So What is Airbnb Pro? Here are the Benefits and Tools for Hosts

As an Airbnb SuperHost with a handful of properties, I began to wonder if there were any solutions to help me manage all of my listings more efficiently and with less headache.

It didn’t take me long to find Airbnb Professional Hosting, which includes a suite of tools designed to offer hosts a more seamless way to manage listings and scale business.

So what is Airbnb Pro?

Airbnb Pro is a collection of tools and resources designed for hosts to gain efficiency and insights — all from a single, visually appealing dashboard. Whether you’re renting out a single room in your home on the weekends or the head of a property management company with 25 active listings, the Pro Tools allow you to easily update pricing/availability, assign tasks to team members, review comprehensive property data, and market your property/properties.

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If you’re anything like me you want to know if it’s going to be worth the time it will take you to learn these tools or if you’re better off sticking with the everyday Airbnb host dashboard you already know and (maybe don’t) love. I decided to dig in and explore exactly what was available in this professional toolbox.

Who can access Airbnb Professional Hosting Tools?

While the tools were originally designed for hosts with multiple property listings, Airbnb has since opened access to all hosts. So whether you’re renting a single room in your home or have 20 active listings around the country, everyone has access. It’s easy to opt-in to the Pro Tools, simply go into your host account settings and click “use professional tools.”

Learning How to Use Airbnb Pro Tools

While the collection of tools and a new dashboard may seem daunting, I took comfort discovering that Airbnb provides a variety of learning resources specific to the Professional Tools.

Community Center: Professional Hosting Tools Board

This Airbnb Product Team recently launched a Pro-Tools dedicated board in the Community Center where hosts can expect to learn about the ongoing product updates and improvements. The Product Team posts monthly “Changelog” updates to inform hosts of any significant changes to Pro Tools and seek direct feedback about the suite of tools and dashboard experience.

Finding the Professional Hosting Tools Board

To find the board, simply visit the ‘All Discussions Rooms’ area of the Community Center, from either the Homepage or by hovering over your name in the top right corner. This is the very first product-specific board the team has ever launched, so they truly are looking for host feedback to make it a better experience.

“New to Professional Hosting Tools?” Discussion Thread

If you haven’t spent much time in the Community Center, it’s a fantastic resource for hosts to share experiences, ask questions, and even engage directly with Airbnb team members. This particular thread is quite new, but the original poster, Stephanie (an admin of the discussion board) is engaged and eager to make this a positive experience for hosts.

Additional Pro Tools Resources

In addition to the community center discussion groups, there are several articles in the Resource Center that you may find quite helpful as you begin exploring the Professional Hosting Tools. A quick search for “Professional Hosting Tools” in the resource center allowed me to learn “How to update multiple listings at once” and explore how the “New Host inbox and task tools simplify hospitality for teams.”

Getting to Know the Suite of Airbnb Pro Tools

Okay, so the real question you’re probably asking is what tools and resources are included in Pro Tools? Here I’ll group the tools into three categories — Awareness, Efficiency, and Insights — based on what I see being their respective main benefit.

Gain Awareness with a Pro Marketing Page

Now you can showcase your listing or multiple listings on a dedicated landing page where potential guests can browse your property/properties and easily search by date and number of guests. One of the best features of the marketing page is the social media share buttons. This allows you to easily share and promote your listing on Facebook, Twitter, as well as via email and Facebook Messenger.

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Gain Efficiency with Multi-Calendar, Rule Sets, Standard Fees, Occupancy Tax, Teams, and Tasks

Multi-Calendar: The Multi-Calendar is really helpful for hosts with more than one listing. Here you can view all listing calendars at a single glance with the ability to easily update pricing and availability across your entire listing portfolio at one time.

Rule Sets: Establishing rule sets can be particularly helpful if you manage more than one listing and want to apply special discounts for multiple night stays, increase nightly rates during a certain time of year, etc. For example, you can create a rule that increases your nightly rate by 10% for dates during the summer months and apply that to each of your listings with ease.

Standard Fees: Seamlessly add and collect additional standard fees from your guests at the time of booking, including resort fees, linen fees, management fees, and community fees.

Occupancy Tax: If you provided Airbnb with a business ID and relevant tourist tax registration information, you may be eligible to collect taxes directly from guests. This Pro Tool allows you to set the type of tax and the way you want to collect it — fee per guest, fee per night, percentage per booking, etc.

Teams: Any host can establish a team to include other individuals who manage a listing with you. Once your team members are added, you can delegate tasks and responsibilities, including listing management, guest management, finances, and team management.

Tasks: If you are a team account owner or a member of a hosting team, you are able to edit and assign tasks. You and your team can create specific jobs for other team members or service members to complete by a certain day and time. This is an excellent way to operationalize cleaning before a guest stay, maintenance requests, guest greetings, and more.

Gain Insights With the Performance Dashboard

Host Performance Dashboard: Now it’s easier than ever to get an instant read on your guests’ experience and make improvements to ensure your host performance is improving over time. Sometimes the smallest changes can make the biggest difference in your ratings.

On the Performance Dashboard you can view and track your performance across five main metrics: conversion, occupancy & rates, quality, earnings, and hosting progress. It’s up to you how much or how little you dig into these metrics, but I find them incredibly helpful in measuring the level of service I’m providing each individual guest but also the experience I’m providing as a whole.

I think this dashboard could be an interesting thing to keep an eye on as you start using the Pro Tools. Perhaps the more efficiency you gain with some of the tools and awareness you build
with your pro marketing page will result in higher performance scores.

To activate the Airbnb Professional Tools features, click HERE.

Alternative, 3rd Party Tools Worth Exploring

You may have heard about tools outside of the Airbnb platform like iGMS, Logify, and Guesty (check out our head-to-head comparisons: iGMS Vs Lodgify and iGMS Vs. Guesty) that allow hosts to streamline and automate many of the day-to-day tasks required for managing short term rentals.

These channel management tools offer similar benefits to the Airbnb Pro Tools, and then some. For example, iGMS (Intelligent Guest Management Software) is an excellent option with countless benefits:

Integrate easily with Airbnb, VRBO/Homeaway, and Booking.com
Sync calendars between booking websites (promote higher occupancy rates while avoiding an accidental double-booking)
Publish Airbnb listings directly from iGMS
Pay per night booked rather than a monthly fee
Comprehensive team management options

Not Sure if You’re Ready for Pro-Tools or iGMS?

Perhaps you’re a smaller host trying to get the ball rolling by hiring your first support staff. Navigating how to share calendars with staff and cleaners can be a nightmare, but it really doesn’t have to be. Check out Rental Recon’s top ways to share your calendar HERE!

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If you want to give iGMS a try, take advantage of our 50% off Promo Code. Click Here>>