Today’s Holiday stay market
If you own a houseboat, a holiday home, a hotel or any other accommodation for rent, you will also know the benefits of the online homestay sharing networks like AirBnB booking.com or HomeAway. In the past ten years, online booking has become overwhelmingly popular amongst travellers and more and more people are making use of it in all around the world making the number of listings grow exponentially. In this fierce market, the one chance to impress and the most important thing that will make your listing stand from the others is your pictures. Studies show that visitors spend more than 20 seconds on listings with professional photographs and on average only 2 seconds on listings without.
The importance of Great Photographs
It is superfluous to say that a great picture says a thousand words, sells anything and gets you more likes and visibility and there should be not any confusion between a cool Instagram pic and a professionally taken photograph that shows the space in its best light, with a well crafted and informative composition. The right angles, the correct colours, the balanced exposure and finally but not ultimately the use of professionally grade wide angle lenses combined with full frame cameras, sturdy tripods and fill in flash can just not be rivalled by the most updated smartphone or the latest consumer grade camera.
If you can not request an Airbnb photographer, hiring a local interior photographer in your area will not break the bank and will definitely be the best investment you can ever make for your holiday stay. Not only you can update your own website, booking sites, directories, booking agencies and social medias.
Moreover updating all your online presence will gain search engine performance across your published content meaning that your listings, website, Google business directory will all start to climb, not only Google search pages but, all search online engines.
AirBnB published some case studies around the subject and some hosts declared that after they updated their listings with professional photos their booking increased from 50% to 100%
I work as an architectural interior photographer in London and the home counties, the west country. I work in Italy, South of France, North of Spain and Morocco as an Airbnb photographer. I also work with other holiday stay property management companies and real estate. Within five years of professional experience, my clients have gained from 20 to 100 times the initial investment spent on my services.
I would definitely recommend anyone who is starting in the holiday rental business to invest in pictures at an early stage instead of waiting too long before deciding; every day your listings are live without professional pictures is a profitable day you are missing.
Airbnb verified photographer
Alessio Paratore