Why Leaving Revenue on Autopilot is Costing You Bookings

Hi, welcome to the Boostly Podcast. This is the podcast that gives hosts the tools, the tactics, the training and most importantly, the confidence so you can go out there and get direct bookings. We do a mini series on this podcast where we shine the Boostly spotlight on people and services and tech that you need to know about. And today we're joined by the founder and CEO of Techtape. And this is something which if you're a host and you're wondering what to use and how things can connect, then this is going to be really interesting and you're going to really get, get a lot out of this episode. So please do listen to the end and, and see how you can add the information that you're getting in this into your business or reach out to tech tape. So welcome along Jon. Thank you for, for joining me today.

Hey Liam, it's, it's good to see you again. Talk again. It's been a little, a little while, but yeah, it's always good to reconnect.

It's, it's, it's nice to have you on as a returning guest. It's been about two years since we last spoke to you. So for those who are listening to this, who haven't heard of you or haven't heard of Techtape, can you give us a quick overview of Techtape, who you're, who you help and how? Yeah.

So Techtape is a company that focuses exclusively on the short term rental industry. We have two services. The first is we work with short term rental operators large and small and we really help them boost their revenue performance. We the revenue management for them and we have some, you know, some clients who have one property and some clients who have 100 plus properties and working with them across the board to boost their revenue performance. And then what you just mentioned briefly, we also are the way we execute this, we do take a lot of the technology that's out in the short term rental space and we make it all work so that it works for your business as opposed to how the, you know, the company decided that technology should work. So those are the two services. But right now we really are focused on the revenue because I think as you know, the revenue performance seems to be slowing down a bit from the 2021, 2022 and even 2023, you know, boost. And so we're really helping a lot of operators regain the revenue performance.

What led you to get into Techtape? What problem were you looking to solve when you first set out? Not many people may know, but You're a host yourself. If you can just give us a bit of background.

Every solution that Techtape provides is solutions for operators, by operators. So not only was I, but I continue to be, I still have a company where we provide, where we are managing properties out in Honolulu, Hawaii. And so all of the pain points on the day to day operations that we feel we're creating the tailored solution, whether it's on the revenue side or whatnot, to address those problems. So we're not, we don't have to go out and do kind of a case study and try to figure out what our industry needs. We know what the industry needs. And then on the, on the revenue side, when I was just running my short term rental business out in Honolulu and you know, this was within the first year of operating, our two bedroom, two bath condos were routinely generating in excess of $200,000 in US dollars of annual gross revenue. And this is prior to Covid. So it's not, you know, it's not the, you know, post pandemic bump. And so other managers in Honolulu initially asked, hey, can you help but help us just to the revenue side and we'll take care of everything else. And so we did that initially to help our colleagues. And then my friends and operators on the mainland in the US started asking, we did that and then so in 2021, end of 2021 is when tech Tape was formally formed as an entity on the technology and revenue management side. But for many years prior to that, probably five, six years prior to that, we were creating solutions. And so we've been really growing up with the industry and not coming in as a tech provider trying to find a problem to solve. But we know what the problems are and we're solving it first for ourselves and then deploying it to other operators.

What are some of the biggest signs of these shifts happening and why is revenue management in particular so critical for the hosts that are listening to this?

I just want to put this kind of into a context that I think a lot of us can see and understand has happened in other industries. So if you look at like the e commerce industry, for example, right. You know, about like eight, you know, eight, 10 years ago, it was very easy to start an E commerce business. You know, you just kind of had a product, you put it online or you put it on Amazon and like you could start making a lot of money doing, you know, basically once you have the systems doing nothing, not nothing, you know, very little, and create a good business. I would say today not Too many people will just jump into an E commerce business willy nilly saying, hey, this is my next move, right? It's matured so much, the technology, the platforms, you know, Amazon taking so much of the cut, the competitiveness, so that if you want to succeed as an E commerce business, you really have to go into it as a serious business, have the system set up and you know, from the get go so that you're not just wasting your time and money trying to start a new business. We're kind of in that phase in the short term rental industry where, you know, 2021, 2022, you could still just list a property on Airbnb or vrbo. And even if you didn't like get your systems right, or even if you didn't get your revenue management right, things just happened and revenue came in. We are at a point right now where the OTAs are starting to take more and more. There's a lot of competition coming in, there's a lot of technology that's helping the competition be better at the game, right? And so if you think what you did one or two years ago is just going to continue to go on, you're going to be one of those, you know, successful E commerce businesses that kind of, you know, fizzled away because you thought you could continue to do exactly what you were doing. And then competition, you know, started taking the market share. That is literally what is happening to the short term rental industry at this point. And so in any business revenue, the top line revenue, right, is the starting point. And then you have your expenses and your systems and everything. So revenue management is so critical to get right right now. And even if you were able to bring in great revenue a year or two ago, or two years ago, it does not mean that like it's just going to continue on that way. And I'm not saying this as doom and gloom or I'm just giving some historic context. And this is kind of the natural progression of emerging industries. And that is literally what I'm seeing. And I'm not the one that came up with this analogy. You know, there are other experts who came up with it and I listened to them. The founder of Minoan was the one that I, you know, kind of open, opened me up to this. But it's very clear that that is what's happening to our industry right now. And so if you want to be successful, whether it's revenue management, whether it's systems, whether it's hiring, whatever it may be, you really need to take it as A serious business and not as a side hustle or a hobby.

One of the mistakes, as we said, is leaving on autopilot. But is there any other big mistakes that you see regularly before we talk about the solutions, is there any other kind of mistakes that people who are listening to this may be making that they might not be aware that they're making?

Yes, this will sound very counterintuitive, but trying to force your property or your portfolio or to meet what others or what the market is doing, or exceed it by a certain percentage, Right. What we call it is chasing the market or chasing the competitor. Right?

So.

Trying to force your pricing or your pricing and revenue strategy around what you see or what you believe your competitors are doing 85% of the time, that actually is very counterintuitive because your property is unique and not just in terms of its physical attributes, right. Where it's located and the views and what it has, but the photography, the reviews that it gets, the, you know, where it's showing up in the algorithm. Right. So even if you have, like the same property in a condominium building, if the algorithm is pushing you down, then there are things that you need to do to get it back up. Right. And you can't just say, well, the property next door to me is pricing it and getting booked at this rate. And I see so many even very expert operators chasing that. And when you chase what your property cannot achieve, what actually happens is you underachieve even further because there are all. There are other dynamics that are going on aside from the physical property itself. And so that is something that I just want to. It's really difficult, especially as a real estate asset. It's like, you know, everyone's used to the comps, and if this property sold for this much, then my property should suffer this much. But chasing that is something that I see consistently that ends up causing the underperformance.

Would you be able to share how people can come and find out more from yourself? Where do they go? What links? And then can you also to. To finish share with the listeners what piece of advice? What's the one thing they should do straight after this podcast to go and, you know, move the needle forward in their business?

I. I am Fairly active on LinkedIn myself and then obviously my company, Techtape. So if you look up, you know, John on tech tape on LinkedIn, you can find me and I'm happy to hop on a call, you know, kind of a brief, you know, introductory call to learn about your business, and you can schedule a Time there. We have our website and I, you know, I'm sure you don't put in the show notes, so, you know, I can leave it at that. And we have a small presence on Facebook and Instagram.

Thank you so much.

And the advice to move their business forward, I'll focus specifically on the revenue side, which is it's the consistency Every, you know, few days, looking at your revenue, seeing what's happening and making an adjustment that will really help move that needle forward. And I think that's like kind of lowest hanging fruit that a lot of people miss is, you know, it's a month or two before they go back into the revenue management tools and make adjustments. So I will say it's the consistency that really matters.

Definitely do one thing every day that, that moves the. The business forward, which is. Which is great. This has been really fun. John, thank you so much for, for coming on. And thank you too for listening to this on the Boostly podcast. Hopefully you can take this information and you can go into your business and ultimately everything we talk about here on the Boostly podcast is how you can improve your hospitality business, but particularly those direct bookings and obviously improving your revenue. Being set at the right price, having the right tech. There's a number of different ways you can come and do this. And if you want to talk more about direct bookings, there's two places you can do. You can go to. You can go to the Facebook group, which is the hospitality community. It's a free Facebook group. Or you can go to Amazon and buy the bestselling book by Mark Simpson, which is the book Direct Playbook. And it'll help you get more direct bookings if you give that a read or listen on audible. John, this has been really fun. Thank you again for coming on. For everybody who wants to go and check out tech tape, go to ww.gettechtape.com and the links are in the show notes. That's it for this episode. We'll see you on the next one. Thanks. Bye for now.

Having a blast. Gonna get it on the Bruce Lee podcast. Bruce Lee like Bruce Lee. Cause it's so hard and the T is loosely making up those rhymes. Don't write it, just do it loosely.