Local collaborations for holiday rental hosts

May 2024

Would you like to reduce expenses when advertising your holiday home? Are you looking for free resources to promote your property? Then, this post will interest you. Here, we’ll discuss local collaborations, their advantages, and how they can help you promote your holiday rental. Additionally, these collaborations will allow you to save a good amount of money on advertising.

Collaborating with local agents will serve you not only to attract new guests but also to increase the visibility of your property. This cooperation is a tool that few hosts use but has great potential. And, if you also have your home listed on a holiday rental portal, the chances of getting guests will multiply.

How to establish collaborations with local businesses?

There’s no single way, really. If a company offers you a free product (welcome chocolates, bedding…) to increase its advertising, you can easily reciprocate the exchange. Promote that company on your blog or display an advertising poster from that company in your own holiday home.

But who to collaborate with for holiday rentals? Mainly, with service sector companies. For example, a restaurant that collaborates with you, how could it benefit? You would recommend that restaurant to your guests for dining, and the restaurant would promote your property as holiday accommodation. A fair and balanced exchange where both parties benefit.

And where to find companies to collaborate with in holiday rentals? To get these holiday rental collaborations, you’ll have to move and approach companies yourself. Talk to their managers and present your idea; they’re sure to be interested. All companies like free advertising. Both of you will save money on marketing that you can well use for other things.

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Which companies might be interested in an agreement with a host?

Practically all of them, whether it’s a restaurant, a bakery, or a travel agency. They can recommend your property to travellers, and you can refer them to their respective businesses. Everyone goes to restaurants and wants to have fun during their holidays. So, we advise you to focus on the most profitable and secure businesses.

Once you’ve built a stable local network, you can always expand it to other nearby businesses that are less related but still interesting. For example, a pharmacy or an optician. The more collaborators you have, the more potential benefits you’ll get.

An important point: only collaborate with reputable companies that offer good products and services. Otherwise, you risk losing the trust of your guests. It’s fine to collaborate with local holiday rental businesses, but always with your tenants in mind. It’s the only way to create a solid and reliable image of yourself.

Can I collaborate with a local tourist office?

Not only can you, but you should. Local tourist offices want to offer travellers as many services as possible, including holiday rentals. So, it’s the perfect place to make your property visible to the public. You can even leave cards in case anyone wants to take them.

Additionally, you can get significant benefits from these tourist offices. Among other things, links from your business to tourism websites for free. This will also help you position yourself better on famous search engines. In some cases, local tourist offices may ask for a monthly or annual commission, but this is not common.

You can also contact information points in your city to propose collaboration. They’re not tourist offices per se, but they’re support points for travellers. A few brochures or cards from a holiday rental property will allow them to recommend your accommodation to travellers.

Turn your property into a space for activities

Seminars and workshops that freelancers or small businesses want to hold are an excellent alternative to earning economic benefits and advertising your holiday home. Renting out the holiday flat for other activities can be very profitable. And you can even focus on it during low booking periods.

Advantages of using your property for workshops:

• You increase the productivity of your property
• You work with a new market niche that will bring you benefits
• You attract a new profile of clients
• Customers often have good experiences, as their goal is the activity itself
• The possibility that some attendees recommend the property to their friends

You should also consider that each seminar or workshop may consist of professionals from different job fields. And the possibility of using your home for these activities would be very lucrative for you. Holiday rentals and businesses can forge very good partnerships with benefits for everyone.

But what do you need in these cases? What should your holiday rental property have to be interesting?

• Suitable furniture for the activity
• Sufficient furniture for all attendees (chairs, tables…)
• Excellent Internet connection
• Appropriate lighting is essential
• Spaces to work and others to relax

Regarding the Internet connection, at Holidu, we recommend conducting speed tests. Not all seminars need it; for example, meditation ones; but it will be essential for certain groups. If it’s slow, you should improve it, as this could lead to negative feedback and the group may not want to return. Collaboration in holiday rentals is an exchange in which we should always get involved.

How to adapt your property for different activities?

In addition to offering your guests a holiday home that meets their expectations, you can enhance their experience with nice details. Surprise them when they leave with a pleasant memory, especially so they want to come back. Or you can also give them a welcome gift.

Regarding how to collaborate with holiday rental companies, you should be clear that renting out your holiday home for activities and workshops doesn’t necessarily require major transformations. The most basic and common for almost all of them are:

• Lighting
• Minimalist spaces
• Internet connection
• Furniture in good condition
• Relatively spacious common areas
• Chairs and tables suitable for the activity

And what about minimalist spaces? It means that homes shouldn’t be overly furnished. When hosting a group of people, they’ll need space to move freely. It’s important that the furniture is appropriate and sufficient but without excess. The same applies to decoration.

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