The Best Personalisation Tricks To Stay At The Top Of Your Guest Minds

Welcome then to the latest episode of the Bouchely behind the Host Podcast. The podcast that gives you the tools, the tactics and the trainings to take power back from the online travel agents and get you more direct bookings. Today we're going to be interviewing one of the biggest characters in hospitality that I've had the pleasure to meet in the last few years and I'm excited to introduce her. But first, just quickly, we're just going to share a quick win from the hospitality community. One of the members in there, Lynn Radford, who is a Team Boostly member and a hospitality she is, shared that she's going to take the dive into managing directly, taking the power back from a management company and implementing some of the trainings that she's learned to get more direct bookings, which is really cool. So if you can just wish her good luck in the comments with me. So good luck, Lyn, and we wish you all the best with that. Let us know how you get on. So today on the behind the Host podcast, we're sheared. We're sharing it with Daniela Darien, who's the CEO and founder of Skoll Apartments, Merbear Holidays. And I'm really excited to dive into her business today. She's going to be sharing some of the personalization tricks that she uses, which has helped her to remind remain top of mind with her guests. She scaled to over 200 units in Spain. And listen in as you're going to get some good tips on how you can model some of her success and implement it into your business. So welcome along. Daniela, thank you for joining us.

Hi Liam, thank you very much for the warm welcome and introducing me as one of the characters of hospitality. Thank you very much for that.

That's true.

I'm actually CMO and founder. The CEO is Vincenzo, my partner in life and crime, who's the Ying to my young. And I must say we, we really work well together in everything. So yes, we work in this beautiful sunny office here in the center of Marbella, Spain, Costa del Sol, 55km from Malaga and 80km from Gibraltar. So the location is ideal. 10 months of sun a year, very hot and very busy now in the summer, but ideal for winter sun and especially working remotely with these amazing views I have here behind.

That's it. That view just in the background sells it. I mean, when Daniela came on, we're saying should we go for the, you know, sort of the still view in the background or the live view? But the live view definitely sells it. So I know you've introduced yourself briefly there, but let's get started on today's episode by just tell me how. Tell me a little bit more about your product properties, what people can come to expect if they come and stay in your apartments and also how you got started as well.

Okay, so we have 90 units here in the Skol Apartments Marbella on the beachfront. They're all studio, one bedroom and two bedrooms. They're small units, normal apartment for normal people. Not the five star luxury people expect from Marbella. We have that three kilometers down the road. So this is normal price for normal people. Fully fitted apartment, kitchen, WI fi, air conditioning. So ideal for your family holiday in the summer, in the spring, in the school holidays because as I said before, with 10 months of sunshine and also ideal to come and look for some winter sun. The prices in winter are like half of what it is in the summer. So ideal to come and try that. We also have a beautiful garden with three pools, tropical gardens with direct access on the boardwalk. So really ideal for families, for couples and for the remote workers and digital nomads. We also have 19 golf courses within probably 10 minutes drive. So if you're a keen golfer, this is also a great place to start because we've got plenty bars and restaurants around us, Irish pubs as well, worldwide cuisine. So ideal place. How did I start when I came here to Marbella in 1998, couldn't speak a word of Spanish, so I went to work for an English real estate. And what we did in real estate, what we had empty for Easter and for the summer we would rent out for holiday. Let's. This is what is always been in style. It wasn't. It really got specific holiday rentals in 2008 with the other crisis. So then we didn't have a lot of business in normal rentals like long let and sales. So we started to rent everything short term and it went well. We started with 15 units in this block because a lady was retiring and she said, please help me with this. So. So I said okay, I have nothing else to do. So I started to help her. I never really did holiday rental specific. I was much more into sales because of course sales, 5% commission here in Spain is a much more juicy job. But because it was the crisis, okay, let's go for it. And I really started to like it. Welcoming people, showing them around, telling them what to eat, what to do, how to make the best of Marbella, giving them insider tips. And people started to notice that we liked what we did. So in the first year we grew from 15 to 30, completely organic, word of mouth, neighbor to neighbor. People that were renting gave the apartment to us. And then the following year, two years later, a gentleman decided to retire. He had another 40, 50 units and he gave them to us. So all this really became serious. It became our prime source of income. And we really started to concentrate on tourists by the week, two weeks, some of them were staying a month, but yes, and then we started to offering them airport transfer day trips. Some of them, we were also sending them over to Morocco for 3, 4 days trips, or organizing a tour of Andalusia. We have some beautiful cities around us, Sevilla, Granada, Cordoba. People come from all over the world to visit them. So while they were in Marbell, well, why not go and have a look at this? And then on the other side, we started to give other services to the owners as well, like farmish men helping them on how to furnish a home, the rental. Because of course, people were buying these apartments as an investment. So how do we furnish it? So we would tell them, okay, you need this, this, this and the other. And also because it's not a very young building, so it needs constant updating. So we do project management for like bathroom, kitchen floors, window, air conditioning, very important, how to keep the air conditioning up to date and so on.

That's amazing.

And it hasn't been too long.

No, I mean, but we do many.

Things, you see, there's a lot of.

Spokes to the wheel, isn't there? There's a lot to talk about. And you mentioned, right at the start there, you mentioned, you know, when you came there, you didn't speak a word of Spanish. It's worth letting people listening. So, you know, where are you from?

And you know, I'm Italian, I'm from Trieste, the north of Italy. And Vincenzo is from Naples, the south of Italy. And we met in London back in 1996.

That's cool. And ended up in Marbella. And we actually, we said. Because obviously we went for a meal in London at the Book Direct show, didn't we? And we said it was funny that we've got. You were telling us where we needed to go and check out, and it was Italians who live in Spain, leading us to a Vietnamese restaurant in London, which was fantastic.

Yeah. Vincenzo is a chef, actually. He trained as economist, accountant. Then he decided he didn't like it. So he did the chef for about 25 years. So he knows, he's very fussy with this food. He knows what he likes. So this is why we know all the best places to live. Well in London we lived for three years so we, we know lots of places. And you miss Barcelona? Barcelona was also great fun.

Well, it definitely comes across that you've learned the, you know, the local area and just being that guide. And also one thing that really comes across is, you know, the work ethic that both of you have put in. So when you took on the first 15, were you surprised by the, you know, the differences of the level of work involved with doing holiday let's versus you know, sort of real estate.

What I really liked at the beginning is that holiday let's. Although you have a very small margin into each week, you have so many apartments, so many weeks, so you have a day to day cash flow while for the sale sometimes you have to work two months in a sale. So for two months you don't know if you're going to close it and if you're not going to close it for those months you're not going to make an income. I remember an ex friend of us who is not now in a very good position, let's leave it like that. He was teasing me, oh, you're working so hard, you're only making €50 a week into each apartment. And I said, yes, it's €50 a week for 50 apartments. At the end of the very first summer I was able to take my small family on a week holiday to EBITDA and other people that were waiting. Wait, the guy that trained me in real estate, many, many, many years ago, he was after the big deals, maybe he was closing a deal every three years, but it was like a big deal, like multi million. But I couldn't work with no income for three years. I prefer this cash flow of like 50 a week and so many weeks. I'm sure you can relate.

Yeah, it's fast paced but good fun, isn't it? And the cash flow is good.

Exactly. And it gives you security. I mean if the kids say oh can I get a pair of shoes? Then yes you can because I have so many weeks booked. So I know how, I know what I can afford and what I can't. So for a young family, when you start off is really, really important.

And one of the benefits of hospitality is the more effort that you put in to market your business, the more guests you're probably going to get.

And that absolutely word of mouth, repeats, referrals, that is really the key of our business.

So going on from that then you've set up your business, you know, You've got your 15 initial units. You've added more units on. Did you have to set up cleaning teams? How does it work for cleaning teams?

Oh, yes. At the beginning with 15 units, we had a lady by the hour. But as we grew, we started to employ cleaners. We don't outsource anything. We're control freak and we like to control the quality of a cleaning. Plus basically we have work 10 months a year. So it makes much more sense personally and financially to employ people. So we have five cleaners and four maintenance guys. The maintenance guys also do the refurbishments in the winter and now in the summer, everybody's on the cleaning. Even my two children are now grown up. They're 17 and 19. They're on the. In the. They're on their summit job. Remind you they're on the job all year long, but now they're like full time.

I love that. I love that though. That's good to keep, you know, keep that in the family and, you know.

Learn they have to earn their worth. They need to know that the money don't come from the trees.

Yeah. So in terms of marketing your business, how do you market your business at the moment? Is it on online travel agents or what different channels you use.

What a nasty word. Online travel agents. Anyway, the majority of our booking are direct repeat and referrals. So they come through the website, through the phone, through WhatsApp emails. That's it, yeah. Walk ins. We get the walk ins from time to time, usually people that have been scammed. And then the other 20, I would say about 12 to 13% are Airbnb and 7, 8% are booking.com Expedia. I've cut them off because they are the worst of the worst. They just decide what rates and how many days you should sell. And nobody is ruling in my house. So Expedia, Airbnb and booking, I still keep them at the distance, but if I can get 100% direct booking, I think I'm going to get rid of them.

It's really cool to hear how many, you know, repeat guests there are. And, you know, one of the things that I can see that you're really strong just from seeing your social medias is the relationship that you build up with your guests. So how do you build up that good rapport with guests?

Because I like people, I like to talk to people. So, yeah, the majority, they keep coming back here after year. You see the kids growing and you see how people evolve in life. They like to see how my kids grow up. I mean, they Remember my kids playing about in the pool and now they see them working around so it's something to be really proud of. And then their kids, they go to university and then some of the kids come back on their own with girlfriends and boyfriends. So it's really nice to see how it all evolves throughout the years. And what really made me bond with the majority of them is in lockdown. We kept contact with them through newsletters, Facebook and Instagram because of course they couldn't come here. So we were bringing this to them every day. And I still get now emails and people that see me in person. Oh, Daniela, we really love your video. Oh, Daniela, thank you very much for keeping in contact with the newsletter. Oh, it's been so important to see that Marbella was still up and running and we were so worried about you. I mean our guests were worried about our business. I mean they were feeling for us, I think it's a soft skill. You're either born with or you're not. To be quite honest. If you talk to people and you develop a relationship, yeah it comes across.

Very clear how passionate you are about the business and the area and you know that people warm to that, you know, and it's one of those things where you've made an important point about remaining top of mind because those newsletters and what you were doing when it was quiet to remain top of mind. I mean, if I'd have got the newsletter during the pandemic, looking at a nice sunny place, I'd be like, I can't believe you sent to me this. But you know, people do like to see what's going on and once they've invested in your business, you know, it's good that they can see that you're doing well and that you remain in top of mind. So when things like now where they have opened up and you mentioned, obviously we talked briefly before the call, but just for the sake of the people listening. How are things going at the moment? You know, things are open again, things are fully open.

We've been non stop really since July last year. Yes, I should have mentioned that 90% of our clients, well, 95% of our clients really are from, are foreigners. Top. Irish, uk then Scandinavian, French, Moroccan, Italian, north of Europe, really Spanish are only 5%. So these people, you people are very organized and tend to book very well in advance. So when US Mediterranean, that is Spanish and Italian decide to go on holiday, usually two weeks before, there's nothing available. So we end up not in the top places, not on the beach front. So this is why. Sorry, I've lost track. What was the question?

So, yeah, just in general, just how things are going, which sounds as though.

Oh, yes, we're fully booked. Yes, exactly. This is where I was coming from. We've been fully booked since July last year, which is when UK and Ireland opened international travel. And all of them just came here and here. And one of the big trends that was the revenge travel. We've seen it totally. The majority of them have booked two holidays and some of them even came three times last year, like July, September and November. We had a very slight break in December, and then in January, we had booking season in full swing and people coming for winter sun, January, February, March. So really, we. We haven't stopped for a year. So at this point, I'm enjoying it. It's lovely. But I'm very much looking forward to November.

Yeah, not ever so much long now. There will be a rest at the end.

Yes, briefly. I enjoy it and I try to have a rest every day, like half an hour, half an hour for myself to really calm the mind and clear my head.

That's cool. And when it comes down to the business in general, I mean, I see your Instagram posts and that. How important has social media been for school apartments?

Well, it's been very important, as in brand recognition, reselling to the same client. Well, reselling, not really like keeping on top of minds of our current guests. And as a referral, because when we go to all these seminars and webinars, they tell us, okay, customer journey, dream research, books, I review. Die customer dies after the review. No, you have to keep. You have to put them into dream mode constantly. This is why Instagram and Facebook and especially WhatsApp status, which is like, the stories have been really, really important for us because we kept them dreaming. We kept them dreaming and inspired throughout lockdown and even now, I mean, between holidays, we're always there every day, inspiring them. So when they want to come to Marbella or if they want to, if they hear somebody say, I want a sunny holiday, I'll go to Marbella. And they take out the phone and say, oh, look.

Yeah, it's just that moment. Where should I go? And you're top of mind. You appear.

I'm always there. Yeah, I'm always there. And especially put the face there so that people see your face. You give them more credibility. Like, I'm a real person in a real place. I'm not going to say scammy or anything. And from time to time, we do get new people, like new new guests through Instagram and to Facebook. They usually, usually come from recommendation. And then we recently started with Luis Bryce, that also works with you, the most excellent copywriter I ever met. We started the Marbella tapas tour. We've done three episodes already where we go for tapas in the small local tapas bar, family owned. So we show it's a win win because we show the guests where to go for an authentic tapas experience. And on the other end, we support small local business, which is one of my crusades to get our guests to go and spend money into the small local places. When we finish the tapas, we'll be doing the shops.

And you get some awesome tapas as well. I mean.

Oh, God, yeah, yeah. And then we have to do a lot of exercise, you know, a lot of running. Living in this place is so hard.

I can imagine. I couldn't do running. I can't do running across here, let alone in the heat of where you are. But it just sounds as though the, the way that you've remained top of mind is to use all the tools available to you. But the other thing is there'll be a lot of people listening to this who don't want to put their own personality into their business. What would you say to people who are, you know, perhaps not wanting to, you know, put themselves out there into their business? What advice would you have for them?

There is another guy in our network, very, very good property manager there in the uk, I once said the city, because otherwise you don't know who is. I say I don't want to talk to my guests. I want everything automatized. I want all the tools possible. I don't want to see them, I don't want to talk to them. Yes, fine. I respect your opinion, but hospitality for me is opening my house to a person, like welcoming them. Not in person. Check in is impossible with 90 units, but I end up seeing them more or less all of them around the pool, check in at checkout the following day. For me, hospitality is a people's business. People buy from people. I open my house to people. You have to be friendly. If you don't like people, just don't work in a bank. Really?

Yeah, that's right.

I mean, I assume this is for like small, small companies and small companies, you can be personal. You can totally be personal. Now if you have 3, 400 units, definitely you cannot be personal and you have everything automatized. It's another kind of hospitality, really. I respect everybody and everybody does what they think is best for the business.

Yeah. And that is one thing that comes across is just by putting yourself out there. I think of my bear and now I think of yourself and your business, you know, and that is, that's what you want people to. So by putting yourself out there, getting in front of the camera, but putting Instagram lives out and reels, it just really makes a big, A big impact. More so than we know, because there'll be people watching these who may be considering booking, who we wouldn't have known otherwise. So. So in terms of the tech in your business, Daniela, what sort of tech do you have? What? What sort of do you use? PMSS and any other sort of tools?

Yes, I have an all in1 system. PMS, channel manager and website. Shall I say the name?

Yeah, yeah, you go ahead. Yeah.

Yes, we use Logify. Very happy with them. That's it. Because from Lodify we export an Excel sheet that we actually print out in paper and give to the cleaner, so they know where to go. And then we have a WhatsApp group. Vincenzo is operational manager, so he tells them where to go, what to clean, who goes out. So he's really, he's on top of the, of the operation. We do around 12 to 15 cleans a day. So it's very important to know what time people come in, people goes out, go out. So because we usually have an hour to two hours to clean a place. So he directs them all like an army, like this, step up, down. And we do that with WhatsApp.

That's cool.

Not very techy with normal people. And then we have a very cool gadget, digital guy type style. I'm totally, totally in love with that thing. Because now they get a welcome letter. So on the welcome letter they get this QR code. They scan the QR code and they know exactly what to do, where to go. They have a link to the videos of the Tapas tour in there as well, plus other recommendations. So, yeah, I think that's all the tech we. Oh, now then we also have Revios from Christophe, another amazing guy that has built a beautiful tool. It's. See if I can say, all right, he's a review aggregator. So on. On our website, we have all the reviews from Google, which is the most important one, and they also pulls them from booking and Airbnb and I'm not sure, TripAdvisor. So they give us a ranking, which is, I think it's now 4.8 throughout all channels. So people go to the Website and say, okay, these people are for real. These people are really good. Let's book with them. Trust factor.

That's cool. And I mean, it sounds like you've got a really great tech stack there. The one that I want to dive into is the digital guidebooks there. Do you get feedback from your guests from having the digital guidebook? And how much easier does it make it for your guests to get all the information they need?

Okay, it's only been operating for like a month. People like it, but they still send me a WhatsApp message. How do I work the safe? The other day I went to physically see some clients and she said she was asking me a question, and I said, yes, it's all in the digital guy. Yeah, but you tell me, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. There was 15 minutes later. And then the following day, she rang me and she said, where do I throw the rubbish? It's in the digital guide. Yeah, but you tell me. Yes. So, I mean, I think there is only a few of them like this, but I think in general, they'll kind of get used to it.

Yeah, that's cool.

For the younger generation is much easier. Remind you, this lady wasn't old. This lady must have been mostly. Mostly fortified.

It's the curse of being available, isn't it? By being available, people just want you to tell them straight away.

You see, that's the other thing. You show your face, you look happy and friendly and familiar. Oh, she won't mind if I ask her what the rubbish is like, literally there.

Even if it's on page one of the guide. You know, I'll still ask anyway. It's just.

But it's something just to make sure. Yes. Like another. Yes, I know you have this tapestry. I know you have this. I know you have that. But where do you go for lunch? It's in there. This is why I do this, so that I don't have to repeat myself exactly.

I swear. You can refer them to the tapas videos. You can just say, look, here's the link to the video. This is where we go instead.

No, but they want to hear it from my mouth. So the next thing I want to build is an hologram. You know, an hologram of me.

Yeah, yeah, hologram.

You can just click. And I'm like, yes, I'm here. How can I help you when you've.

Got your hologram of Daniela there? We'll come back, we'll do another episode. Definitely. That'll be wonderful. How is the hologram?

Yeah, so techie People listening. Build me a hologram.

So what would you say the favorite, your favorite thing about being a host is I suspect I know what you're going to say, but talk to people.

And be around people. And then there is another one. I have to travel to get inspired. So not only traveling to see, to go to conferences and then do a bit of. Of leisure on the side as well, but really taking a nice relaxing leisure holiday. So yeah, being around people is what I really like.

And like you say being able to travel as well, it's research, tax deductible. It's research.

Yeah, yeah, totally, totally, totally. Have to travel more and more. Actually, the very. When travel opened in spring, it really started in spring 21, I said we have to travel because we have to show people that it's safe to travel. Even in September 2020, we hopped on a plane and went to Ibiza and we did the all on video to show people how easy it is to travel, how safe it was to travel. And yeah, I mean, putting yourself a video again, it creates credibility.

It's being a leader within your industry. I can definitely see that. And what would you say is the leader of having. What would you say is if there was a wow moment in your business so far? What has that been over the last few years? What has the wow moment been?

Wow moment as in when I realized something.

Yeah, something which is perhaps changed or something where you went, ah, this is awesome. Or when you've had a challenge.

Well, challenge, of course, it was the pandemic. Getting through it and reinvent ourselves from one minute to the next. We had no business. So we reinvented these offices with views because obviously these balconies were empty. So I was using them and Vincenzo was taking the piece, taking pictures and sending it to the. To the kids that were in lockdown at home. Look, you're locked down at home and mommy is here replying to emails and stunning herself. And then I put it on Facebook, then I put it on LinkedIn and all this office with the new movement started. And yeah, so this would be a wow moment. People think the business from 100% leisure to 50% leisure and 50% remote working digital nomading.

That's amazing. Then. So you let them out as offices for people to work with of you?

No, no, no. We only marketed them as offices with views for digital nomads and remote workers. In the very first lockdown, only me was using them. But then already in September, October 2020, people started to book for two, three, four, and even five months. And they spent the winter here with us. And they were working from these sunny offices.

That's cool.

This is how the movement started.

That's amazing.

Last year that we had a normal winter, 2122, we had 90% occupancy, 50% leisure, which leisure is like retired couples that come from months to months to weeks. And 50% were remote workers and digital nomads, people that instead of sitting at home in the north of Europe, they would come up, obviously people. No children in school years.

Well, it's now a big thing, isn't it, where people want to work from, wherever they, wherever there's a connection they can work from, which is amazing. So as we come to the end of these, we'd like to do a couple of quick fire questions. But just before we do, what would be your topic, top tip for other hosts? So if somebody else wanted to get started, whether they, you know, sort of, whether it was broad or, or wherever, what would be your top tip for somebody getting started in the hosting industry?

Put yourself on video. Put yourself out there. Create a brand. Believe in yourself and people will believe in you. That's a nice one.

I love it.

Myself came out just like.

That's true though. It's true. So we like to end with some quick fire questions. These can be as short or as long as you like. What celebrity would you most like to meet? Daniela.

Jennifer Lopez.

Jennifer Lopez.

And why I should say immigrant, darkish in New York in the 80s and built an empire on woman empowerment.

Love it, love it.

What would you say, you and everybody listening, if you haven't watched her documentary on Netflix, finish this and go to watch it. She's really, really inspiring.

Nice, nice. I'll stick it on the old playlist, on the old watch list. What is your favorite book or a book which has inspired you?

The Loop Tale by Bruce Poon. Tip. I had the great pleasure of meeting him in 2014 World Travel Market in London. He's the CEO and founder of G Travel and he creates tours in, let's say, normal and not so normal destinations. And he empowers the people in the small villages. So for example, if you go to Peru, they will take you around to where they handcraft all their beautiful clothes. And he uses local people to teach the tourists and travelers. And so the money that these tourists spent stay in the destination. And he was the guy that inspired me to promote the small local businesses here in Marbella.

That's really nice. I like that answer. Yeah. So what is the, what is your lifelong Dream. And what does the future look like?

Me to get myself a small casamaran more out here and control the whole thing from the sea. This is. This is how Vincenzo and I will end up reciting Small Thing. And from here to Ibiza, then to Italy, and then all the way down to Israel. Coast to coast, we can go all over in the Mediterranean.

I love it. And what a great way to bring it to a close. Daniela and I feel we've learned a lot about your business. I'm sure everybody listening and, you know, sort of watching on the Live will have got some really great tips. Especially I think just putting yourself out there, really having passion for your business. Hosting, going back to the roots of hospitality is so important. And certainly that's what's made you, in my mind, one of the biggest characters I've met is very memorable. So how would the people listening and watching get in touch with you if they want to? Is there a website or socials?

What's the best way they can find me on LinkedIn, Daniela. Or the easiest is infomarbeaholidays es. That is my email. Or you can find me on Facebook, Daniela Vincenzo Marbella. Or on Instagram marbellador Holidays. And I think that's it will be everywhere. And my phone number is basically public, so you can shoot me a WhatsApp, no problem.

Amazing. Amazing. Thank you so much, Daniela, for spending your time with us on behind the Host today. Thank you again, and my pleasure. Yeah, I'm sure we'll. We'll see you at the next Book Direct show or wherever it is.

Absolutely. Looking forward. Bye bye.

Bye for now. Having a blast. Gonna get it on the Bruce Lee podcast.

Bruce Lee.

Like Bruce Lee because it's so hard and the T is loosely making up those rhymes. Don't write it, just do it loosely.