How to Increase Your Inquiries to Rentals Conversion Rate
Tips converting VRBO.com inquiries into bookings.
Make sure you are answering all rental inquiries quickly. Responding quickly increases your chances of getting the booking. Whenever possible, we recommend that you give the potential renter a phone call. That extra 'personal touch' can really make a difference.
Use your listing headline to advertise any last minute discounts, or specials. That way, a prospective renter can see if while scrolling down the page of listings for your city. It might pique their interest enough to click into your listing, where you can give more details of your special.
Add the FREE Rentors Calendar & Guest book Each one has it's own icon on the index page ... the icon helps to "draw the eye" to your listings. In addition, the guest book can really help instill confidence in your prospective guest ... especially after you have a few positive comment built up. You can view an example of the guest book at listing #176: http://www.vrbo.com/176. Click on "View comments from previous guests". You can create your Rentors.org calendar through your VRBO.com member administration area. Click to edit your listing, then click the Rentors.org Tab near the top in the yellow area.
Take a moment and compare your rates with other listings of similar accommodations to make sure that they are competitive with others in the same area. Since listings with more photos are displayed higher on our Index page, you may want to consider adding some more photos to your listings. You can view information on how we sort at
You many want to consider opening up a merchant account so that you can accept credit card payments from your renters. You can find information at http://vrbo.com/global/cc.htm. Our experience is that listings that accept credit card payments typically get more rentals that listings that do not.
If you are new to renting your vacation property 'by owner' or would just like to learn more to maximize your profits, well-known author and speaker Christine Karpinski has an excellent book available called 'How to Rent By Owner'. Topics include: organizing all rentals, paperwork, money and maintenance, advertising for quick results, identifying and avoiding "bad apple" renters, maintaining your property from a distance, and much more. To read more about this book and the accompanying workbook, please visit:
http://vrbo.com/global/howtorentbo.htm.
For more VRBO tips and help, visit the new VRBO Help Manual for Members. To access the online manual, login and then click the "Help" link the upper right-hand corner.
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