The role of myRent in communication with guests
Interview with the tourist agency Rovinj Advisor
Rovinj Advisor is the leading agency in Rovinj and the surrounding area, which has advanced its rich tourist tradition and hospitality skills with the modern solutions it provides myRent.
Read below what theirs told us about their many years of experience with our services founder and director, Vedran Ilakovac.
How does myRent help you communicate with your guests?
myRent it helps us a lot. Especially since we really use the option intensively email templates ("template") which is useful for us because we can create a template in 4 different languages, and the mail is then forwarded to the guest in the language he uses. That's really cool for us.
It is also very good for us that myRent works in cooperation with the communication tool "Twilio". In this way, we also send SMS messages very simply. And the option is especially useful for us email triggers ("timer") with which it is very easy to set when and to whom an individual mail is sent, with the fact that multiple recipients can be specified.
Can you give us some examples of situations where you use the myRent e-mail "template" and "timers"?
We use them very often. Here are just a few examples:
At the time of booking, we send the guest an email confirming that we have received their reservation. This makes life especially easier for guests who book accommodation through the site Booking.com. It happens relatively often that the guest only looks at the photos that are on the cover, and not the photos of the apartment he booked. In the email that the guest receives at the time of booking, we send a link to our page where you can see all the details of exactly the apartment that he booked. In that "timer” we know how to write some particularity of the apartment in question that the guest may have overlooked at the time of booking. A concrete example would be when the guest expects a view of the sea, even though he did not book an apartment with that view. Thus, with the initial email, we eliminate any problem at the very start.
myRent is full of details, which may seem complex at first, but we think it's great. This is why we can very easily send all the necessary information to the guests through the "timer". For example, 3 days before the guest's arrival, we send the owner of the accommodation "voucher" (booking confirmation) with all the details he needs to welcome the guest. There is information about whether the guest has paid something in advance and how much needs to be paid. What is very good is that it is accurate worked out net price. In this way, the owner has a clear overview of the amount due to him for a specific reservation.
We also send the guest the detailed information he needs 3 days before his arrival. Using myRent, we send a folder with instructions on the easiest way to get to the accommodation in question, as well as other tips that could be useful, in the language the guest uses.
The fact that the email contains the owner's contact number and a request for the guest to contact him before arriving makes our work especially easy. In this way, the guest is in direct contact with the owner. Since guests used to call us when they came to Rovinj and had difficulty finding the location of the accommodation, we can say that this is a big improvement and time saving compared to the period before we used myRent.
Furthermore, we have several facilities where we play the role of "host". And here again, through myRent, we set all the additional data and instructions how can a guest enter the apartment by himself and using the link register yourself in the "eVisitor" system. So we don't have to wait for him on the spot, or even at the agency. In this way, the guest is satisfied because he does not have to waste time from his vacation looking for an agency and accommodation, and we are also satisfied because we saved a lot of time and effort again.
How much do you think quality communication affects the overall impression of the guest?
Quality communication is very important. The guest gets the impression of professionalism, quality, accuracy, promptness. And above all trust, which is very important in this business.
Do you find that guests leave reviews more often because you remind them after they leave?
Definitely.
Using the automatic "timer" that is sent to the guest after leaving the accommodation, we ask him to evaluate his stay. When he does, the review automatically appears on the website which then means a lot for SEO sites, but also for future reservations.
And not only that, we also ask the guest to rate us as an agency on Google. Since we started this practice, the number of reviews has multiplied many times over.
Apart from communication with guests, do you use myRent e-mail "template" and "timers" for some internal processes or some other situations?
We use them very often, and here are a few examples: if we have an object where we need to pay an advance payment, for example, 14 days before arrival, we very simply set it up within the myRent system, which sends reminders to our email.
Then, we have a few landlords who can't have it check out and check-in on the same day. Then they ask us to block one day between bookings. And we set it very simply in myRent, and when we receive the reminder, we manually block the day before and the day after the reservation.
We also have a set "timer" that notifies us if the guest we asked to pay an advance within 3 days has not done so. In this way, we do not have to actively monitor whether someone has paid or not, but the system itself informs us.
We also have several renters who do not rely on e-mails or SMS, but we have to call them to inform them about a new reservation. And we enter that very easily in myRent, which then sends us a notification when we receive a reservation for such a renter.
Do you think that in addition to this method of communication, guests can be offered some additional service, such as excursions or car rental?
Of course. The possibilities are limitless. It is possible to put anything in the mentioned emails. At the moment, we send links to external transfer services to our guests via a "timer", if they request it.
We are currently dealing with the idea of how to include excursions, tennis school, a recommendation for a restaurant and the like.
The importance of a website
for the business of travel agencies
In addition to successful and professional communication with the guest, it is important to have a functional and attractive website.
Web page I present a showcase of your business. It is often the first impression that potential guests make and the initial contact between you and potential guests, as well as the place where the travel agency sells its services (without additional commission).
A quality website of an agency should contain basic and important information about the agency as well as the accommodation units, excursions or transfers that it offers. In addition to the above, it is good to have a simple and attractive booking engine so that the agency can easily sell its services over the web and thus increase its profit.
An excellent example of such a website is tourist agency Rovinj Advisor.
What our users say about us:
Do you want to improve communication with future guests?
Try myRent for free!