marketing Expert Panel
Keeping well connected with our guests has been particularly challenging during the pandemic. What tips can you share for maintaining guest interest and keeping engagement high?

“At Smiling House, we’re maintaining the guest connection and communication in various ways. Our Instagram page is regularly updated, letting guests know which markets are open and to whom. Also, we give them examples of current hospitality trends, such as remote working from a vacation home, or multi-family gatherings in a safe and clean environment at a larger home.

We also give solutions. For example, getaway suggestions where people feel close to nature and far removed from the city and the stress of COVID-19. Top tips for self-excursions to explore nature at its best are always popular too.

Additionally, we’ve opened a dedicated Facebook page for special COVID-19 promotions, encouraging locals to travel by car in their own country. This concept has proven to be very successful throughout 2020 and to date.

Besides our social media and website initiatives, we’re keeping in contact with previous guests via newsletters and Whatsapp messaging. We introduce them to the ease of restrictions, special offers, and new destinations as we grew our inventory to 29 countries and over 90 destinations worldwide.”

Moriya Rockman
Chief of Marketing, Smiling House Luxury Global

Source: https://www.revfine.com/maintaining-guest-interest-and-engagement-during-the-pandemic/

Talk with Ryan Luke, discussed on how Moriya Rockman and his husband Ira Rockman has created an unbelievable short term rental business spanning over 28 countries and more than 3,000 properties.

We are super happy to have been nominated for the Best Leisure Property Management Company at the Shortyz 2021 Awards. We are inviting you to vote for us, as this will not be possible without you support!

Every vote counts. Thanks so much for your support.
Click the button to vote and we are on the 21st question!

From the Source: https://www.rentalscaleup.com/the-ultimate-list-of-luxury-vacation-rental-websites/

Originating in Gstaad, Smiling House now offers an exclusive collection of luxury chalets, villas, and apartments in 28 countries such as France, Italy, Portugal, Sri Lanka, and Bali, New Zealand, the Maldives, Tel Aviv, and more.

Serving diverse group sizes, Smiling House also facilitates luxury experiences such as cycling treks, shopping in high-end boutiques, horseback trails, sailing and flying, etc., in tandem with vacation rentals.

Top destinations on Smiling House: Switzerland, Greece, Italy, Mexico, the Caribbean, Thailand, South Africa.

We are thrilled to have won the pioneer award at Shortyz 2020 Awards hosted by International Hospitality Media. The awards ceremony which took place in London is the first and only for the short-term rental industry.

Thanks to all of you for voting and supporting. We feel honored for this great recognition. That was a great event with 12.000 votes – AMAZING!

Thanks for your words Simon Lehmann We promise to keep on “not taking no for an answer” and to do more for this great industry.

Congratulations to all of the other winners At the 12 category: Mark Simpson Check-in Scan Ben Smith Minut Buster Bark PriceLabs Travlet James Harrabin Nestor Fran Milsom Check-in-London Gavin P. Tanielle Pereira Direct Booker Nino Dubretic Casal dei Fichi Lavanda Guy Westlake Zeevou Na’ím Anís Paymán MadeComfy Quirin Schwaighofer Alexander Limpert.

Last February 25, 2020 – Smiling House’s Founder and Chief of Marketing Moriya Rockman participated at More Booking Direct Conference. She discussed an interesting and timely subject matter about finding new partners within the travel industry.

You may find more interesting discussions and webinars at BookDirect shows thru this page: https://bookdirect.show/

Finally a webinar focusing on the luxury vacation rental segment. Smiling House is proud of its CMO and founder Moriya Rockman one of the panelist of the session “The Future of Luxury Rentals” as part of #AJLProfitabilityHub In this discussion, she gave a unique insight from her wide experience and as well an interesting forecast for what to expect for the coming summer, connection to real estate and more.

Vacation Rentals Business Development During Corona Times by Moriya Rockman and Pierre Becerril.

More than 200 Travel Professionals from all over the world joined our session last Apr 26, 2020 at the Worlds’ First Online Travel Conference – OTC LIVE 2020.

Together with Pierre Becerril from Transparent, we led the session focusing on the Vacation Rental Industry. We have discussed the global impact of the COVID-19 Crisis on the Vacation Rental Industry with recent data on OTA demand, market rates and occupancy by market. We tackled at an analysis, country by country, and also leisure, luxury and getaway destinations vs. urban markets.

Bonus: We have discussed on how to adjust to the new traveling trends and to get more bookings.