Julian Sage:                         00:00                     In this episode we’re going to be talking about welcome baskets and things your guests will expect when they stay at your Airbnb short term rental. So state soon. Vacation rental machine helps. So suggest like you learn how to start, grow and scale your short term rental business. This show is all about creating systems that help you automate your business, giving you more time and money freedom. If you’re ready to start living the vacation rental life, then subscribe to this podcast today. Come and join us on our Facebook group, the host nation where we’ll be talking about starting automating and scaling a short term rental business. Now onto the show. Hey, welcome back host nation to another episode of vacation rental machine. In this episode we are talking all about pre listing materials now. So we have moved on from the previous step and now we are talking more about a step number five, which is all about your pre listing materials. So we’ve already built up our team. Now we are working on our units. So welcome baskets is something that, yes. It’s kind of like icing on the cake for a lot of guests and a really can help you with your guests experience. And we’re also going to be talking about things that guests are expecting in vacation rental units now. So when they are checking in, there’s going to be certain items that they expect. So, so John, what are some of the things that your guests can expect when they are arriving to your unit?

Jon Bell:                                01:16                     Very first thing is after they pop that door open one we leave our blinds a little bit open just to let light in, in case they come in a little late. So if they come in when it’s daytime, right at check-in, they’re coming into a very bright and clean space. We want to make sure that we’re not trying to hide anything. And most times once you open that door and like, you know, there’s just the scent of not too much of like air freshener or anything, but there’s a pleasant scent that when you open the door, it’s just there, it’s clean, it’s like home. That’s really what I want my guests to feel when they come. So we try to duplicate that over and over again. Some of the other things that we do have four, I guess sometimes not all the time.

Jon Bell:                                02:04                     Do we actually have a welcome basket? So I am probably going to go against the grain of a lot of people here. We just, because I’m not telling you that you need a welcome basket. I haven’t received a bad review because I didn’t give one. I also haven’t received the good review just because I gave one. So to me it’s, it’s not really a big thing. Now when I do give a welcome basket, it normally is because I’m making up for something. So for instance, if something were to happen with the guests, maybe they asked for something and I didn’t provide it or something went wrong and I’ll have my assistant go drop off. We call it a sorry bag, but it’s really a welcome basket. It’s got a couple of bottles of wine, some trail mix and some gummies. We dropped that off.

Jon Bell:                                02:54                     Even if we have to go run and bring something that maybe wasn’t in the unit, maybe like a, when we used to run blankets to units we would include this in there. It’s like, Hey, I’m sorry for whatever, but I hope something in here should make it better. If it’s not the wine, maybe like gummies. And if you don’t like gummies and trail mix should work. I don’t know if you’ve got kids. They love the gummies and the all the adults always loved the why. So it still is off to a good start. Now the time that I really do show out for welcome baskets is when I know my guests are having a special occasion. So when somebody says, Hey, I got a 50 year anniversary coming and we’re coming to your place, we’re going to spend it in DC. And I’m like, okay, great.

Jon Bell:                                03:38                     You know what? I’m going to go get a bottle of champagne. It’s going to be right there and I’m probably going to put some orange juice in refrigerator and just leave a little note saying happy anniversary. And it’s very simple. It doesn’t cost me that much or anything. But then on their special occasion, they should remember that I did something above and beyond. Now, not everybody expects that. Not everybody tells me that they have a special occasion until sometimes it, after they’re in there. I don’t necessarily run stuff to people all the time, but I might, it just depends on our customer interaction. Like, you know, if they, if they’re pretty interactive, they give me good vibes or whatever, I might go above and beyond just to kind of go for awhile. I also, when I was doing welcome baskets for everyone, I didn’t have them in the room. My welcome baskets used to always be delivered the next day. If they only had a one night reservation, then I didn’t, they didn’t get anything. But if they stayed a couple nights, they would get a welcome gift the next day. And it was just one of those things. It’d be sitting by the door, wasn’t something to like walk into the room. You’d be like, Oh my God, somebody was in the room. But it was just one of those things had the logo on it and it was just a Brown bag.

Julian Sage:                         04:58                     So John, what you’re saying is that not everybody has to have a welcome basket. It’s not like the expected thing and when everybody shows up that they, they have to have a welcome basket, otherwise you’re going to get a bad review.

Jon Bell:                                05:10                     That’s exactly what I’m saying. Like it was one of those things I used to kinda like pull my hair out, not having a welcome basket in the unit when two people arrived, but the people that arrived and it wasn’t there, they still didn’t complain. Like I said, I mean it was no change in their experience. I mean, I’m still providing a great space, still providing a great place to work or sleep or you know, just to come back to. It’s clean, it’s just ready. It’s, you know, hotels don’t even really give you a welcome gift unless you’re staying at a super nice place where they just, you know, do a turn down service or something like that. So any other time you go, it’s a paid thing, right. You pull this water out, you could, you could have this free water. There’s their part, but if you drink this Fiji, it’s going to cost you $6. You know, we could get to a point like that, but we don’t. So having a welcome basket is still, I think, optional at this point.

Julian Sage:                         06:08                     Now, now, now, aside from welcome baskets though, what are some of the things that guests expect from a unit? I know a lot of different hosts, they might include like a Keurig or they might include, you know, maybe like some snacks or something. Are there things that you include in your units that really help the guests experience? Yes,

Jon Bell:                                06:27                     Part of my brand is very good coffee, so you will not see a Keurig in my units. That might be a problem for somebody that’s coming and they want to just bring a bunch of coffee that they like because nine times out of 10, we don’t use those pods. But what they can experience is still a very pleasurable coffee experience with the equipment that we include. It’s somewhat exclusive. Sometimes it’s a little hard to get pods if they want to go grab them on their own. But it also offers a, another revenue stream for me. When somebody says, Hey, I need new pods, I don’t know where to get them. And I quickly say, Hey, I can drop offs, a few more pilots for you F for this fee. And they pay the fee, they get their coffee and they’re happy.

Jon Bell:                                07:17                     Recently I just had a guest tell me that the coffee experience that she’s had at one of our new places was so great that she wants to buy us a month worth of coffee. And I was like, wow. Not a month. You must be playing. Right. All right. So we’ll see how much she actually ships. But I’m thinking that’s great. There’s no other compliment other than that for me, one of the other things that’s really important is a good blow dryer, like for your hair. So you, you gotta have it. Nah, I don’t use one obviously. But it’s one of those things that when you have a bad one, somebody will say something about it and you can’t always go for the really, really super cheap cheap ones just because you need one and it just says it works.

Jon Bell:                                08:08                     It really doesn’t work. You need a good shower experience in my opinion. So I want to make sure if the water pressure is weak, I’m going to get something to help make that a good shower experience. Beds, beds are really important, but beds are very hard, right? You either like it from your, like it soft sometimes in the middle really isn’t in the middle for people. But I would say per your taste, it should be somewhat on the softer side of things. It shouldn’t just be like a brick. You can’t sleep on a brick comfortably. Some people can overseas, but you’ll get good reviews about beds. You’ll get bad reviews about beds. But that stuff should be good. Linens, linens, linens, linen should always be white. Right? People want to feel like it’s clean. They can pull it back, they can see if it’s clean, they can see stuff.

Jon Bell:                                09:07                     White linens. I always use white linens on my main beds, but in some cases on my pullout beds or like my air mattress, I might leave a set of printed whatever. I think that’s okay. But that main bed is always going to be white. Everything’s white. I don’t do too many of the designs on the dubé or anything like that. So it’s just gotta be clean. I don’t, I can’t stress clean. I mean, that’s, that’s, that’s got to be the biggest expectation for somebody that’s coming to stay is like, Hey, I don’t care if it really is not exactly like the photos. I just want it to be clean. I mean, sometimes when you have to stay at a hotel somewhere where you maybe a small town, do you know, you just, you kinda cross your fingers and you’re like, Oh, this is Joanne’s in, I just hope it’s clean.

Jon Bell:                                10:04                     Cleanliness is definitely the top expectation. Last thing I’d say is some type of water upon arrival, whether that’s like a Brenna filter or something like that. Sometimes you walk in and you’re a little parched. You just want to grab something and get it. You don’t want to have to filter it out or do anything. So I have water that John, what about things like Netflix? Is it expected to have Netflix or cable or sports and all these extra channels and all of your units? Because that can start to get expensive. It can get very, very, very expensive. For me, I got a, a rule of thumb. If my average nightly price is above hree hundred dollars, I need cable. Any unit that’s less than that on the average nightly rent, I don’t need cable, but I do need at least a Hulu and Netflix. So I do both.

Jon Bell:                                10:57                     I have all the other apps and stuff available for them. If they have a subscription to it or if they get it from their cable provider, they could log in and log out at their well. The only time that this becomes somewhat of an issue is football cause certain people want certain games. There was ne time I did go ahead and buy like a, a subscription to NFL ticket just to allow a guest to watch football games. But also this guest was staying with me for orty five days. So it just made financial sense for me. I don’t carry that subscription outside of that, but that is the base as far as what you need. You can’t not have anything. You gotta have something somebody wants to turn on the TV and at least get something. So what about just like local channels? Is that something that your guests should, I do think that people want local channels. So we’ll include a over the air antenna on at least ne of the TVs in the place. Maybe like in the living room that way in case somebody wants to turn on the news and see something locally, they can see that there. Cause I mean they are traveling to your area. They might want to be up to date on what’s exactly going on in this region. So that’s always a good idea.

Julian Sage:                         12:20                     The living space is expected to have Netflix and Hulu available for those more expensive units. It’s more expected to have like cable and extra services in the kitchen you’re providing for you personally with your brand, it’s more like, you know, high end coffee and a no Keurig stuff, but it is expected to have some type of coffee or something available for your guests. I’m now moving into the bathroom. Some, I know that a lot of guests they might want to include like toothbrushes and toothpaste and deodorant and everything that like maybe a little store has. What are your thoughts on providing like all these extra bathroom amenities?

Jon Bell:                                12:57                     Absolutely not. I mean, think about it. You’re going to have to throw this stuff away every time somebody checks out. So if you’re buying me wo of pace and wo fresh and stuff, maybe I don’t open it, but technically nobody really knows. If I did anything with it, I might’ve did something weird. I mean, you got to think these people are in your space. We don’t know technically who they are or what they’re into. They can be doing weird things and you just got it out for the next guest, you know? Yeah, don’t do that. It’s just going to be more of a waste of money. It is a nice touch. Granted maybe you could have some lockup somewhere and somebody says, by chance if you, if you have this that would help you can give them access to it from there. But this is also is kinda on the same lines as having a phone charger inside the unit. I mean, you know, I’ve had a guest asked me like, Hey, you should have this here. And I’m like, I think it would walk every time. Like somebody would take it home and I’d have to charge somebody for it. So it’s really up to you. If you think it’s going to add to the value of your place, then sure you can do it. But I don’t personally recommend it. Definitely not deodorant.

Julian Sage:                         14:16                     And if you’re building a vacation rental machine, something that is scalable and automated, I could imagine that it’s going to be very challenging if you have to constantly be checking on these items, replacing them. It’s just another thing that your cleaner is going to have to bring with her when she goes to the unit. And let’s say that you always include these things and you’re taking photos of it and you know, showing that that, you know, these are things that you have, which you shouldn’t be doing. You shouldn’t be showing like all these extra stuff that you have besides maybe like your coffee and stuff like that. But if all these extra amenities that might not be available because someone maybe just takes them all and then your guest is expecting that, it really does put a, you know, puts a, the people aren’t expecting what you are showing them. So now that we have moved on from the bathroom in the sleeping rooms, ne of the big things is maybe televisions. Is that expected to have a TV with every single sleeping space?

Jon Bell:                                15:09                     I do not have a TV in every single sleeping space. Technically I look at the space itself. If it’s a small apartment or you’re probably only gonna get ne TV I personally don’t like TVs in the bedroom, but that’s my personal opinion. But yeah, I don’t put TVs in every room. There are some places where I’m like, Hey, this is the kid’s room. I should put a TV in the kid’s room preferably so the kids can be separated from the parents. So I will do that and I have put TVs in every single room that I could in other units. I really just play ear by ear on the actual apartment layout or the house layout and I just decide, Hey, this is a TV that’s needed for here, for the living room. I teeter-totter between ifty five inches and ixty five for the bedrooms. It’s normally like a orty three inch TV or something like that. Nothing too heavy or too big. But living room, TV size is somewhat important.

Julian Sage:                         16:12                     Now people are saying in your place, are you also providing maybe things like games, board games, card games and stuff like that as well?

Jon Bell:                                16:20                     I do provide some type of game, whether it’s a deck of cards, whether it’s tic-tac-toe, whether it’s Jenga or something like that. So there is some type of group or family entertainment available.

Julian Sage:                         16:33                     So John, are your systems going to be the same for how you are furnishing and applying these amenities for all of your units? What about more like expensive luxury units?

Jon Bell:                                16:43                     They’re technically going to be about the same. I mean, like I said, I don’t want my guests to go across my band of apartments and have a different experience. It might be a little a different at the top band because I might have a little bit more of stuff. Like we normally put some type of bar inside of our heart, high end units, which include, you know, bar stuff, mixologist, a sets and the cantors and better wineglasses stuff like that. But for the most part they can go and have the same experience there. Always be a gang. There always be technically the same type of beds. Just the furnishings might be a little bit different in the location, the apartment itself, size, those things you can’t change but the experience is still going to be good.

Julian Sage:                         17:31                     And with your bars, are you providing alcohol for them or is that totally up to the guest to bring?

Jon Bell:                                17:36                     Absolutely not. I prefer my guests don’t drink, don’t party, don’t do anything but pay in sleep.

Julian Sage:                         17:44                     So obviously the things that you’re going to be including in your unit is going to be very contingent on what your brand is. Now with John, John identified that he is going to be providing high end coffee and coffee makers. He’s not including things like Keurigs in his units. For me I include like a lot of teas and my units. I include a tea kettle, a lot of tea variety, like a Chinese blossoming tea is a little special gift for them and so I advertised that in my units and my guest can expect that. Something that you have to take into consideration is that this has got to be, if you are going to be scaling this business, that it’s something that you can repeat, that you can have your cleaners come prepared to all of the units and have them, you know, not that they’re going to this unit and they need to bring this thing and then they go to this unit and then they have to bring this thing because that becomes very stressful and there’s a lot more items and accountability that they need and that you need and you don’t want to add that extra layer of stress.

Julian Sage:                         18:34                     So keeping things as minimal as they are, you know, not having to include that welcome basket every single time, but using the welcome basket as more of like a way to amend a situation. So instead of just having to jump to a last resort, which is like, you know, having to refund them or give them money, you can give them a welcome basket and turn a negative situation into a positive ne. So lots of really good stuff in this episode. And with all that being said, host nation. Until next time, keep on hosting. Hope your host found value in this episode. If you did, please go on over to iTunes and leave us a review is that would greatly support the show if you’d like to connect with Jon, the community, and I then going over to our Facebook group, the host nation, talk to your hosts in the next step. Sowed. Keep on hosting.