400,000 short term rental hosts (STR’s) operating in the UK are typically missing between £3,000 to £9,000* per property each year because they fail to adjust pricing for local event demand.
Lack of visibility of verified industry grade data has, until now, has left STR hosts unprepared to receive and act, in a timely fashion, to optimise the returns of high impact events taking place in their vicinity leaving an approximate 25%** Average Daily Rate (ADR) uplift unrealised.
The AI Blind Spot
Price Waterhouse Cooper’s 2023 Travel & Hospitality Outlook reports live entertainment, conferences and business travel as key urban traffic demand drivers, yet even with the advance of automation and AI platforms, hosts still have a blind spot to the industry grade verified data used widely by the travel and hospitality industry.
To date hosts looking to optimise pricing based on events have relied upon arduous manual scanning of event listings, local media and individual venues for foresight. Yet even when seeking the assistance of AI platforms cannot automatically serve timely, verified event information in one place due to the inability to import, load and process data from external sources into a centralized system or provide a structured Application Programming Interfaces (APIs). This leaves hosts still with manual cumbersome search tasks often missing out when events are freshly announced and opportunities to adjust pricing as booking windows become open.
Dynamic pricing tools optimise and serve information based around historical pacing, pricing and competitor trends often detecting demand acceleration after booking behaviour changes. By that stage, premium STR’s may already be secured leaving the chance to realize increased revenue lost. And The limitations of AI models mean that data sets cannot be generated, sorted and updated on their own.
That is where HostAlert comes in. Recognising, through bitter experience, that pricing uplift opportunities where missed time and again, Liverpool’s number one ranked AirBnB host sought to rectify the problem.
The solution for time-poor STRs
Recognising that STR hosts are frequently time-poor and amidst increasing competition in the mature market seeking ways to maximise the returns on their asset, host Andy Crosby set to create HostAlert. The UK first app would provide industry-grade, verified data, as used by global brands from Dominoes to Uber and the hotel industry to identify future demand surges, automatically providing relevant alerts to users along with seamless integration to booking platforms facilitating pricing adjustments at the optimum time.
“Revenue intelligence is only as strong as the data underneath it”, says HostAlert CEO, Paul O’Donoghue, “so it was essential that HostAlert secured access to the same industry-grade data as used by global players and the hospitality industry yet interpreting it for the needs of the STR host.”
Working the leading provider of event data created through access to over 450 structured, deduplicated, verified and enriched sources, HostAlert delivers real-time data on scheduled events ranging from sports fixtures, conferences, concerts, expos, cultural and community events as well as festivals and expositions. The app also serves data on non-attendance events such as school holidays and public holidays.
Seamlessly enabling STR hosts, to act at the right time to adjust pricing and observe predicted demand surge patterns, HostAlert integrates with platforms such as Airbnb, Vrbo and Booking.com or channel managers such as Hostaway and Guesty. The app provides hosts with a frictionless journey to act ahead of predictable revenue moments in the vicinity of each of their STR sites.
“For the first time HostAlert puts verified event intelligence in the hands of the independent STR host which is already widely used in hotel, aviation and ride sharing sectors, enabling greater foresight and the ability to act on increased revenue opportunities”, continues Paul O’Donoghue.
The Revenue Gap
*UK hosts typically miss out on £3,000 and £9,000 in event based revenue per year
- AirDNA and Statista STR industry data state the UK average annual daily rate as £140-170 with properties operating at 55-65% occupancy levels to deliver between £30,000 and £45,000 per year
- Pricing platforms report revenue uplifts between 10% and 40% (PriceLabs) and between 10% and 30% (Beyond Pricing) based on seasonality, demand forecasting, event demand and lead-time optimisation
- Industry revenue management practioners estimate event-driven demand accounts for 1/3 to ½ of this uplift, giving the conservative uplift that events are between 5% and 15% of the total increase
- A property with £30,000 annual revenue could miss between £2,100 (7%) and £6,000 (20%) and a £45,000 revenue property could miss between £3,150 (7%) and £9,000 (20%)
** AirDNA, 2023 reports that ADR uplift during event periods average approximately 25%, with high-impact events exceeding that figure significantly.
Reports state STR revenue increases for large scale events as between 30 and 300% with reports of Taylor Swift’s Era’s tour driving up bookings + 77% in Edinburgh and +85% in Liverpool, according to AirBnB.