Wow! Membership Renewal Fee!

[happykeeper]

I cannot say that I am surprised by the diatribe from the CEO. I can say that it is very disappointing. This is the attitude that runs pervasively throughout the organization. It explains why we feel like one of their worst customers- because apparently that is how they see us. You complain- you’re bad.

These folks must be counting on the fact we are all too busy or that we lack the skill and desire to put together a collective action that pushes back. Oddly, we are paying them.
Can you imagine writing an email to one of your customers like that?

Dear Prunehead,
We don’t understand how you can complain about not having running water in your room. We told you when you arrived that the pipes in your room were frozen. You act as if we turned the heat all the way, off, when in fact we had it set at a very comfortable 52 degrees. You’re just a big whiner and probably don’t have any friends. If we could charge you extra we would, but you left early.
Get Lost,
The world’s best bed and breakfast (cause we say so).

 

[happyjacks]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.

 

[YellowSocks]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

Why do you feel our pricing is not fair?

She didn't say it wasn't fair. She said it was too much. She's right.

I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as...[blah blah ]... they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math ... [blah blah]... we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning.

Because cost is what hurts.

[several long paragraph about how we're wonderful followed by...]
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks.

There's a lot of people here. Some cynical, some not. None of us appreciate being told we're a "bunch of glass half empty folks."

How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.

She's an innkeeper.
I've said it before, I'll say it again: Your pricing makes us little guys feel like we're being screwed. (It doesn't matter if we're not, it's how we feel.) If you're so wonderful, why don't you arrange your pricing structure to have 28,000 B&B's instead of 7,000? You may have awesome numbers and stats and all kinds of reasons why you're the best thing since sliced bread. But when a small B&B's entire marketing budget is $500, they can't afford to spend it all on you.
Like someone else said, you're pricing yourselves such that you will have the big inns and the boutique hotels... and lose an opportunity to list the thousands of little B&B's, and help a significant portion of our industry. Your loss... ours, too.
Two thoughts just to throw them out there...
First:
When I was young and in debt, if I had $50 in my checking account and nothing bounced I was happy. But if something came up and I needed $100, it was a major big deal. Now I try to keep at least $1,000 in my checking acount all the time... if something comes up where I need a $100, I write the check, no big deal.
When you're a big inn, or a small hotel, then you pay the cost of doing business and don't think anything of it. When you're a tiny B&B, with a correspondingly tiny budget, you track your dollars very carefully and feel the bite when the big ones hit.
Second:
A great quote I heard this week: "It takes twenty years to build a reputation and only five minutes to destroy it. When we realize this it effects our behavior."
=)
Kk.

 

[gillumhouse]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

Eric,
I am sorry that losing one inn upsets you so much. I did not think my little inn in Podunk was that important.
If you remember last year we had a discussion regarding the ads on what we considered "our" pages and I said is was not going to renew and pay MY money to have someone's ads on "MY" page. I did quit BUT within the month, the ads were gone so when I was called, I said OK you listened to us about what we objected to and fixed it, so I did renew. I do not even remember now which discussion it was, but you insulted all of us by suggesting our view that differed greatly from yours had something to do with "the phase of the moon". Not a nice comment, Eric.
If David Swain did not take a vacation in 10 years, it was HIS problem, not mine. If he had raised his rates a bit gradually (and I said a bit, not a lump), as much as his product was liked and used we are business people and understand slight increases AND he should have been making enough to hire help rather than the do it myself credo. Not our problem - our inns are our problem.
You are a business person so you should understand in a reasonable manner that a small inn simply cannot afford to pay such a huge amount (and paying monthly costs even more) when I do not care how many "hits" came from that site, they were looky-loos and not bookings. Large inns may be able to afford it, I cannot. To be told I do not know how to run a business, which is basically what you have said to me, because I said you were too expensive for me is not the way to win friends and influence people. And to tell me that the lady with the Bronze just loves you matters not to me - I see you have added e-mail the innkeeper to the Bronze listing - I see you do allow reviews on Bronze, a nice touch to keep driving traffic to your site, a very good business move.
I am in no way trying to tell you how to run your business or how much you should charge. That is your decision just as it is mine to say you have reached my breaking point and beyond. I am small potatoes serving a segment of the population with a wonderful place to stay and I do know what I am willing to pay and I do know when I have reached a point where I will say it is a matter of principle. I have now reached the point, due to your attack on me, and yes, it was an attack (I hope I did not attack you personally earlier when I was venting, I was however attacking your business practices as I see them) aimed at me. I am not a person who would, in my estimation, cheat an Aspiring by not making them aware of all the directories, and yes, I will say yours is - at least for now - the largest, but I will also tell them how much you charge to have a link and how much you charge with only an e-mail contact to the innkeeper. They will have ALL the facts.
Yes, I am vocal about my displeasures, most dissatisfied people are. But for us, if we have a dissatisfied guest, we try to find out why (I told you up front why) and then we attempt to fix it if possible and it is is not possible, drop it. We do not castigate or belittle. I do thank you for making me feel that I am such an important person that what I say or think rates a response - and SUCH a response - from the head honcho himself.
Edited to add that I do not hide my identity. Everyone knows who i am, where I am, and I make no apologies for being in a very small City or for being small. I will tell you this though, although my inn is small, I am known and respected in my State because I look beyond my own front door when I work for the industry.

 

[JBanczak]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!

 

[Copperhead]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks your comments here are right on target. Not much I can add here to get my reactions noted. Good Job.
Eric,
I will say this - it would serve your company better if you would refrain from posting and allow John to do so. He is much more tactful when defending the company's actions. Maybe it is because it is not his 'baby'. I will also say that IF you think this forum is down on BedandBreakfast.com, it is a good thing you can not see any of the other more private innkeeper forums out there.
As Happyjacks mentioned, this group provides very out of in the open feedback, no holds bared. It would be of GREAT benefit for you and your staff to take our feedback to heart. Each of us know it is hard to hear something negative about something that you have placed your heart and soul into but you must remember that we are your bread and butter...and what we say represents a good % of your customers. A 12.5% increase during a hard economic crisis does is not the way to keep your customer base, no new frills just a cost of doing business increase. Now I wonder if I increased my room rates by 12% just how many customers I would have returning this year, even though I have made several expensive changes in the rooms over the past 3 months. With many of my hotel competiors now decreasing their room rates to get business, I most likely would be batting zero.

 

[egoodell]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!
.

You may spend more money, but I still get the majoirty of my bookings from the affordable bbonline.com rather than you. It could be because when you do a google for Bed and breakfast charlottesville, and charlottesville bed and breakfast they come up before you. And that's where they are going and finding me. Period. That's all I need.
The only other thing beyond that I really need is Webervations. And I'm afraid you'll add bells and whistles to that to justify a big hike. It would be fair to see a modest hke, but I'm expecting a big one, unfortunately.
Riki

 

[gillumhouse]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!
.

John,
I do not think the comparison of B & B to Motel 6 is even in the same book much less th same page. I do not even want the Motel 6 crowd. Bandb.com obviously does not want the small inns. No problem.
My rate went up over $100 from what it was last year. Not chump change in my book. The first intimation of a rate increase - when it was raised to $349 - began with the words to the effect of we know the economic times are hard... and then we are hit with a whomping rate increase, not a small one. I said it was more than I could afford because the ROI was not there for me. It is not. I may get hits but if they are hits from looky-loos in California or Europe who are not making reservations it does not matter. Reservations matter. Anyone can say it is because I do not have a good web site - I have seen worse - but if your site is doing the job for me as is imtimated, that should not matter, YOUR site is supposed to be getting me the reservation.
I am leaving your directory with a reasonably nice accumulation of pay per click in my account - I believe it was $147 and change in the last e-mail urging me to sign up for featured inn. I do wish I could transfer it to someone who could use it because I will certainly not need it. If I would have considered changing my mind, Eric cemented it for me.
It may have been me, BTW, who said I could get 2 other directories for the price of this one but I did not name them. Are they big boys? No, but they ARE targeted to a specific interest and surprining as it may seem, a specific interest group will produce reservations.

 

[Copperhead]

John stated:
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
John, I was not the poster your are referencing here but I can understand where they are coming from...and I am sure you do as well. It is not the quantity of traffic that matters, it is the quality. It does not matter how many visits there are to a listing if they do not book. If a site clearly focuses on a certain target audience - whether it be snow skiing, biking, etc., and that is the B&B's target guest, they will produce more reservations from a smaller number of views. But I am not telling you anything you didn't know...you are a smart man.
I can see the day when needing to be on a directory will be obsolete. As more and more b&b's develop websites of their own and maintain them, the need of the directories will fade into the sunset. As it is, our site comes up in first position for most of our keywords. I joined bedandbreakfast.com because I felt that I was possibly missing some B&B.com's dedicated users. Users that have been faithful to the directory, just as there are those faithful to bbonline. As of now, my click throughs from each are running neck to neck but bbonline has brought me more bookings - same time frame. I have recently thrown in the towel with Lanier due to lack of preformance and will do the same to any I find not bringing in guests. Coming out even is not preforming...I expect at least to make at least 10 times the membership cost to consider it profitable.
And as for your idea about 'pay per reservation', or more like a commissioned based site...I think it would be truly an eye opener and ego deflating experiment for bandb.com -----for me, I am game!

 

[Willowpondgj]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did.

Uh, you also raised your commissions on your gift card program, which is why we dropped out, whilst violating your own notification policies.
I've had enough, I'm speaking up.
You know, many of us reward our return guests, why don't you reward your renewing customers? If anything, you should lower your rates for loyal customers!
We may not be renewing either, not just because of the increases and the poor customer service (that's right), but for the way you have represented yourself here. Not sure we want to support a corporation that clearly thinks so little of the little guys, as made clear by the tone in this response and your other posts.
For the past year, your service has only amounted to 5% of our bookings. That's even with your online booking program. I know, that's our fault, for not uploading enough inventory, but we are just not interested in paying your ridiculous commission fees! We raised our rates this year too, we had to. Actually, we just went back to the P.O.'s rates from 4 years ago, but only so we would be able to make a living after paying you your commission.
I can relate to the P.O. of Webervations, but I think his motives were a lot different than yours, which I'm sure will be evidenced by at least a 67% price hike when it's time to renew. But I guess, peon that I am, I should be grateful you haven't raised the webervation renewal rate already. And I am, knowing that it is coming soon. Hopefully, by then, we will find a new reservation software program that hasn't been bought out by you.
My husband and I have not had a vacation in three years. I bet you did. I didn't go to my grandmother's funeral this year, there wasn't enough money (I had just returned from my other grandmother's funeral that same week! I only got to go to the first grandma's funeral because we had free miles.) And it wasn't for a lack of trying. We had guests every day for 6 months straight, with no days off, count them -"0", and we worked our butts off. We have no staff, we can't afford one. I wonder, do you have a personal housekeeper? Many of us on this forum ARE the housekeepers. We just cannot afford to pay any more to corporations like yours, when we work this hard to barely make a living, especially in this economy!
According to your website you average 41 room rentals at the Silver level. Since the majority of the guests who booked us thru your site booked the cheapest room available, even had we uploaded all of our inventory and had 41 rooms booked thru you, which we didn't, once we subtract your commissions and pay the listing fee, it would only have allowed us enough to make maybe one mortgage payment or go to the funeral (one plane ticket). Well you know which one we did. It's hardly the return you make it out to be when you break it down into my real life.
NEWSFLASH: Many innkeepers aren't millionaires! Unlike the stereotypical innkeeper, most of us don't sit on the veranda drinking mint juleps in our sunglasses and hats, hob-nobbing with all of our wealthy guests. We don't have time to, because we have to WORK, and we're lucky if we make enough to squirrel away for the slow season. Many of us also have jobs outside the inn just to make ends meet. Sometimes, it's close!
It's too bad that there aren't enough innkeepers willing to stand up against you to make the point. No matter how many times you and your staff members respond, you just never seem to hear us. I think Copperhead is right, your company will eventually only represent large inns and boutique hotels, since the little guys cannot afford you anymore. You obviously don't care or you would take our opinions to heart instead of always coming onto the forum telling us all why we're are always so wrong and you are always so right.
It's hard to see the glass half full when someone's always drinking out of your straw!
One thing you definitely got right: You don't understand!
Once Willow Pond drops out, you will have no listings in our town, or the town next to us to the east, or the to west. In fact, there will not be a listing within a 100 mile radius of our city, and we are the largest city between Denver and Salt Lake, a huge tourist destination. Too bad for you!
Signed,
Laurie Lester
Willow Pond Bed & Breakfast (A bedandbreakfast.com member, NOT a Bedandbreakfast.com directory competitor, NOT an anonymous innspiring.com member)

 

[JunieBJones (JBJ)]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!

BandB.com is still #11-#15 on my referrer list for the month of January. You are not sending everyone an overabundance of business. "if you don't like it don't renew" okay. Sounds about right after being with BandB.com since 2003.
btw no innkeeper here is wanting CHEAP they want the best bang for their limited buck. To remind you all once again - these are family owned and operated small businesses, we are not big corporations, to pay a HIGH fee to be listed on BandB.com takes MONEY away elsewhere. Most of those in this business STRUGGLE to make ends meet.
In fact I would PREFER to pay a fee PER BOOKING! Per click. Go ahead make my day. I would agree to that.

 

[JunieBJones (JBJ)]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!
.

You may spend more money, but I still get the majoirty of my bookings from the affordable bbonline.com rather than you. It could be because when you do a google for Bed and breakfast charlottesville, and charlottesville bed and breakfast they come up before you. And that's where they are going and finding me. Period. That's all I need.
The only other thing beyond that I really need is Webervations. And I'm afraid you'll add bells and whistles to that to justify a big hike. It would be fair to see a modest hke, but I'm expecting a big one, unfortunately.
Riki
.

You may spend more money, but I still get the majoirty of my bookings from the affordable bbonline.com rather than you. It could be because when you do a google for Bed and breakfast charlottesville, and charlottesville bed and breakfast they come up before you. And that's where they are going and finding me. Period. That's all I need.
The only other thing beyond that I really need is Webervations. And I'm afraid you'll add bells and whistles to that to justify a big hike. It would be fair to see a modest hke, but I'm expecting a big one, unfortunately.
Riki

BandB.com doesn't work well for VA. I get MOST bookings online other than google searches, from BBONLINE as well. They top my list in every way!

 

[YellowSocks]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!
.

The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?

My rooms are worth at least $350/night.
I don't charge that much.
I simply wouldn't get any reservations... maybe three a year.
Because price (as any economist knows) isn't a static amount... it's formed by a neat little chart of supply and demand... more demand, less supply = higher price. Where the two lines intersect is the ideal price.
In an economic downturn, demand is definitely down. And, while we're a zillion times better than any boxy hotel, we can't charge a zillion times more... and hotels are part of the supply whether we like it or not.
We all charge as much as we can to get as much business as we can for the least amount of work. Ideal is a high price with a moderate amount of work. (I.e., I don't want 100% occupancy, I want to make a living without breaking my back.)
And as a small B&B, my supply is limited. Four rooms a night and it's gone. As a directory, yours is virtually unlimited.
Like others have said, it's not simply cheaper that we're harping on. It's the perception of gouging. I'm happy to pay an extra $30-$50 for a B&B over a Super8. I am not willing (or able!) to pay an extra $200 to stay at a B&B instead of a Super8.
ROI... yes, we all care about ROI. But even if an Investment had a 3 zillion percent return, if the Cost of the Investment is out of my reach, then I can't make the Investment. Simple, cold, hard economics.
So, to say it again... your ROI may be out of this world, your rates may be the most reasonable rates in the industry, you can justify them til the cows come home... we little B&B's feel like we can't afford you and we feel like you don't care.
You may care a lot, but many of us don't feel like you do.
Oh, you say, feelings! This is a business here. It's all about ROI.
Well, businesses are run by people, and people have emotions. That's why image and branding and customer relations are so important... because customers aren't logical.
You can logic all day long about how right your prices are.
And we'll emote all day long about how we don't like paying them.
And it remains to be seen... will you keep enough customers to maintain yourself, or will enough little guys leave that you'll have shot yourself in the foot?
Why not find a way to woo the little guys like me... who never get around to joining you?
Why not find a way to do your pricing to increase your listings from 7,000 to 28,000? If you charge half as much and make twice as much, that's good economics as well as good for the industry.
Why not find a way to be ubiquitous... every dinky B&B in the country listed with you? I know of B&B's who are not listed on any directory. (Don't ask me how they get their customers!) When I see you searching them out and helping them out, then we'll know you truly care about our industry... all of our industry, not just the big guys.
=)
Kk.
Kathy Kollar, Innkeeper
(aka, Owner, Operator, Accountant, Housekeeper, Cook, Landscaper, Snow Removal, Laundry, Maintenance, IT, Business Manager, Receptionist, Dishwasher.... and mom of twins.)
College House B&B
Ashland, OH

 

[YellowSocks]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!

BandB.com is still #11-#15 on my referrer list for the month of January. You are not sending everyone an overabundance of business. "if you don't like it don't renew" okay. Sounds about right after being with BandB.com since 2003.
btw no innkeeper here is wanting CHEAP they want the best bang for their limited buck. To remind you all once again - these are family owned and operated small businesses, we are not big corporations, to pay a HIGH fee to be listed on BandB.com takes MONEY away elsewhere. Most of those in this business STRUGGLE to make ends meet.
In fact I would PREFER to pay a fee PER BOOKING! Per click. Go ahead make my day. I would agree to that.
.

btw no innkeeper here is wanting CHEAP they want the best bang for their limited buck. To remind you all once again - these are family owned and operated small businesses, we are not big corporations, to pay a HIGH fee to be listed on BandB.com takes MONEY away elsewhere. Most of those in this business STRUGGLE to make ends meet.

Amen sister!
=)
Kk.

 

[Morticia]

I just reread this. Didn't we all have a heart attack a couple of months ago when the new rates were posted here? Now you're telling me the rates went up AGAIN? In less than 3 months? According to my calculations another 15%. On top of the 30% increase? Sorry if this has already been brought up. I'm paying monthly and it's $29.95. I renewed in November.

 

[swirt]

I think there are some really interesting things being brought up here. Many we've hashed around before here and on the old forum. As I have always said, a company can decide what they want to charge for their products and consumers can always decide whether they want to pay it or not. Sounds like there are several here who are willing to vote with their feet and go.
John brought up the comparison of joining two or three directories for the price of one. I've got some numbers on these that I'll post here shortly, but I have to make some pretty charts so I can't post them yet.
But there are a few other things that have come up that I can address now.

I can see the day when needing to be on a directory will be obsolete. As more and more b&b's develop websites of their own and maintain them, the need of the directories will fade into the sunset.

It would be nice if this were true, but I don't see it happening as there are only 10 slots on each search engine result page and searchers only dig so far. The difference in traffic between number 2 and number 8 is huge. Directories, by current search engine ranking methods, typically have more power for the big terms.

Why not find a way to do your pricing to increase your listings from 7,000 to 28,000? If you charge half as much and make twice as much, that's good economics as well as good for the industry.

This is a real interesting question and one that I think gets overlooked. In any directory, there are two sides that have to balance. There has to be a balance between the amount of properties and the amount of prospective guest traffic.
Examples:

• A directory with 28,000 inns and 7 prospective guests clicking around would be bad for innkeepers.
• A directory with 6 inns and 5000 prospective guests would be great for those 6 inns, but bad for the potential guests (not enough choice).

In my estimation based on what I see while searching bandb.com based on their advertising, organic poisitioning and other programs like gift cards etc has gotten very close to the upper limit on potential inn guests. Keep in mind that for every new inn they bring into the directory, they have to bring in ~100 new potential guests per year. So rapid growth of the directory would cause a dramatic drop in the number of referrals each inn gets. It is possible, since some are saying that their referral numbers are dropping, that this large price increase is really a method of thinning the herd (collection of inns in the directory) to make it better for the inns that stick around.
And of course we do similar things... when we hear someone saying they have an 80% occupancy rate and are getting burned out, we tell them to raise their rates.

 

[JBanczak]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!

BandB.com is still #11-#15 on my referrer list for the month of January. You are not sending everyone an overabundance of business. "if you don't like it don't renew" okay. Sounds about right after being with BandB.com since 2003.
btw no innkeeper here is wanting CHEAP they want the best bang for their limited buck. To remind you all once again - these are family owned and operated small businesses, we are not big corporations, to pay a HIGH fee to be listed on BandB.com takes MONEY away elsewhere. Most of those in this business STRUGGLE to make ends meet.
In fact I would PREFER to pay a fee PER BOOKING! Per click. Go ahead make my day. I would agree to that.
.

btw no innkeeper here is wanting CHEAP they want the best bang for their limited buck. To remind you all once again - these are family owned and operated small businesses, we are not big corporations, to pay a HIGH fee to be listed on BandB.com takes MONEY away elsewhere. Most of those in this business STRUGGLE to make ends meet.

Amen sister!
=)
Kk.
.

"btw no innkeeper here is wanting CHEAP they want the best bang for their limited buck. To remind you all once again - these are family owned and operated small businesses, we are not big corporations, to pay a HIGH fee to be listed on BandB.com takes MONEY away elsewhere. Most of those in this business STRUGGLE to make ends meet."
Taking money away from an advertising investment that has a positive rate of return only hurts your pocketbook though. We evaluate advertising all the time - and we pay a lot more on certain websites to get traffic that often isn't nearly as good as we get from far cheaper websites. But cutting off a higher-priced website for our own advertising that is generating a positive rate of return would only mean I would be even less profitable. The same logic applies to any advertiser.

 

[Mr.Design]

Hi everyone,
Long time lurker and aspiring innkeeper here
I just wanted to add my 2 cents in here about bedandbreakfast.com.
I recently planned a trip down to Key West and in my opinion, Trip Advisor is much more helpful than B&B.com. As a consumer I found B&B's site too commercialized and cheesy.
I would focus on improving my Trip Advisor ranking as opposed to paying such a large membership fee with B&B. When I looked for a place to stay I look for those with the most guest reviews and traveler photos. B&B just doesn't have the number of reviews that TA does and thus wasn't as useful. Besides that, obviously since not all inns are members at B&B.com, B&B doesn't list them all. As a consumer I don't like that. I like to have all the possible places in front of me, ranked by what other travelers think, not who pays the most for a top spot.
Maybe I'm weird but those are my thoughts!

 

[happyjacks]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.

John, I trust you have ways to communitcate with your existing customers other than on a public forum, and that they would have heard about the program through other channels.
But I don't take issue with you posting about changes to your pricing structure. I do take issue with you for only giving half the story. You tried to pass the post off as information, but in reality it was self-promotion (bring on the back-patting and kudos!). If it was about keeping the innkeepers here informed, you would also have told us about the rate increase.
That just comes off as manipulative and deceptive marketing. But whatever. Like I said, it's good fodder for case studies.

 

[JBanczak]

Kathleen,
No, we do not offer the rebate credit on annual payment plans, only monthly. Sorry to see you turn a creit porgram for somethign that helps innkeepers sell more rooms, into a negative...
Why do you feel our pricing is not fair? I understand we are the most expensive, but when we look at basically every metric that is available to us such as: innkeeper's Extremne Tracker pages, the Google analytics for the sites we host for innkeepers stats from companies like Moriah and INsideOut, or even to simply comparing us to other directories on independent third-party sites like Quantcast - they seem to unanimously support our pricing as fair. If you do the math on traffic, conversions, reservations or dollars - we deliver an order of magnitude more business to our member inns than other directories, and we do not charge an "order of magnitude higher price". So we are actually a better deal than most if not all other directories when you look at ROI. You seem to be solely looking at the cost. Why do you not look at the return? I do not understand, but would like to understand the logic behind this reasoning
You also make it sound like it is bad that we have acquired other companies in this industry that we are going ot force innkeepers to "Pay up or go out of business". What the heck are you talking about??
If we wouldn't have bought BBCOM back from WorldRes, who knows what would have happened to it since WorldRes basically went out of business. WorldRes also owned Guest Tracker and made us take them with our purchase of BBCOM back from WorldRes. Had we not done that, Guest Tracker would probably also be out of business. We just acquired Webervations and while it is a greta product that many innkeepers love, it had one programmer that basically worked his entire live on maintaining this product to keep it from crashing, add functionality, etc. (David Swain). The man had not had a vacation in 10 years and had a cot in his office... You think that is a good way to run a company? It certainly is not fair for you to expect David Swain to not have a life so you can save a few bucks. His business was not sustainable. You cannot run a business long-term without a family or personal life. THAT IS WHAT IS NOT FAIR. Now that we have acquired it, aside from a few short0lived issues with transitioning an entire website and database - which should be expected), we have made a lot of improvements to the back-end that will protect innkeepers using the product with things a core piece of any innkeeper's website should have that were lacking. Things like security, redundancy, back-ups, exception reporting, etc.). Had we not acquired it, at some point David would have thrown in the towel - and he was close. Then if you look at the actual facts around Property Management Software - since acquiring Guest Tracker, we have brought the price down from $599 to $199 (and many times it is completely FREE) while becoming Microsoft Gold certified, spending 6 months and lots of money to become security certified (soon), created an agreement with Intuit (industry first) to integrate with Quickbooks, moved to a much more robust SQL database, added much morte online support (videos, FAQ, Wiki's, etc.). We have also led th eindustry in dropping the price of our real-time online booking engine product from 5% er reservation to a flat monthyl fee that saves innkeepers 80% over what they use to pay for this product. And you say we are forcing innkeepers to "pay up or go out of business"..??? The ONLY thing we have increased pricing on is for listings on BedandBreakfast.com and we have already clearly explained by how much per average per year, and why we did. So how on earth are you saying it is bad that we kept these comapnies alive and continued ot invest in and improve them and dropped prices for many things.???
To answer your question about the Bronze level, it is for folks to get a listing on our wesbite. Not everyone wants a link. So we offer those that don't a level without a link. Again, I don't see where that is bad...??? It is our lowest number of members by category, but these folks get business or we would not see the renewal rate as high as the other levels and these folks would drop off.
If you really wan tto be helpful to aspirings, tell them all of the directories, their cost, the amount of traffic they get (check Quantcast or something), their page rank on Google, and an estimated ROI. Otherwise that is like saying that newspaper A cost X, newspaper B cost Y, and newspaper C cost Z. Without knowing their circulation, the information is not that useful/meaningful. The prices are based on their reach (number of eyeballs).
Man, I really thinnk this group is full of a bunch of "glass half empty" folks. HappyJacks - Our new offer for international members is less for international members because we drive less traffic to them - and therefore provide less value - and therefore charge less. It really is pretty simple and straightforward. It is not because we are trying to screw anyone...?
The free 3 month membership is for ANY new member, not just international. So now we are bad guys for offering innkeepers 3 months up-front with absolutely no risk?????????????????
There is never a "devil-may-care" attitude here about our rates for ANY product. We spend lots of time making sure we price our products and services fairly.
How is it HappyJacks, that we have over 7,000 members with a 90+% renewal rate if we have "poor customer relations"?? I seriously cannot figure out where you are coming from unless since this board allows people to post without identifying their true indentity, you are from a competiting directory.
So we realize we do not have a smuch traffic in Europe as we do in the US, so we offer discounted rates, free trial, invest in SEO and SEM, and you feel we are bad for doing it. Hmmm... Sorry, you lost me...
We launched a program to offer innkeepers an opportunity to earn a $60 credit per year and you say it is "slimy"...? We raise our rates every year. We were not hiding anything. The "credits" starting applying immediately to all monthly paying members regardless of if they are on the new pricing or not. It is not only working for folks on the new pricing. So how exactly is it slimy?
Kathleen - If you can put your money to work somewhere else and get a better return, we have advocated that ALL ALONG (even on this board). But what is up with such negativeness? I am sorry if our ROI is not enough for you. But just as innkeepers have to price their room and cannot price so every single perosn that wants to stay there can stay there, we also have to price our business at the level that gives US a fair ROI on OUR investment. I promise you though that if I come across a B&B/Inn?Hotel that is charging more than I am willing to py, I won't begrudge them. This is capitalism. They should charge a fair price for the value they provide. I am not going to throw them under the bus for it...
Have a nice weekend folks.
Eric
PS. Here is a comment I JUST got from an innkeeper. a BRONZE innkeeper. Maybe this will help you understand that we have to meet the needs of many differnt types of innkeepers and as I stated above, some of them only want a Bronze membership with no link - so we offer it. You don't need to beat us up for it because you don't need it or you think it is a rip-off. It works or innkeepers would not buy it and we would not offer it.
"Thank bedandbreakfast.com for all of your help and quick responses to my questions. A huge percentage of my guests the first year of membership have been from bedandbreakfast.com and I'm thrilled! I love this site.
Carolsue McCue
THE HERB COTTAGE".

I use the word 'slimy' as it pertains to deceptive sales tactics. When John posted two weeks ago about the new credit review program, it was in the guise of sharing info with the innkeepers here. It seems to me that it was about self-promotion and not informational sharing, otherwise he would have shared the whole story on the changes to the pricing structure--namely the rate increase which essentially negates the credit.
Eric, if you think customer relations is only about keeping your happy customers happy, you are doing a disservice to your company. It's also about how you service your unhappy customers, and how you relate to the portion of the market who are not your current customers but have the potential to be.
Take this credit review program and rate hike for example. John could have posted that there were some changes coming to the price structure, explaining the rate increase up front and then giving the good news that members could reduce their fees by earning review credits. This would have gone over better than the one-sided back-patting story and possibly mitigated some of the backlash here that has you reacting defensively. Effective customer relations policies are proactive, not reactive.
A company cannot control it's reputation. It can only control the interaction and communication it has with its customers. The customers decide the reputation. A company that ignores even a small portion of its unhappy customers takes a big chance, especially in these times where the internet makes it so easy for customers far and wide to share their grievances with a larger audience.
You have a unique opportunity here with this forum (and its predecessor) that many companies spend big bucks to replicate: focus group feedback. One way to use it to your benefit (and your customers') would be to compile the feedback you get, spend a round-table meeting with your staff/partners actually considering how any of it may fit the company, and then here's the key: come back and tell your feedback group customers what the results of that meeting are. People want to be communicated with, not talked at and marketed to.
I've seen more than a few examples over the past four years of what I consider missed opportunities and missteps in customer relations and business strategies. The good news is I've managed to use them to help others with their own businesses.
.

Happyjacks,
The review credit applies to anyone - regardless of when their rate hike goes in place. If you paid the old rate in November, or December, you still get the review credit. So it is completely independent of the rate hike. If I hadn't posted in this forum, and the innkeepers here didn't hear about this program - then they would be mad they lost their chance to earn their rebate.
The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?
So why are we more expensive than our competitors? We spend far more money on our website, our advertising, our services, our staff and try to achieve far more than our competitors. That may not make any difference to you - you may just want "a bed and a TV at a cheap price," but we also usually back it up by sending you far more reservations. If we don't, then I'm the first to say you should spend your dollars elsewhere. Doing this costs more money, and we charge more. We feel we are worth it, just like most B&B's feel they are worth more than a Motel 6.
Now clearly some of you don't think we are, and we understand that. If you are looking for a site where you can just save money on your fees, and you think any listing is as good as the next on the internet, then I can understand where you would want to send your business elsewhere. But you are likely going to wind up with one that has less traffic, less ad spend, less features, less staff, and that is going to send you far less revenue as well.
At one point I read in another post someone saying they were going go join two other sites for the price of our one silver listing and drop us. I found it it ironic since the two sites combined put together about 1/3rd of our monthly traffic... so this property now is paying the same for 1/3 of the traffic... and somehow that is supposed to be a good idea? What are we to learn from that - that we should fire our staff, cut all advertising, quit releasing new products, stop attending tradeshows, lose a lot of site traffic - so we can afford to lower our price?
We've had properties post that on a per visitor and per reservation we have been significantly cheaper than our competitors... it always makes me wonder why there aren't more complaints about other sites being too expensive. In fact - I have a proposal to make...
Lets get all of the B&B sites together (or at least the five that everyone mentions). Lets find out what the lowest cost per user or reservation site is (and lets not include BedandBreakfast.com in that mix). Then lets have all the sites agree that we will all switch to a pay-per-click model and price exactly the same - we all price at the same level as the current lowest cost-per-click or cost-per-reservation site, and go from there.
That way if a site sends you more business, they make more money, and if they send you less business, they make less money. I can tell you right now that BedandBreakfast.com would be ecstatic to switch to that kind of business model since our average cost per click to a property, and cost per reservation is generally far lower than anyone else - it would be nothing but upside. It would be completely fair - we'd all be charging the same - and the sites that generate the most users would make the most money - but no one would ever pay any site more per each user they are getting, and no one could complain they were getting charged more. If we busted our butts to find more business for the industry, we'd get rewarded, and if we sat on our duffs doing nothing, then we wouldn't make money...
Anyway, that is my rant for the night!
.

The opportunity in this forum is great, there is fantastic feedback and we take a lot of it. But there are so many posts where the point is "just give me something cheaper..." I get it - cheaper is better - but ultimately we just don't agree on the "value" of our website. Sometimes I feel like this is like the age-old issue of B&B's being more expensive than cheap hotels. A Motel 6 customer stays there for a reason - it is a room, a bed, a TV, and it is cheaper. But B&B's deliver more service, amenities, and a better experience than a Motel 6 - and they are more expensive. B&B owners think they are worth the higher price. Motel 6 customers probably don't think it is worth the price - and I don't agree with them or I wouldn't be here.
But asking you, as B&B owners, to justify your higher price compared to a Motel 6 is like asking us why we are not as cheap as some other websites. Afterall - you have a room, a bed, and a lot of times there isn't a TV in the room... Yet B&B's are generally far more expensive? How do you justify it?

My rooms are worth at least $350/night.
I don't charge that much.
I simply wouldn't get any reservations... maybe three a year.
Because price (as any economist knows) isn't a static amount... it's formed by a neat little chart of supply and demand... more demand, less supply = higher price. Where the two lines intersect is the ideal price.
In an economic downturn, demand is definitely down. And, while we're a zillion times better than any boxy hotel, we can't charge a zillion times more... and hotels are part of the supply whether we like it or not.
We all charge as much as we can to get as much business as we can for the least amount of work. Ideal is a high price with a moderate amount of work. (I.e., I don't want 100% occupancy, I want to make a living without breaking my back.)
And as a small B&B, my supply is limited. Four rooms a night and it's gone. As a directory, yours is virtually unlimited.
Like others have said, it's not simply cheaper that we're harping on. It's the perception of gouging. I'm happy to pay an extra $30-$50 for a B&B over a Super8. I am not willing (or able!) to pay an extra $200 to stay at a B&B instead of a Super8.
ROI... yes, we all care about ROI. But even if an Investment had a 3 zillion percent return, if the Cost of the Investment is out of my reach, then I can't make the Investment. Simple, cold, hard economics.
So, to say it again... your ROI may be out of this world, your rates may be the most reasonable rates in the industry, you can justify them til the cows come home... we little B&B's feel like we can't afford you and we feel like you don't care.
You may care a lot, but many of us don't feel like you do.
Oh, you say, feelings! This is a business here. It's all about ROI.
Well, businesses are run by people, and people have emotions. That's why image and branding and customer relations are so important... because customers aren't logical.
You can logic all day long about how right your prices are.
And we'll emote all day long about how we don't like paying them.
And it remains to be seen... will you keep enough customers to maintain yourself, or will enough little guys leave that you'll have shot yourself in the foot?
Why not find a way to woo the little guys like me... who never get around to joining you?
Why not find a way to do your pricing to increase your listings from 7,000 to 28,000? If you charge half as much and make twice as much, that's good economics as well as good for the industry.
Why not find a way to be ubiquitous... every dinky B&B in the country listed with you? I know of B&B's who are not listed on any directory. (Don't ask me how they get their customers!) When I see you searching them out and helping them out, then we'll know you truly care about our industry... all of our industry, not just the big guys.
=)
Kk.
Kathy Kollar, Innkeeper
(aka, Owner, Operator, Accountant, Housekeeper, Cook, Landscaper, Snow Removal, Laundry, Maintenance, IT, Business Manager, Receptionist, Dishwasher.... and mom of twins.)
College House B&B
Ashland, OH
.

"Why not find a way to do your pricing to increase your listings from 7,000 to 28,000? If you charge half as much and make twice as much, that's good economics as well as good for the industry."
I would honestly love to find a way to do that, but I'm not sure it is possible - even sites with very low rates haven't been able to do it, and in fact usually have way less listings than us. If price was really the deciding factor - why haven't some of the cheaper directories gotten up to 28,000 listings?
I know some of the answer to this question... people have said in the past "but those smaller directories don't have enough traffic, so folks aren't that interested..."
Well - that is my point exactly. They don't have rates high enough to afford to build the right staff and spend money on building their own business - which in turn exists for the sole purpose of driving business to B&B's. If they can't grow - then their customer base won't either.
We have to walk a thin line and find the right balance. For Rezovation - we were able to slash our pricing and make it work. Technology has gotten cheaper and easier in a lot of ares (like credit card processing for instance - our new gateway is very reliable, our old one was a nightmare - that helps). But advertising and traffic generation has only gotten more expensive. Keeping-up-with-the-jones'es as a consumer website is VERY hard. Consumers expect us to be as good as an Expedia with our functionality, as comprehensive as a TripAdvisor with our reviews, and as elegant looking as a RedEnvelope with our UI. That has only gotten more competitive.
As we've said before, we view the large online travel agencies and hotels as our competition - and trying to get the 96% of travelers who say they never stay at B&B's to actually try a stay. That is not an inexpensive or easy thing to pull off.