Starting September 28, Booking.com will hide guest phone numbers like Airbnb does. Hosts can fight back by capturing real contact info through a pre-arrival form, a printable arrival sheet, or a QR code offering local tips, collecting data when guests are most engaged.
Something interesting is happening in the world of the online travel agent. As you can see here, as of the 28th of September, Booking.com is no longer going to give you the phone number of the guests when they book. And this is after Airbnb introduced something called temporary phone numbers. This news from Booking.com and Airbnb, what is happening is that Airbnb are no longer giving you their real phone number. It's a masked phone number, but when you call it, it diverts to their real one. And when they check out, it disappears. And on Booking.com now, they're no longer even sharing that with you. So if you need to call your guests, if you need to get in contact with your guests urgently, you need to do it via their app. Now for the book direct movement, you may think that this is a bad thing and it's game over, but there is ways to make it work. Now at Boostly, every single one of our members has got this check-in form that when a guest books, It gets their first name, last name, real phone number, real email address, and also other information. Now we send this because at the point of the guest making the booking, that is when their endorphin levels are through the roof. They're so excited about coming to stay with you at the property. It doesn't matter whether they've booked direct or through an OTA. This is the most important time to get their data. And at the end of the day, data is king. It's the most valuable commodity out there. It is the new gold. But the trick is to make sure you get it. Airbnb, Booking.com, Expedia, they are not stupid, and they know that if you've got the guest data, you can do remarketing and retargeting and get in front of them more. And just because they're taking it away, it doesn't mean that this is the end. You just got to be smart. Now, you can do it pre-arrival, and you can do it during arrival as well. Let me show you this. This is something I just put together on ChatGPT, but you can put something like this, print it off, put it in a frame, stick it on your fridge and you can have it when the guest arrives. And it's got all of the information on here, but you can also add a little QR code. Now I would add a little QR code here with the sign saying, hey, if you want our top 4 secret hidden places to get food, yada yada yada, scan this QR code. And it would open up a lead gen form that looks like this that we create for all of our members. The takeaway though is this: just because Booking.com, just because Airbnb and Expedia are taking things away from you, it doesn't mean it's the end. You just have to be smart and savvy. I've given you 2 things that don't cost any money. So stick around for more, follow for more. If you want all of this advice in a nice little guide, comment the word rocket and I'll DM it to you.
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