How important is it to be on page 1 of search results?

[Ute42]

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Many of us have complained about the airbnb review system. It is a rankingsystem much similar to the ranking in the top contributor list to the right of the startpage.

I am currently (June 14, 2018) No 2 on that list, do I deserve to be there? I am afraid no. I am there due to two posts I have published in the airbnb-thread „Clarity about the new superhost criteria change“. For one of my posts I got 590 thumbs ups, for the second I got 173 thumbs ups.

I did a research on this superhost thread to find out what the reason is I got so many thumbs ups. Is it the content of my posts or is it something else?

In this thread right now there are 401 answering posts from community members on 27 pages.

What is the average number of thumbs ups based on which page they where published on?

Page:........................................................1..........2..........3..........4..........5..........10

Average thumbs ups per post.........274.......28........19.........6..........4...........6

Can it be, that posts on page 1 have such a highly valuable content and starting with page 2, the content quality goes down the cliff? Certainly not. The answer is, how much thumbs ups You get does not depend on the content quality, it depends on what page You publish. And therefore, the ranking of the contributor list is wrong.

I am right now No 2 on the list, have published 228 posts in the last 3 months and almost all my thumbs ups come from 2 posts. My dear Friend Rebecca from Oregon has published 1165 posts in one year and is No 4. Shouldn't Rebecca be infront of me? No. 1 right now is Brenden from Palm Beach. All he did in his live was asking one question on the June2018 Host Q&A and he asked the question on top of page 1.

What can we learn from this?

1. The number on thumbs ups someone gets does not depend on the contentquality of the post, it depends on the page You have posted on.
   
   

2. If there are multiple pages of any kind, it is always important to be on page 1.

This is a good example how important it is, to be on page 1 of searchresults, there You make it. Page 2 or 3 may be good enough to survive, starting page 4 You are dead. The reality obviously is, everyone reads page one, some people read page 2 and 3 and then it goes down the drain.

Airbnb should not be surprised that hosts fight against bad reviews like a lion, bc their average rating and being a superhost or not, determines on which page they end up in search results.

And the criteria for the guest ratings often reflect nothing else but the insanity of human behaviour. Guest often give bad ratings bc the wheather was bad, their car broke down, host didn't agree on a 8 hrs earlier check in, they ran into an argument with their host or they claimed money back and they didn't get it. All this has nothing to do with hosting quality and it upsets everyone.

So, based on this, airbnb should not be surprised about the headwind they are getting for their new 4.7* / 4.8* requirements.

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This is the thread I took my data from:

https://community.withairbnb.com/t5/Airbnb-Updates/Clarity-about-the-recent-Superhost-criteria-chang...

[Aogán0]

Trying to make it onto page 1 of the listings is definitely a battle - although when we listed our main house last year, all the bookings came when we were on page 2/3 and lower.... I think there might be something in the psychology, and I've done this myself, of finding a place on page 2/3/4 and thinking, oh what a lucky find!

But then maybe I'm just odd, sometimes I even just read the first couple of posts on a long thread, then jump to the last page, to see where the thread has ended up, quite often a very different place...! 🙂

[Pete28]

While Airbnb doesnt share any usability, I assume a usual guest workflow is

- enter city name : overwhelmed by number of results

- use map to locate target area near downtown, transit etc : fewer results

- set price to budget then explore result set

so the reality of search placement requires a hypothetical map area (say downtown Seattle) and budget under $150 (otherwise cheap hotel). Then I look where I am sitting and play with price if needed.

it is odd / interesting that Airbnb does its best to hide the map control, and doesn't allow sort by price....

[Ute42]

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Hi Pete,

I agree on Your assumption on how people search, that's the way I do it.

When I travel I would always like to  stay with one of those traditional hosts that live in or close to the place they rent. So we could have a glas of wine together sometimes. Those are difficult to find though. There are so many listings now on airbnb that You have to read through pages and pages of hotel- and agency listings which are of no interest to me.

[Pete28]

Perhaps a sort by host lives on site. My impression is that a certain % of Airbnb customers try to avoid that so they can party, smoke etc. the hotels are welcome to host them 🙂

[Fred13]

Amen!

[Robin4]

@Ute 

Uté, I don't really care if I feature on that ranking or not!

On the plus side it tells me that a few people are getting some value out of my contributions!

On the negative side, the fact that I am there tells me I am putting in a lot of time when I should be doing something else...getting in the garden, repainting the bedroom.

For me I think what it boils down to, I found this community chat extremely valuable when I started to host, many of the wonderful people here helped me and stopped me from stuffings things up.

@Helga, @Marit Anne, @Gerry And Rashid, @Andrea, @Clare  @Dave & Deb  and others I  would like to mention but currently find their tags!

Things have only turned out so well for me because of this community centre and I guess this is my way of trying to pay it forward...

And if that involves sitting  in those rankings at the head of the thread then, so be it!

The fact that you are there Ute simply says your presence here is valued, and rather than just 'kick the cat around' people are being helped by what you are offering. I am sure others would agree, it's the content, not the volume.

Your analogy between your ranking here and search rankings is valid. If you slip to page 10 on a listing search then might just as well de-list your property for a while and find something else to do.

Ute.....Two posts or a thousand, you have my respect! 

Cheers.....Rob

[Ute42]

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@Robin0

Hi Robin,

 I am sure others would agree, it's the content, not the volume.

Of course it's the content what's important, but the contributor list does not reflect that. Not people posting the best content are elected up there but the ones that post  on page one of a thread. I think it's a brutal finding that if this the same with being on page one of search results, we all have to understand what it means not to be there.

I haven't hostet a single airbnb guest so far, but I have learned a lot from this community center. I do (did) like this CC very much. And  I am very unhappy that it looks as if airbnb is making changes to the worse.

Thanks for Your advise so far.

[Willow3]

So an interesting tidbit... I think.  I have been almost exclusively in the first spot, row one for my town.  Until this week.  What's different?  I had changed my minimum night stay from one night, to three nights.  It dropped me to the third row of page one.  Still premium location, but to guess what will move us up the rankings is a fools errand I fear.  (changed my minimum to 2 nights just today... will be interested to see if I move again.) .  

Just checked - On the second row now... top row from left to right - 1 night, 1 night, 2 nights

then me at new 2 night minimum... seems to me minimum stay is a large factor in search placement.  

[Ute42]

Hi Willow,

interesting finding. I never thought that the number of minimum

nights would factor into the position of search results. Thank You

for the information.

Anyway: One night minimum stay for me: Never.

[Jessica-and-Henry0]

As a guest user I always use the map to find listings in my target area first. I like to get a general "feel" for the accomodation options available and pricing (also usually check budget hotels) before I start looking at specific listings.

So, I did a very broad search of Seoul/Homes/1 guest (map including most of Seoul) - my listing was not among the 17 pages.

Zoomed the map to include half (northen part) of Seoul - still 17 pages and no sign of my listing.

Zoomed specifically to see my neighborhood (about a 3~5km range around me) - I show up on the 1st page.

Since I didn't put in any dates or filters, not sure how that would affect the results. Interesting~~~~

[Huma0]

@Jessica-and-Henry0, I believe you only accept long term bookings? If @Willow0 is right, then that would push you down the search results. If putting a two or three night minimum can lower your position, imagine what putting a month minimum would do?

You might remember that I decided to look for long-term guests for one of my rooms. I opened up the dates, changed the minimum from two nights to 30 nights and waited. Nothing.

So, then I decided I might as well take short-term guests during peak Summer months as those long-term guests might not be looking for a place until September. I opened the bookings up for two night minimum during July and August.

Low and behold, within an hour, I got a short-term booking, but the interesting thing is that, shortly after, I also got a one month booking. It could just be a coincidence, but I think it's possible that the listing was buried down in the search results until I changed it to two nights.

[Jessica-and-Henry0]

@Huma0

So glad to hear you got a long-term guest 🙂 

Technically,  I don't NOT accept short-term guests..... I just happen to have trip length additional requirements set according to the school calendar. This year......

During February 18, 2018 – June 29, 2018, guests stay for minimum 110 nights. 

During June 30, 2018 – July 31, 2018, guests stay for minimum 28 nights. 

During August 25, 2018 – December 26, 2018, guests stay for minimum 110 nights. 

And all other dates in between, I have a 3 night minimum. But I guess my listing description and house rules are tailored and presented in a way that favors longer term guests so much so that I usually don't get a lot of inquiries for short-term stays. If I ended up not getting a long-term guest for a whole semester, I'd probably change the setting to accept short-term guests with a  3 night minimum but till now I've been lucky and my strategy seems to be working. FYI, I just got a booking for the fall semester only a few hours ago - which will bring me to an 84% occupancy for 2018 with only 4 guests. 

I've done a few more searches using different filters and I have found that for anyone specifically looking to stay close to any of the 3 subway stations near me, my listing usually shows up on the first page of about 4~6 pages worth of listings in a 1~2km radius of those 3 subway stations.

But of course....... I do not show up if the super host filter is on  😞 

[Noel63]

My town only has one and a bit pages of listings; we are pretty small. That makes things easier. We're just lucky that a lot of people have to stay here on the way to Uluru.

[Ute42]

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I forgot to mention this:

Again, the topic of this airbnb thread was:

Clarity about the new superhost criteria change

The first post on page 1 says:

I am a host and would like to see the other hosts reviews on a guest, how do i do this?

This post has absolutely nothing to do with the topic in question but it got 52 thumbs ups.

That means, You can write what ever You want, as long as You're No 1 on page 1 people think Your contribution is helpful?

Weird.