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It’s easy to be overwhelmed by the depth of short term rental (STR) data.
There’s always more you can do to understand what’s going on in your local market but using data well doesn’t mean you have to be glued to it all day, every day.
With in-depth knowledge of the power of data, and by looking at how our top property managers use the Key Data Dashboard, we’ve compiled a cheat sheet for you that sets out what the best operators are doing each day, week, and month to hone their vacation rental strategies.
So, we’re sharing how you can become an STR data superuser with Key Data. Adapt these ideas to your own priorities to get the best results for your business.
Daily Habits To Improve Your Data Game
The short term rental market moves so fast that you can’t take your eye off the ball, even for 24 hours.
Set aside just a few minutes of time every day to check the market. Some property managers will create an appointment or time block in their calendar each morning to capture the current performance at the start of the day.
Pacing Detail Report
Leading the list of items to check daily is the Pacing Detail Report. Compare your short term rental performance and the wider market to the year before, so you can see how much potential there is for improvement and where those gains could be found.
This allows you to zoom in on one or two chosen key performance indicators (KPIs), to deep dive into your data by area, bedroom count, or your own customized unit group. This information can help you to focus on the metrics that currently matter most to see where strategy adjustments may be needed.
You can use filters to show which parts of your inventory are performing well and which need attention. Plus you can highlight key events — like major holidays — to see how they are affecting demand.
Benchmarking
Secondly, it’s vital to compare your performance against your competitors, and that’s why benchmarking should also be part of your daily routine.
Proactive property managers, as well as investors and owners, routinely track metrics like revenue per available rental (RevPAR), occupancy and average daily rates each day. By using historic and forward-looking data, you’ll be able to see if your rates are too high and occupancy is underperforming. These three metrics will tell you how the business is performing, and watching them closely means you’ll spot any issues before it’s too late to do anything.
Rental Projections
Finally, keep on top of rental projections with our add-on module, which gives you real-time information on how the market is expected to evolve. This data is often used to keep agents, owners and investors in the loop with rent forecasts.
Good daily routines are essential, and you should supplement daily checks with weekly and monthly follow-ups.
Weekly Tips For Market Tracking
Demand IQ®
Once a week, use Demand IQ® to track guest activity on your website over the seven previous days. Demand IQ® lets you see what visitors are searching for and where they are coming from. DemandIQ is an important tool because booking data alone doesn’t give you a full picture of demand.
This information will let you work out your ‘shopping window’ — how far in advance of stays potential guests are looking for accommodation — and what locations and facilities they are searching for. It will also give you a more accurate idea of the most popular properties and vacation dates.
Pick Up Tracking
Use the date picker to check your pickup reporting to see how your occupancy compares with seven days earlier. Using pickup reporting in conjunction with Demand IQ will let you see the weekly growth in both demand and occupancy. Studying its pacing data will tell you whether it’s part of a seasonal trend, while benchmarking data will tell you whether your competitors are seeing similar changes. If they’re not, it could be the changes you’ve made to your short term rental business strategy bearing fruit.
Unit Performance
Next, view the performance of different parts of your property portfolio with unit grouping. Create custom unit groups of similar properties such as ‘one to two bedroom condos’, ‘lakefront standard homes’ and ‘first row beach villas’. By segmenting your inventory you can spot your top performers with the leaderboard function. Make it a habit to keep an eye on the next 90 days and 180 days.
Owner Reports
Finally, owner reports are the best way to keep homeowners and investors informed. Create a weekly personalized report containing all the key short term rental data for each unit.
Monthly Checks To Keep On Track
Marketing Source Report
Check the marketing source report at the beginning of every month. It will show you how previous months have performed in terms of RevPAR and booking windows. Plus, you can see what sites your guests are converting on, and use historic performance to create your strategy for the coming months.
Budgeting
The budgeting tool will help you report performance to your leadership team every month. You can track and pace revenue goals at a company or unit level to create powerful forecasts and goals.
Bookings By Date
Finally, look at your bookings from the last 30 days and see which stay dates are linked to this revenue. Glance at ‘booking by date’ to see if the number of sales in the last month is better or worse than the same time last year.
Getting Into Good habits
Following these steps will improve the value you get from your data, boost revenues and establish a rock solid relationship with property owners. By using this as a baseline, you can further customize the reporting schedule for your individual company to best monitor your performance.
Want to find out how you can implement this superuser schedule with ease? Click here to schedule a personalized call and see how you can take your STR management to the next level.
