By renting a home on Airbnb for their vacation or business trips, travellers are looking for authenticity and local expertise. To help meet these expectations the rental platform has just added a new feature to its website and App: Guides. This gives hosts the opportunity to help tourists discover their neighbourhood’s hidden treasures.

 

Host Guides

The "Guide" option, available in the left column on Manage Listings, allows hosts to further delve into the hospitality aspect by enriching their guest’s stay with local recommendations. Hosts can even integrate their favourite spots in the rental’s vicinity to their public listing. They can even categorize those spots into different themes such as: Food Scene, Drinks & Nightlife, Sightseeing, Parks and Nature, Arts and Culture, Shopping, Essentials, Entertainment and Activities, Getting Around and more. The various locations are marked on a neighbourhood map with the complete address and descriptions provided by the host. This selection can be modified at any time, or even deleted. A great option is to print this list and add it to your house handbook, making it easy to reference when travellers want to get out and about.

 

City Guides

Airbnb has also published compilation guides for certain cities which detail all the things that travellers can do during their stay including host recommendations. To determine which locations will be listed in a City Guide, Airbnb uses "algorithms that study and determine the most interesting content, based on their usefulness, originality and representation of the place. We then display the recommendations which appear to provide the most relevant information for travellers" says the site. Only three host recommendations are selected at any given time and they change regularly but always include a link to the Guide as well as the rental listing. Some cities already have a compiled Guide and others will soon benefit from the same. All that remains is for enough relevant guides to be created by hosts. It’s your turn to play guide!

 

Smartphone screen with Airbnb Guidebooks for neighborhood

 

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