Adriaan de Jager
It may sound obvious, but having your own independent website for your vacation rental is a very important and effective way to receive bookings. In this article, we tell you why, and how easy and affordable it is to create a website with our simple CMS.
To run a successful rental company, bookings are vital. Maybe you want to receive as many bookings as possible, or you’re aiming at a certain group of clients. In both cases, or in any case, online presence is a vital ingredient to do so. To be found online and to receive bookings, there are several routes that can be taken. You can list your holiday home or B&B on well-known OTAs (online travel agencies), or you can create your own website. Listing your property on an OTA enjoys a large reach, but also brings some major disadvantages. For example, commissions are huge: for each booking you can pay up to 25% commission. And that’s not all: Airbnb and Booking.com are known for increasing their influence on the rates you charge, the positive reviews you have to score, and the way you are listed on their pages. Having your own website in combination with a flexible booking system is a very interesting alternative. Here’s why.
It’s very important that the booking process of your vacation rental takes you as little time as possible. When it comes to online bookings, there are a number of things to consider, such as keeping your availability up to date, managing online payments, and communicating with your customers. By using your own website, you can add a professional booking system, with which you can automate and professionalize the entire booking process as much as possible. The more you automate the booking process, the less time you spend on it.
As we have already indicated, the commissions that the major platforms charge per booking cannot be ignored and can have a huge impact on your results. You can choose to increase your prices, but your customers will ultimately suffer from this, and this not the way to go. And the more bookings you receive, the more commission you will spend in total. By creating a website with a website builder like ours, your costs are limited and clear, and with no commissions to be paid, you will earn more on each booking!
Through the powerful combination of your own website and a flexible booking system, you create your own platform for direct bookings, and this brings the advantages described above. However, it has another major advantage: you create your own independent booking channel, and with that you can determine your own rules. You lease out your vacation rental the way you want and for the price you want, and no other party can influence this. When creating your own website, one thing is very important: make sure your website is easily found. After all, you have to compete with major platforms on well-known search engines. Besides existing website builders, we also offer our own. With our CMS, we follow SEO best practices, and our websites are optimized for speed and accessibility. We also provide simple tools for you to refine the appearance of your pages on search engines yourself.
As we have already explained, it’s vital to have your own website if you want to receive direct bookings for your vacation home. With our CMS, you can create the perfect website for your holiday home. It’s really easy to match your website's style with your brand. Upload a logo and choose your preferred colors and fonts, all from a single interface. No coding or web developer is required. And what makes our CMS unique is our flexible booking system that is fully integrated, which makes it the ideal combination to display your vacation home online.
Display your condo on your own website and start receiving direct bookings. When you rent out your condo to visitors from all over the world, it’s necessary to translate your content. Our CMS supports translation in over 20 languages out of the box. Start with a single language and translate your content into multiple languages of your choice.
Showcase your Bed and Breakfast online with your own website in a professional way. We have some interesting tools that you can use. Extend default filters with custom options that suit your units. Filter by the number of rooms, amenities, or province to enhance user experience. And easily add diverse content to enhance your website: local tips, blogs, and past reviews. It’s all possible with our user-friendly page builder.
Maybe you think creating your own website is a costly affair. First, it’s important to determine your budget. You can choose to invest a lot and create a custom website through a professional agency. But you can ask yourself the question if it’s really necessary to invest a lot of money in a custom website. We think it’s not. With our lightweight CMS, you do have all the tools you need: a website and booking system combined from only US$23 per month. And most importantly, our tool is 100% commission-free!
Interested to see what Bookingmood can offer you? You can try our CMS and booking system for free and see how easy it is to create your own professional, independent website. Sign up here for the free trial.
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Why it’s important to create a website for your vacation rentalHow you can save time with your vacation rental websiteHow you can save costs with your own vacation rental websiteHow your own vacation rental website can create direct bookingsCMS to create a website for your vacation homeCMS to create a website for your condoCMS to create a website for your Bed and BreakfastHow much does it cost to create a website for your vacation rental?Try our CMS and booking system for freeShare this article