Building a high-performing short-term rental isn’t about throwing money at renovations and hoping for results. It’s about strategic design choices that create a destination guests actively seek out—not just settle for.
In this episode, Mark Lumpkin breaks down his proven framework for transforming underperforming properties into revenue powerhouses. From identifying the right foundation before you buy, to niching down with precision, to leveraging photography that tells an irresistible story—Mark shares the exact steps his team at STR Cribs uses to help operators double their revenue.
You’ll learn how to analyze your competition without copying them, why most properties fail to differentiate themselves, and the small intentional touches that convert browsers into bookers. Whether you’re acquiring your first property or refreshing an existing portfolio, this conversation will shift how you think about design, marketing, and guest experience.
Summary and Highlights
🎯 Meet Mark Lumpkin
Mark Lumpkin is the Head of Marketing and Sales at STR Cribs, a full-service design and construction company specializing in high-performing short-term rentals. With five years in the industry, Mark has helped operators across the country transform underperforming properties into top-tier revenue generators through strategic renovations, amenity planning, and niche positioning.
Before joining STR Cribs, Mark was part of the founding team at Showplace, where he honed his expertise in furniture, design, and guest experience optimization. He currently owns and self-manages a Superhost property while building his own portfolio.
Mark’s approach centers on one core belief: every property needs a clear answer to the question, “What makes this special?” His work has resulted in case studies where properties have doubled their annual revenue after renovation—often with payback periods of under 12 months.
💡 Why Differentiation Matters More Than Ever
The short-term rental landscape has undergone a fundamental shift. Post-COVID, the market has matured beyond slapping IKEA furniture in a spare bedroom and watching bookings roll in. Competition is fiercer, guest expectations are higher, and operators who can’t articulate what makes their property special are getting left behind.
Mark opened the conversation with a striking reality check: “If you can’t simply answer the question, what’s special about my property—what’s different about my property—you’re setting yourself up for failure.”
This isn’t about having the most amenities or spending the most money. It’s about strategic positioning that makes your property the obvious choice for a specific type of guest. When you nail this, everything else—from occupancy rates to direct bookings—becomes exponentially easier.
🏡 The Foundation Comes First
One of Mark’s most valuable insights centers on acquisition strategy. Too many operators fall in love with a property’s aesthetic without evaluating its fundamentals. Mark’s team starts consulting before clients even make an offer.
The critical question isn’t just about location or the number of bedrooms. It’s about space and potential. A property on the side of a hill in Gatlinburg with only a tiny deck has almost nowhere to grow. Meanwhile, a property with acreage and flat land can add amenities such as pickleball courts, fire pits, outdoor games, and other features that genuinely increase revenue.
“You’ve got that tiny little deck, and then anything else would cost you such an exorbitant amount of money to improve the real estate, it wouldn’t be worth it,” Mark explained. Starting with the right canvas means you’re not fighting uphill from day one.
For operators building direct booking brands, this foundation becomes even more important. Properties with differentiation potential become shareable, Instagram-worthy destinations that guests actively seek out and return to.
📈 Case Study: Scottsdale Property Doubles Revenue
Mark shared a standout success story that perfectly illustrates his framework in action. A client in Scottsdale, Arizona, owned a five-bedroom property that had been generating $100,000 to $110,000 annually for five years. Revenue was declining each year, and the property had become forgettable.
The bones were solid: a large backyard, a pool, and five bedrooms. But it lacked soul. Guests weren’t booking because they were excited about the property—they were booking because it was available and cheap.
STR Cribs transformed the property with a clear niche: the ultimate golf-themed bachelor pad. They permitted and converted the unused garage space into a game room with a poker table. They added a backyard golf simulator, a mini golf course, a chipping range, a hot tub, a fire pit, and a pickleball court. Inside, they redesigned the entire aesthetic to match the golf theme.
The result? Annual revenue jumped to $235,000—more than doubling year-over-year. The renovation nearly paid for itself in the first 12 months. The property now attracts higher-quality guests, commands premium rates, and has built substantial equity through permitted additions.
This case study reinforces a crucial principle for direct booking success: when your property becomes a destination rather than a commodity, conversion rates soar.
🎯 Finding Your Niche Without Guessing
So how do you identify the right niche for your property? Mark’s process is methodical and data-driven, rather than being based on gut feelings or trends.
Start with competitive analysis. Identify the five best-performing properties in your market that are comparable in size and location. Study what they offer. If all five have hot tubs, you need one. If four have barrel saunas, you probably need one too. If they’re all dog-friendly, that’s not optional—it’s table stakes.
This research establishes your baseline. You’re not copying—you’re understanding what guests in your market expect from top-tier properties. Then comes the differentiation layer.
“How do I go above and beyond?” Mark asked. “I’ve got the same meat and potatoes, but I’ve got a different flavor of seasoning and hot sauce on it that will maybe bring in a little bit different type of person.”
Mark also cautioned against the “build it and they will come” approach. Creating a completely unique concept in an unproven market takes serious conviction and comes with risk. He’s seen it work, but recommends operators ground their strategy in proven demand first.
For those pursuing direct booking strategies, this competitive intelligence serves as the foundation for your content marketing, SEO targeting, and social media positioning.
📸 Photography That Tells Your Story
Even the most thoughtfully designed property will underperform if the photography fails to effectively communicate its value. Mark emphasized that travelers make booking decisions almost entirely based on photos—not descriptions.
“I don’t believe that most travelers, if almost any, actually read your description,” he said. “They’re reading your headline, they’re looking at the total guest count, bedroom, bathroom count, and they’re looking at the photos. Then they’re either booking or they’re not.”
This insight has profound implications for how operators approach their listing presence. Your photographer isn’t just a vendor—they’re a team member who needs to understand your niche and story.
Mark gave a powerful example: if you’re marketing to families, don’t hide your Pack ‘n Play in a closet. Stage it in the nursery. Put out the kids’ bowls, the high chair, the baby soap. Show families exactly what they’ll experience when they arrive.
“If you’ve got all that stuff out and you take that great photo that shows people what they’re gonna get when they book and it meets their needs, I think that is almost more important than having the amenities,” Mark noted.
This principle extends directly to direct booking sites. When guests land on your website, they need to immediately see themselves in your property. Great photography removes friction and accelerates the booking decision.
🚀 Direct Bookings Start With a Bookable Property
One of the most refreshing aspects of this conversation was Mark’s straightforward approach to direct booking readiness. You can’t market your way out of a mediocre product.
“If your property’s not booking out on the OTAs where you’re getting a lot of leverage because the property sucks,” Mark said bluntly, “do you think that just simply having a direct booking site and running ads or sending people to your site is gonna get them to book?”
This is a reality check many operators need. Direct booking success isn’t just about building a website or running ads; it’s about creating a seamless experience. It starts with having a property that guests genuinely want to stay in.
When you nail the property experience, direct booking becomes exponentially easier. Your social media content performs better because the property is photogenic. Your SEO strategy works because you have a unique angle worth writing about. Your repeat guest rate climbs because people had a memorable experience.
Mark also touched on long-tail keyword opportunities. He shared his own experience searching for a “bachelor-themed house” in Gatlinburg and finding almost nothing. That’s a high-intent search with low competition—exactly the kind of niche that drives profitable direct bookings.
🔍 AI as a Research Tool, Not a Crystal Ball
Mark and Gil spent time discussing how AI can be integrated into the research and planning process. Mark uses ChatGPT extensively for email responses, project quoting, and copywriting—but he’s careful about relying on it for strategic decisions.
“I never want one thing to be my source of truth,” Mark explained. “I want to take in all different opinions and try to bring in lots of different data points.”
His research stack includes AI, as well as local property managers, Facebook groups, and direct market observation. Facebook groups in particular have become goldmines of unfiltered information. Operators openly discuss what’s working and what isn’t, providing real-world validation AI can’t offer.
For operators building direct booking engines, this multi-source approach prevents you from chasing hallucinated trends or making decisions based on incomplete data.
⚡ Rapid Fire with Mark Lumpkin
📚 Book Recommendations:
- The Richest Man in Babylon (audiobook) – Mark’s all-time favorite for wealth building and lifestyle changes
- How to Win Friends and Influence People by Dale Carnegie – “The gold standard for success in your life, business, and relationships”
🧠 One Piece of Mindset Advice: “It’s going to take you longer than you think, and that’s okay.”
Mark emphasized that the biggest misconception in business is expecting quick success. If something promises rapid results, it’s probably a scam. The snowball effect starts small and slow, but compounds over time. Focus on base hits, not home runs.
🎯 One Tactical Takeaway: Start diversifying your booking channels now. You already have repeat guests, friends, and family who will book with you. Send them to your direct booking site instead of OTAs. Just one or two bookings can cover your annual subscription cost, and you’re building owned channels from day one.
🔗 Connect with Mark Lumpkin
- Company: STR Cribs
- LinkedIn: Mark Lumpkin on LinkedIn
- Instagram: @strcribs
- YouTube: STR Cribs YouTube Channel
🎧 Ready to Transform Your Property Strategy?
Mark’s insights demonstrate that high-performing short-term rentals aren’t built on luck—they’re built on strategy, differentiation, and intentional design choices that cater to a specific guest.
Whether you’re evaluating your first acquisition or refreshing an underperforming portfolio, the principles Mark shared will help you compete at the highest level.
Listen to the full episode to hear more about Mark’s renovation process, competitive analysis framework, and how to position your property for direct booking success.
And when you’re ready to build a direct booking website that actually converts, CraftedStays is here to help. Purpose-built for STR operators, our platform makes it easy to showcase your property’s unique story and start capturing more bookings on your terms.
Start your free trial today and take control of your booking channels.
Transcript
Mark: You got that tiny little deck, and then anything else would cost you such an exorbitant amount of money to improve the real estate. It wouldn’t be worth it. So really trying to help people start on a good foundation to me is, is kind of step one, making sure that they’ve got room to grow and something that can be done with it.
Mark: And then after that, it’s really diving into your niche gonna be, what are you doing special that other people can’t do? And if you don’t have an answer to that, I think that you’re setting yourself up for failure. It’s gonna be really hard to compete if you can’t simply answer the question, what’s special about my property?
Mark: What’s different about my property?
Gil: Before we bring on my guest, I wanted to talk just a little bit about something that I’ve been hearing a lot from Host. I keep on hearing the same thing. I know my website isn’t converting, but I can’t afford $8,000 on a agency to rebuild it. Here’s the thing, you’re letting all these marketing strategies, you’re driving traffic and you’re putting it.
Gil: All to work, but if your site isn’t really built to convert, you’re basically lighting your energy and money on fire. And even if you could afford an agency build, every time you want to test something or make a change, you’re having to pay them again. You can’t iterate, you can’t test, and you really can’t improve on things.
Gil: You don’t need a custom $10,000 website to get the conversion rates that really matter. You just need the right platform. That’s why I build craft Estates. It’s purpose built for short-term rentals and designed from the ground up to help you drive more direct bookings. You can finally turn that traffic into bookings and you can keep on testing and improving.
Gil: As you learn, you can make changes all on the platform. You don’t need to learn something new. So if you need some help or you wanna get started, go ahead and go to craft stays.co and start your free trial. Now let’s bring on our guests and dive deep into hospitality and marketing.
Gil: Hey folks. Welcome back to the Booked Solid Show, the podcast where we’re bringing in top operations to discuss marketing, revenue management, and direct bookings. On today’s show, I have Mark Lumpkin. He is one of the early members of STR Cribs. He is focused on really making sure that properties are high performing from the very beginning.
Gil: So him and his team, they work with you on acquiring the properties, have real, have opportunity, but also being able to then convert that over and really do full rehabs on those properties to make sure that they perform. At the top of the market there. On today’s show, he breaks down how he goes through that entire process, what that looks like from a user’s perspective, but also we dive really deep into one of the things that makes.
Gil: Their property is so successful, which is niching down and really trying to figure out what are the types of amenities, what are the types of things that you should be doing as you’re preparing that property, and also what you should be doing after the property is all fully renovated, and how to make sure that you’re marketing that one really, really effectively.
Gil: So without further ado, let’s bring in.
Gil: Hey Mark, welcome to the show.
Mark: Hey, thanks for having me. I’m so excited to be here.
Gil: Yeah, it’s great to have you on. I think we crossed paths maybe a few times now, so I’m, it’s really good to have someone kinda ask me to bring you on. I’m excited to have you here. Um, to kinda kick us off, uh, mark, do you mind giving folks kind of a brief introduction on who you are?
Mark: Yeah, definitely. Um, you are right. It’s a, it’s a small industry and you seem to kind of. Either know people from afar just through social media, or you’ve got mutual friends. So I’m glad we could finally connect in person or over the, over the video zoom. Um, so yeah, if anybody listening in, my name is Mark Lumpkin.
Mark: I am the, uh, head of marketing sales for STR Cribs. I’ve been in the short term rental space for about five years now, and I focus primarily on renovations, design, furniture, amenities. Basically taking properties from just empty canvases to great high performing short term rentals. That’s been my focus.
Mark: Um, I’ve got my own property now. We’re trying to buy a second one. We’re super hosts. Uh, we, we self-manage our own home so far for the last year. It’s been really fun. So yeah, man, that, that’s me. I’ve always been an avid traveler. We’ve got a couple of kids and a couple of dogs. So traveling with short-term rentals always seems to be the option.
Mark: We’ve never been much big on the hotels. And, uh, I just naturally found my way into this industry and it’s been fun.
Gil: Yeah, you, you’re, you’re not kidding when, when you own a dog or a kid, actually, probably more kid having the kitchen and the laundry in. Is so clutch like I remember like when we, when our kids were less than five, just being in a home, being able to cook them their food, be able to warm up their own milk, like that was really, really important.
Gil: When we traveled and we pretty much exclusively, we didn’t even look at hotels. We only exclusively stayed at.
Mark: Agreed a hundred percent. We, uh, I just this a couple of months ago, we, I had to fly in for my sister’s wedding and we had a, a, a long way over in Nashville. We were staying the night at the airport hotel, and my. One of my daughters is five and a half years old, and when we walked into the hotel room, it is the first time she’d ever been in a hotel in her life.
Mark: And we’re avid travelers. We travel all the time and she’s like, where’s my room? Where’s our kitchen daddy? Where are you gonna cook breakfast? And I just was like, this is hilarious that she’s almost six years old and has never been in a hotel. We’ve taken this girl all around the world and
Mark: she’s never been in a hotel.
Gil: Yeah. Yeah. I, I think my kids are quite normalized on an, well, on the hosting side as well too. They’re like, oh, when are we gonna buy another house that we can rent out? So it’s, it’s, it’s pretty funny. Kind of like what we expose ’em into.
Gil: Um,
Mark: I know We’re setting him up for failure.
Gil: no, I think it’s actually pretty good. Like, I feel like.
Gil: I feel like my daughter because. I run like craft estates as a business. She saw me grow it from nothing, from a concept I, she’s not exposed to like the nitty gritty of things, but she knows that like she, she’s swag everywhere. She sees me going to conferences, um, and.
Gil: Also like taking her on all the rentals that we we own and showing her what we do, what we’re renovating. Um, even if like we’re, she’s not there when we’re doing the renovations, like she’s seeing that process go through. So she is like itching for like, oh, when can we buy another house? Like, why can’t we buy one over there?
Gil: I was like, okay, yeah, we can,
Gil: we gotta save up. We gotta, we gotta build that cash flow and get another property. Um, but it’s, it’s pretty neat to be able to expose. I, I didn’t grow up like that, like when I, when I was a little kid, like. We, my, my parents were the W2. They worked, they worked blue collar jobs, they worked their rear off.
Gil: We would get to spend the weekends together, but it wasn’t as dynamic as I think, like folks that grew up in an entrepreneurial family.
Mark: Definitely. I agree. I’m from the same background as well, and yeah, my kids are definitely living a totally different life than we ever lived as kids and we, me and my wife always laugh about that. You know, go check on a property and you take your kids and they’re looking what’s going on and yeah, it’s pretty cool, man.
Gil: I would say like even, um, the. You have kids and, and we talk a lot about, um, the growth mindset quite a bit in our fam in our household. And like my daughter often says like, I can’t do it. And we always have to reminder her like, you don’t know how to do it yet. Um, and it’s like implanting that yet in, in her mind.
Gil: And because I, I, and I tell her like. Constantly that like I fail every single day. Like I fail quite a bit and I’m trying different things and like, I’m like, I have a project on my desk that I’m trying out, like outside of like all the SR stuff and like she sees me fail all, all the time. And like that is something that you want to kind of breed in into that child very early on.
Gil: So it’s really good to be able to expose them into that.
Mark: Yeah, I couldn’t agree more, man. I couldn’t agree more.
Gil: Um, talk to me a little bit about, uh, those early days. Like how, like were you part of the, the founding team? Did you join later on? Like, what was that like?
Mark: Yeah, definitely. So my story’s, uh. Pretty simple actually. As far as where I’ve been at in the space. I started with Showplace, which is a, uh, a just a design firm. I started with them very early when they first got going. I actually remember we had signed the very, when I started, we had signed the very first furniture and design client with them, so that was really fun. I was with them for a number of years, and then I was approached about STR cribs as things were getting going with them. And I was really excited about the aspect where they were gonna do renovations and they were a GC as well, so they could do construction and they could add pickleball courts and they could permit additions and things like that.
Mark: And so, yeah, I was definitely on one of the, kind of the founding teams of both of those companies still with STR cribs now. And so. I’ve always been really intrigued by the startup world as well. I, it’s fast paced, it’s quickly moving and I like that where you, you have a challenge that presents itself and the company can do 180 degree pivot and we can, you know, huddle with the team and say, Hey, this is what’s going on.
Mark: This is the challenge we’re facing. Is everybody in agree? Yep. Let’s go another direction. And you can navigate that. And that’s really fun. I’ve really enjoyed that. Um, you know, kind of the corporate world, big companies where things move so slowly and. difficult to make meaningful changes I was never, never interested in.
Mark: So I’ve always really enjoyed the startup world, and I think I’ll probably probably be in the short term rental startup world for most of my life.
Gil: That’s, that’s awesome. That’s awesome. Like we’re, I feel like a lot of times we’re, we’re in those early days, like we’re still in a place where regulations are still being built and people are trying to figure it out and like, yes, we’ve had like this big wave more recently, but quite honestly, I think in a lot of ways.
Gil: The tools that we use, the standardizations that we have are pretty, pretty new. Um, and I think that the industry is gonna continue to evolve over the next five, 10 years dramatically.
Mark: Oh, I couldn’t agree. It cha It changes constantly. I mean, almost every couple of weeks I’m surprised. I’m like, oh, wow, that’s, that’s new. I didn’t think about that. Or someone’s doing it like this. That’s, that’s very interesting. And so, yes, it’s drastically changed just in a very short time period. Even post COVID.
Mark: I mean, right after COVID you could, you could do anything you wanted to. You could buy a three bedroom, two bath in the middle of a Hayden home community and slap some IKEA furniture in it, and you were making money and you were rented out all the time. And the, the competition has gotten fiercer, the quality of products have gotten better, and so it really takes a unique edge to stand out with most properties. And that wasn’t like that just a few years ago.
Mark: So, Yeah.
Mark: I’m, I’m, I’m excited to see how it continues to change and. As long as there’s hardworking people like you and me getting after the solutions, we’ll find a way.
Gil: Yeah, you’re, you’re absolutely right. I think like there was this big wave and then following that big wave is like folks that trying to elevate themselves and spending a lot of energy on quality of their stays and monetizing their stays. And I think like right now we’re in this like. Really big inflection point of like people starting to build their own brands.
Gil: Thinking about like, I’m not just on Airbnb, but I’m starting to build a portfolio that I’m really proud of, that I want folks to come up back to me to know me as a brand and that direct booking wave that in combination with all the changes that Airbnb has make has been making over probably even the last like eight months.
Gil: Like they’ve made some pretty dramatic changes, like they’re changing their host fee structures. Um, they change their cancellation policy. Um, they change their payment processing. Uh, when someone does like a chargeback, like they made some pretty dramatic changes that are not in favor with ho with with hosts whatsoever.
Gil: Like, I don’t remember the last time they made a change. And hosts are like, can I, I’ve been waiting for this for a long time. Like, I don’t remember the last time that has happened.
Mark: Yeah, I, um, couldn’t agree more. It’s very interesting timing when we’re recording this episode. You know, obviously you never know when someone’s gonna listen to it, but yeah, the buzz all over social media is, that’s all people are talking about is once again, Airbnb. Airbnb strikes again. And another thing that is, that is. Super guest friendly and, and not host friendly. And it almost feels like the balance of power has shifted, you know, the pendulum has swing too far one way.
Mark: And, um, you know, I’m going through the resolution, uh, reimbursement request right now for a guest that stayed couple of nights, three or four days ago, and they did like $2,000 worth of damage.
Mark: They just
Mark: completely destroyed the house. They just literally broke furniture, left pizza stains all over the carpet. Um, it, it is just crazy. And so it’ll be really interesting to see how this goes. And, um, I would say more times than not, these, the OTAs are very heavily favoring the guests and not the property owners. And I, I’m wondering, you know, that’s all people could talk about. I gotta go direct booking, I gotta do more of this, I gotta need more channels because the platforms don’t really care about you. You’re just a number.
Gil: Yeah, it’s, it is been pretty crazy. More, more even like they’re changing, like their in internal, uh, review process of using ai. I’ve heard so many bad things about folks having really legitimate reasons to have a review removed and rather than really using AI to like benefit the, the overall experience, they’re using it to really opt, optimize on like cutting costs and like really making sure like they don’t have the staff people to review.
Gil: Like the review process anymore. And basically an AI agent is going in there and saying yes or no to you, removing your review, and you basically have two chances. And if you don’t, if you don’t get it right in those two chances, and AI feels like, oh, you’re, it is not a legitimate response, they’re just gonna cancel you out.
Gil: And, and even I’ve heard instances where they’re talking to an agent and the agent’s like, sorry, the, I can’t override that process. That’s, that’s, that’s infuriating.
Mark: I can’t override the ai,
Mark: the AI controls everything we live in. And what’s that Will Smith movie that came out years and years ago? iRobot.
Mark: We’re living in that world,
Gil: Oh my gosh. I hope it doesn’t turn out that way. I, I, I see a lot of benefits on ai, but like some, I think some folks are, are not, not using it in, in the best interest of the, the company or the, the users.
Mark: Yeah. When it’s used, well, it, it makes a business and a process and a product much better. When it’s used poorly, it makes it substantially worse.
Gil: yeah, yeah. Slight tangent. I, I, I’d be interested in hearing, like, what are some of the use uses of AI that you’re using? Um, either personally or SDR cribs.
Mark: Yeah, great question. Um. Yeah, it’s, it’s kind of been a company wide initiative. I would say probably maybe 12 months ago, maybe a year ago now. A, as you know, it became more prevalent in everybody’s day to day where we huddled and we said, Hey guys, if we don’t stay on top of this just as a company
Mark: and we’re not leveraging this, these new tools, then we’re gonna get left in the dust. And so, you know, I, I primarily use chat GBT. We’ve got team members that use Grok. We’ve got team members at other, other platforms. But I would say we’re using it to do a lot of our, we’re using it to make our day easier and give us back more time. And so to me that’s been the biggest benefit is what can I automate and streamline That was just clicking a button.
Mark: And it’s not like, it doesn’t require any brain power. It was simply just. Meaningless tasks that I had to do every day. How can I get that stuff off my plate so that I have more time for growth, creative thinking, relationship building, things like that. And so I’d say just holistically our companies using it to offload the tasks that we’re just time consuming, that don’t require our best efforts, and then giving us time back to focus on the things that we do well and that will move our business forward.
Gil: What’s, uh, what’s some examples of that?
Mark: Um, I mean, I’m definitely using it in, in my ai, excuse me, in my email, um, responding, um, in quoting projects and, um, all of my research, a lot of my copywriting, things like that are, are usually where I’m using it mostly.
Gil: Yeah. Yeah. Are you, are you spending a lot of time on prompting or are you using it more conversationally and trying to figure out, like, are you having conversations with AI or are you saying like, I want you to do X, Y, or z?
Mark: Yeah, I’m having a lot more conversations and I am using custom GBT GBTs where I have like, you know, a folder that is client communication about X, Y, Z, and it’s learned as much stuff as possible and, and so it, it’s. Very custom, I would say, all across the board. If I’m on social media, you know, my custom GBT has all of the people, it knows all the people that I’m following that are influencers in this space.
Mark: And it knows what I’m trying to accomplish with my brand and my outbound reach.
Mark: And so I’m using, I’m that, that’s how I’m using it. And you know, I’m definitely not perfect. I’m trying to learn every day. But yeah, it’s been fun.
Gil: It’s, it’s, it’s, it’s a, it’s a crazy time that we’re in right now.
Mark: It was definitely crazy, man.
Gil: Yeah. Um, talk to me about some of the wins that you guys were, were able to accomplish for some of your clients. So like, do you have any use cases or case studies of clients that had a property running. Already, and they’re like, this property has to do better or can do better, and they, they hire you in there.
Gil: What’s, what’s some of the lift that you guys have done?
Mark: Great question. Yeah, so I’ve got some almost unbelievable wins that we’ve had and some of these like case studies are even on like my, our YouTube channel and you can go check ’em out. But you know, recently the one that pokes to mind is we had a client with a property in Scottsdale, Arizona. It was doing about a hundred to 110,000 a year in revenue.
Mark: They’d
Mark: owned it for five years and they wanted to do a full refresh. They were, you know, every year revenue was going down, revenue was going down. And so we looked at the property and it had good bones, had a
Mark: huge backyard, had a pool, already had five bedrooms, and by all metrics should be in that kind of topper percentile of properties. But it did not have any heart and soul, and it didn’t have a theme. It wasn’t. Targeting a certain demographic. It was just kind of the, no one was booking it because they were excited to book the
Mark: property. They were booking it. ’cause it was like, all right, well, I guess this is the house that we stay at.
Mark: That’s what the property was. And so we went in, we were able to take an unused space in the garage, permit it, and turn it into a game room. So we immediately added some additional amenities. It became a golf themed house because they had a huge backyard and they were really close to a bunch of golf courses.
Mark: So we really turned it into kind of the bachelor pad. We did a poker room in the game room. We did a golf simulator in the backyard. We did a mini golf course. We did a chipping, uh, range where we had like the rough and you could chip with your wedges. We added a hot tub. We added a fire pit, and then we added a pickleball court and then just redesigned the inside of the house. They just got back their one year, their 12 month revenue report post. Um, the refresh is what we like to call it. And they ended up doing about 2 35. And so they over doubled their revenue year over year after the refresh and they almost cleared the total cost of the refresh in the first 12 months. And so they, it’s, it’s a crazy cash on cash return and now the property’s just gonna crush it for years to come. So that’s fresh in my mind ’cause I just saw those numbers the other day
Gil: Wow, so you almost got a buyback period of less than a year and Yeah. And
Mark: is which crazy.
Gil: you have increased cash flow. You have a much healthier occupancy rate, I’m guessing,
Mark: Definitely.
Gil: and probably the most exciting part is the built in equity. If they were to flip that property around.
Mark: Absolutely. Yeah. ’cause they’ve done things that are hard, that are, that are value added to the property. You know, they’ve added square footage by doing a
Mark: conversion that’s permitted. We can do that ’cause we’re a gc. They’ve added a pickleball court. That’s a hard ad to a property. They’ve added a hot tub That increased the property value.
Mark: And the other thing too, that a lot of people don’t talk about is they just have a better quality guest too. They’re no longer the bottom of the barrel, charging the lowest rate in town and just hoping for someone to book, they’re a destination that people are seeking out. They’re getting a better quality guest that’s leaving the property in better shape.
Mark: Paying a higher nightly premium, leaving better reviews is just a win, win, win, win, win all across the board.
Gil: Yeah, I, I mean, I’m excited on, on, on the direct booking side because you now have a brand that people want to send traffic back to. They wanna talk about, these are, these are properties that do extremely well on social. They’re very, very shareable. Like these are kind of viral type properties that you can really be quite independent from the OTAs.
Mark: definitely. And yeah, we should dive into that social media ’cause it, I love that you brought that up. ’cause I was a, I’ve got a friend who’s just finishing becoming a pharmacist. He’s in his last couple months and we were out to dinner the other night and you know, like all the buddies were like, hey. Why don’t we plan a trip just like as a celebration for you getting your doctorate. And we’re like, well let’s go to Gatlinburg, Tennessee. ’cause that’s close enough to us. And so this morning I plug into Airbnb and I start looking to try to find a cool cabin for us. I didn’t really find much, so then I Google searched bachelor themed house ’cause we’re not going for a bachelor party.
Mark: But it’s the same type of feel of a vacation. Just a group of buddies
Mark: couldn’t find anything. The only thing I could find on social media was bachelorette themed house. And I thought, wow, that’s interesting. No one’s got a bachelor themed property in Gatlinburg, Tennessee, and no one’s going after that market. I’m sure that people are Google searching it
Gil: Oh my God.
Mark: for that online, but no one’s, no one’s targeting that with their social media or their direct booking sites.
Gil: Yeah, I think those are the folks that do actually really well, especially on the SEO side. You’re, you’re mentioning something called like what we call long tail keywords, which are usually search terms that are very, very specific about what someone’s looking for. They’re usually high intent, meaning like they’re.
Gil: Really motivated to find a stay. Like you’re not just looking for a stay. Uh, you’re looking for a very specific stay where if you do find that stay, your likelihood to book at some point is gonna be really, really high. And the nice thing about long tail keywords, bachelor themed cabin in Gatlinburg is that you don’t have a lot of competition.
Gil: So when you’re creating content, when you’re building your portfolio, creating blog posts about that, you actually can very easily drive traffic to your website. Whereas on the inverse side of things, if you try to optimize your SEO for Gatlinburg Cabin for families, for instance, that one’s really hard.
Gil: If even just put like Gatlinburg short term rental, that’s gonna be extremely hard. You bet you VRBO, Airbnb, booking.com, ve casa, all of them will hit the first five or six different links and probably multiple times as well too. So you’d be happy to be on like page six if any.
Mark: Yep. And I love how you said the high intent. ’cause you’re right, it’s, if I would’ve found it or when I find it, I’m probably gonna book it right away. And I’m not gonna compare the price because I found what I’m looking for. I’m not gonna then go cross reference it with 10 other properties and find out who’s the cheapest or who is three minutes closer to whatever we plan on doing.
Mark: That doesn’t matter. I, I’m searching for something very specific. And when I find it, I’m just gonna book it.
Gil: Yeah. And it, because you’re, you’re, you’re, you’re looking pretty hard, like you already know. Like whatever you do find, it’s gonna be a good one when you do find it.
Mark: Oh, guaranteed. I’m gonna find a good one. We’re gonna have a great stay and someone is gonna benefit. There’s somebody out there who thought this through and, and strategically figured out, Hey, there’s at least enough people. You know, it’s that saying, if you market to everybody, you market to nobody. And so figure out what your niche is.
Mark: That’s what we really like to help people figure out is what’s the niche of this property? What, what can we do to make this thing different and stand out? And the people who do that just seem to win over and over again.
Gil: Yeah, talk to me a little bit about the process there, and I, I definitely wanna dive, talk to me high level about the process of like, okay, someone is interested in really optimizing their property to perform much better, but then also afterwards, I would love to talk to you about like, really that niching down and what does that look like and what does that mean for folks?
Gil: So gimme a high level overview first about the overall process.
Mark: Yeah, I mean, so the process oftentimes for us starts at the time of finding a property, and so people usually reach out to us to consult as they’re doing a search for a property. We don’t oftentimes get people that come to us with an existing short-term rental. It’s oftentimes new properties that are being set up. And so we like to try to give people the information that’s going to really make a difference in revenue. And that’ll come down to occupancy number of bedrooms, the, the proximity of the property to the local attractions. Um, the extra space where you can do things. I mean, you can see behind me if you’re watching this on video, if you didn’t have a backyard, a big backyard, you’re not getting the, you know, the volleyball court, you’re not getting the pickleball court, you’re not doing that stuff just simply ’cause you don’t have space.
Gil: Yep.
Mark: Or where you and me were talking about your property in Gatlinburg earlier, you’ve got a yard you could take advantage of. There’s a lot of properties in Gatlinburg that are on the side of a hill and there’s nothing they can do. You’ve got that tiny little deck and then anything else would cost you such an exorbitant amount of money to improve the real estate.
Mark: It wouldn’t be worth it. So really trying to help people start on a good foundation to me is, is kind of step one, making sure that they’ve got room to grow and something that can be done with
Mark: it. And then after that, it’s really diving into your niche gonna be? What, what, what are you doing special that other people can’t do?
Mark: And if you don’t have an answer to that, I think that you’re setting yourself up for failure. It’s gonna be really hard to compete if you can’t simply answer the question, what’s special about my property? What’s different about my. For you.
Gil: Yeah. So talk to me about like that process. Say you have this property that has a lot of potential. There’s large acres of land, it’s gonna go good, good proximity, so it has all the good bones or foundations of being a really good property. What’s the process of you folks figuring out what the niche is and maybe kinda before you answer that, like why, like why is that important?
Gil: You kind of, you kind of alluded to it already.
Mark: Yeah. Yeah, it’s, it’s important because it drastically changes your revenue projections, and it simply comes down to a matter of making money. At the end of the day, if you don’t do it, you’re gonna get caught in the 50th percentile, and that’s not a great place to be. I mean, the vast majority of revenue is earned by the top percent of properties in most markets, so differentiating yourself is gonna make you a lot more money.
Mark: Step one, how you do that and how you try to figure out what to do with the properties. Is kind of a complicated process. It takes a lot of, lot of research, a lot of local knowledge. Um, but really you start with the competition. So who has the best performing properties that are relatively close to mine?
Mark: Right? I, if I have a two bedroom, one bath cabin, I can’t compare myself to an eight bedroom, 5,000 square foot mansion that’s a mile away that has an indoor pool. I’ve gotta find relative close comps, and then I wanna say, okay. Who’s got the best five properties in this market? Who’s earning the most amount of money?
Mark: And that gives me a benchmark. And I say, okay, these are my five comps and this is what they have. All five of them have a hot tub, so I at least have to have a hot tub. Four of ’em have a barrel sauna. Probably gotta have a barrel sauna. All five of ’em are dog friendly. This is a dog friendly market. The best performing properties are dog friendly.
Mark: I better make sure that my property is dog friendly, and maybe that means a fully fenced backyard. Maybe that means, you know, a little setup for the dog with dog bulls, dog treats, kennels, things like that. But I’ve gotta go through what are the boxes that my, my, my competition, my best performing homes are doing?
Mark: And that’s my benchmark. And then to go above and beyond, how do I differentiate myself? Well, those four, four or five properties are doing this, and I think maybe I could do this. That would be a little bit different. I’ve still got the same meat and potatoes, but I’ve got a different flavor of seasoning and hot sauce on it that will maybe bring in a little bit different type of person. So to me, that’s the most proven way to do this. There’s also the theory of kind of the field of dreams build it and they will come. That takes some serious stones, for lack of a better
Mark: term. You’ve gotta have some guts to go out there and do something that no one else has done in a market. I’ve seen people do it.
Mark: I’ve seen people be rewarded. Um, but that’s, there’s not as much data behind that. So oftentimes I recommend people look at what’s been done by the best homes and try to do that, and then do a little above and beyond.
Gil: Yeah, I, I’m guessing the, the field of dreams one, those are like ground up development. Those are unique bills. These are something different. Or are you referring to even, even when, when you’re acquiring an existing property?
Mark: Yeah, even when you’re acquiring existing property. And so it’s almost like, uh, you know, if we go to. there’s a lot of Disney themed houses, right?
Mark: Almost every house is Disney themed. And so doing a Disney themed house in Orlando is not anything new. And there’s not, like, there’s not no data behind it. But if I go to Cheyenne, Wyoming and I do a Pink Pony themed house for, for, you know, whatever, and I make it crazy pink cowgirl themed house, well, there might not be any out there like that. And so I might be really putting myself out on a ledge. And maybe if there’s a big enough bachelorette theme bachelorette market in that town.
Mark: Like if I’m in Savannah, Georgia or Nashville, maybe there’s some data behind that and that might work out for me. So you’ve, but you’ve really gotta be strategic in that. ’cause you could fall on your face and you could set up a crazy house that looks really, really cool and is unique, but then everybody’s like, no, I’m not, I’m not going to Salt Lake City to stay in a Barbie house.
Gil: Yeah. Yeah. Um, you mentioned earlier that, um, sometimes you’ll use AI for research. Like how do you get around, um, kind of going back to that, that topic there,
Gil: if you, if you use AI for research, how do you avoid it from providing you hallucinations? Um, because that, that happens. Quite often where you’ll ask a question and it’ll give you an answer that you might want to hear, but like from a data perspective, like you don’t, you don’t want a bias answer.
Gil: You want something that is act like factual. Have you found any tricks to make sure that when you’re using AI for those types of research, that it’s giving you concrete data?
Mark: It’s a good question. Yeah. Um, I mean, you can definitely ask why shouldn’t I do this? Give me all the reasons why we shouldn’t do this. Uh, play devil’s advocate. I think I’ve, I’ve done that before and it’s worked out really well. I also am not necessarily relying on AI for all of my information gathering.
Mark: To
Mark: me, it’s just one piece of the equation. I’m also really relying heavily on local resources, so local PMs in that market, you know, they
Mark: know the, they know, they know that market so well. Man, if you just, if you, if you can call a guy who’s got a hundred properties under management, he’s been doing it for a couple years, he can probably tell you everything you need to know about what the market needs, doesn’t need, and what it will support. So I really like that approach. I really like using social media. Facebook groups are so powerful. There’s just so many Airbnb, short-term rental Facebook groups, and I can search any topic. I can go into a group with 500,000 people and has 50 posts a day, and I can go to the top right, and I can search Branson, Missouri, and I can start reading about what people are saying. They’ll tell you, they, they, people wanna put their dirty laundry out there. Someone will say, Hey, I’ve got a three bedroom, two bath condo, and I’m getting annihilated and my revenue’s down year after year. And then another guy says, oh, I’ve got a six bedroom on the lake and I’m just crushing it. And do, I mean the market has all the information out there?
Mark: No, there’s no secrets anymore. People are, put it on the table. You just gotta go find.
Gil: Yeah, that’s, that’s, that’s super clever. That’s super clever. And I, I, I like your balance of like, I think nowadays a lot of folks are relying pretty heavily on, on ai and they think like, oh, that has, it’s this. All, all knowing machine there, that that has all the information. But no, actually a lot of it has to do with information that it doesn’t know, like it doesn’t read Facebook, it doesn’t have access to a lot of those posts out there.
Gil: And you knowing that. That has a very reliable source of data from actual host and you working with local property managers, that’s gonna give you very true answers. Whereas usually these LLMs are gathering information from what’s widely known, what’s widely searchable in the web. So it’s great for like some of the things you mentioned about like automat certain tasks there, but you have to be very careful about how to use it specifically for research purposes.
Mark: Definitely, definitely. And I, I, I never want one, one thing to be my source of truth. I want to take in all different opinions and, and try to bring in lots of different, uh, data points and then try to come to a conclusion of what we think is gonna be best and, you know. This industry is so unique in the real estate world, and there’s not necessarily a right or wrong answer.
Mark: There’s no proven playbook. We’re still writing the playbook, and that’s why there’s a potential for huge returns. If you go out and build an apartment complex with two bedroom, one bath apartments and you got a hundred of ’em, you can pretty much just figure out, oh, I’m gonna be at an 82% occupancy and I’m gonna have $1,100 as my average rent per month.
Mark: Like that. There’s a reason that’s stabilized, that industry is not changing at all, and the short term rental industry has so much opportunity because it’s drastically changing so quickly. And if you can stay ahead of the curve, you can do really, really well.
Gil: Yeah. Yeah. Talk to me about the influences of what you focus on of really making these properties perform at its highest. Um, talk to me about on the flip side of like not just be doing well on the OTAs, but how does that impact overall direct bookings for folks that want to go independent?
Mark: Yeah. Um, yeah, we were, we touched on this just a little bit ago, but I think you, you said it well when, if you don’t have a property that is desirable, it makes direct booking really hard. ’cause if your property’s not booking out on the OTAs where you’re getting a lot of leverage. Because the property sucks. Like, do you think that just simply having a direct booking site and, and, and running ads or sending people to your site is gonna get them to book? You people are thinking about the property as part of the vacation. That really is the mindset, the mindset shift over the last couple years. To me, that’s the biggest mindset. Travelers used to see Airbnb, VRBO, short-term rentals as an alternative, a place where they could go get a kitchen in their own little spot, and they don’t have to be in a shared space. Now they’re really seeing it as, man, we’re going to Gatlinburg to stay in this really cool cabin that has a zip line and dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, dah, and has a view of the waterfall. They’re really thinking of the property as part of the stay, and so I think that. Setting up a great property from day one that people will be excited about and will want to visit. Just puts Rocket fuel in your direct booking strategy and it makes everything so much easier. I’m sure that there’s some real tangible data behind the conversion rates from clicking.
Mark: And you know, you make a post on social media if you make a TikTok of a crop property, that sucks. It doesn’t matter if you get a hundred thousand views, no one’s gonna book it because no one wants to stay there. But you could with a great property, do a thousand views and get one or two bookings because it’s a great property and the few people who did see it are really excited and want to go stay there. And so, yeah, it’s like, you know, putting a bunch of advertising behind a crappy product is not usually gonna work out for anybody.
Gil: Yeah, so I think kind of like to what you were saying earlier is like one is like first identifying what your niche are, what your niche is, really target, what that person is looking for, and then second is then figuring out how do you actually amenitize that place. So that it stands out for that particular niche.
Gil: It can also stand out for other folks as well too. And you wanna make sure that like, like what you’re saying, it has life and heart and soul into it. That heart and soul makes such a big difference for direct bookings. It makes a huge difference on just kind of bookings in, in general. Even on the, on the OTAs, you can see a lot of these places that step.
Gil: A few, not just up in terms of design, but also deliberately like izing the place and making sure that it feels like it’s made for that user. That has a huge difference. Like I use this example quite often. Our property
Gil: is a family friendly stay. Um, we really try to make sure that it has what we need when we’re traveling out there.
Gil: So we have the pack in place, we have the high chairs and such, but. So one of the things that we do is when we photograph our property, we put the PN play out, we put all the things, we put the kids bowls out there, and these are like small little touches. Um, and like, yes, definitely we can go like all out.
Gil: Like one of our, our brands in place has very similar to what you showed earlier to me before the call, which is like that, that tube slide out there. Like we have that at our abandoned place. Like you know that if you are a family that has kids under the age of eight. You know, they’re gonna have a great time.
Gil: You just know it. And as, as the, as a the person, like we call, like the person booking it, they’re actually the one that’s hosting it. They’re hosting it for their family. So they wanna make sure that their family is gonna have a great stay, especially if the grandparents are there, other families are there, they’re that host.
Gil: So the better that you can really make sure that that host feels really connected to your property. The, the much, so much, it’s gonna be so much better in your direct bookings, on your marketing all, even on the OTAs, it’s, it’s gonna perform extremely better.
Mark: definitely. And you touched on something that I think is so important ’cause a lot of people see what we do and they go, oh my gosh, I don’t have 50 grand to do this and do that and do this and do that. And I can’t. I don’t have the space to create this crazy super property. I don’t think you actually have to, I think you can still be intentional about, about the little stuff.
Mark: Like you said, you’ve got a family friendly property. Well, I bet you. Half of the properties in your market have that stuff. They have the kids bowls, they have the pack and play, they have the high chair, da, da, da, but they’re tucked into some closet somewhere. They’re not clean. They haven’t been used in forever, and they’re not, they’re not showcasing it in their advertising. If you can do that, if you can put all that stuff out and you’ve got the kids soap in the da, da, da, and you take that great photo that shows people what they’re gonna get when they book and it meets their needs, I think that is almost more important than. Having the amenities. A hot tub is great, but if you don’t tell a story with your hot tub and if you don’t take a great photo with the sunset in the background and the lights on and the person sitting there enjoying it or whatever, you’ve gotta make sure you tell a story with what you’re offering. And I think it goes into the photographs, right? Which is that this is such a photo centric industry and people book, in my opinion. Almost solely upon photos. I
Mark: don’t believe that most travelers, if almost any actually read your description. I know for a fact that they’re not reading the, the, the seven page description on your property.
Mark: They’re reading your headline, they’re looking at the total guest count, bedroom, bathroom count, and they’re looking at the photos and then they’re either booking or they’re not. So those having great photos that tell a story to me is really mission critical. Cool.
Gil: Yeah, and I think like what it is, what, what it reminds me is that. Oftentimes, I think for larger property managers, they have systems and processes in place. There are things that they want to do and they have teams that kind of support them in that. And I always say that your photographer is one of those team members.
Gil: Your designer, the person that renovates is part of your team member, and really making sure that every one of your team members, whether or not they’re full-time staff or they’re, you’re contracting them for this one time, like one time use case. You need to make sure that they understand. What you’re trying to accomplish.
Gil: Like you need to tell ’em that niche. You need to tell ’em the story that you want to tell, and that all has to come together. Um, because if it don’t, if it doesn’t, you end up getting photos that you, you could spend hundreds of thousand dollars on your on, on your renovation. And if that photographer doesn’t really understand like.
Gil: What are the little bits and pieces that you wanna make sure that you capture when you post those photos on, on Instagram, on, on your listing, like you’re gonna miss the mark quite a bit.
Mark: Definitely. Absolutely. I couldn’t agree more.
Gil: Awesome. Mark, we, we usually end the show with three questions. First question first, what’s a, what’s a good book recommendation? I’m doing a lot of reading now,
Mark: I I, is it okay if I give two?
Gil: please.
Mark: I’m gonna give an audio book. My favorite audio book of all time is The Richest Man in Babylon. It’s just so entertaining and there’s so much value in there and just wealth building and, and lifestyle changes. So Richest Man in Babylon would be my favorite audio book. The guy has a great voice. And then I think that for me, win Friends and Influence People is really just the gold standard for success in your life and your business and relationships by Dale Carnegie. So those would be my two book recommendations.
Gil: I love it. I love it. Those are really good classics, and I think both of them are, they’re not new. They’re the richest men in Babylon has been, has been out for, for a long, long time.
Mark: Both those have gotta be old books. Dale Carnegie. I think
Mark: that the, the, the one of the copy I’ve got sitting on my desk here is from like the fifties of how to win Friends and Influence People, and it’s the revised version.
Gil: Yeah, I, I love how some of those old books, even now in a like a day where things have changed so much, it still holds true. Um, that I, I love those type of books. Um, second question, what’s one piece of mindset advice that you would give to someone that’s starting something completely new?
Mark: Um, yeah, I, I give this advice, advice to myself really, um, is that it’s going to take you longer than you think, and that’s okay. And I think to me, that’s the biggest misconception in just business and, and life and success in general, is that it’s gonna happen quickly for you. And if it doesn’t happen quickly, then you’re a failure. And I’m oftentimes, if not always surprised at how long things take. And people that get that, they’re just like, they’re just less stressed. They understand this is a marathon, this is not a sprint, and we’re gonna, and we’re gonna make moves that are gonna take some time, but we’re gonna keep chipping away at ’em.
Mark: So, uh, to me that would be, it is just, it’s gonna take you longer than you thought. And if you think that it can happen really, really quickly, it’s more than likely a scam or just somebody not telling you the truth.
Gil: I a hundred percent agree, agree with that, both on the short term rental industry side of things, but also as an entrepreneur. I thought that. It was gonna be so much easier that first year, building up Creta days. Um, and it wasn’t like, it was really hard grind of like really trying to figure out how our marketing is, what’s the right product to start to launch with?
Gil: Who do we integrate with? All of that took way longer than I expected, but second year. Things have been phenomenal. Like, yes, we, we didn’t hit the mark the first year, but this year we’ve already grown 5, 5, 6 x and I’m super happy with the growth and just how people talk about us and how much they love us.
Gil: And like, and it’s just about like really slowly chipping away at it, but like also not lose sight on why you’re doing this. And the overall vision of things like those, like little small pieces make a huge difference. And I think I a hundred percent agree with you. Like if you think that. You can flip your life around in a year, and sometimes it does happen, but oftentimes if it takes, maybe not the first year, but if you just held on longer to that second year, you actually could have exceeded your exp expectation expectations for the second year.
Gil: So,
Mark: Yeah, definitely. Yeah. It’s almost like the snowball effect.
Mark: It starts real, real small and it’s hard to get it going, and then it starts building and building and building on you. And oftentimes you get to the point where it’s hard to stop ’cause it gets so, ’cause whatever you’re doing gets so big, but it just takes you a little longer to get going than you thought.
Mark: Always.
Gil: Yeah, and I, I would say like, to add on top of that is like really just focus on like what are the fundamentals? Like it’s okay if you’re doing things that is a bit harder and that doesn’t have short term benefits there. Um, but it sets you up for that second year success if you stack enough of those and you’ll hold true to those things.
Gil: That’s where I see Mammoth growth happening. Um.
Mark: go get, go get base hits. If you’re a baseball analogy, go get base hits. That’s how you win the game, right? That’s how you win championships. You don’t get home runs. You go get base hits and you get all your guys on base, and then one comes in at a time.
Gil: That’s, that’s, that’s a perfect analogy. That’s a perfect analogy. Awesome. Last question, what’s one tactical takeaway that you would recommend someone just either think about or put into practice today to either get started in direct bookings or, uh, or amplify it?
Mark: Um, well obviously just go visit crafted stays and, and get yourself going, right? Um, yeah, I think that, I think that especially today and myself included. Diversifying where your bookings come from is gonna be really, really important. And I think that obviously having a direct booking site is just, is just that first step You’ve gotta have somewhere to send people, you know, we’ve all got, you know, we’ve got repeat clients all the time and, and friends and family that need a place to stay and dah, dah, dah, dah. All of us internally, if you have a short term rental, you already have a couple of people a year just in your Rolodex that you know are gonna book with you. And that you could really quickly send to your direct booking site so you can get some real quick win wins right off the bat. And you don’t have to launch with this crazy, all these ads, outbound micro influencers coming in, crazy viral TikTok reels. You can just have a link that you can send your friends, ’cause you know they’re coming on vacation, they’re gonna state your property anyways and, and probably pay for the direct booking site just with a couple of
Gil: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I mean, a lot, a lot of folks that first year, they’re building out their direct booking engine. They’re collecting emails from folks that have visited them, them before. They’re starting to build up that, but like one or one or two bookings, kind of like, depending on what your portfolio looks like.
Gil: But you can easily pay for the subscription just off of a couple, a couple bookings.
Gil: And, and, and from there it’s really about like how do you ramp those, those tactics over time? Um, yeah, I totally agree with you on that one. Awesome. Mark, it was a huge pleasure having you on the show and just really sharing kind of how you and SDR Cribs really thinks about really how to like separate yourself from the crowd and kind of your journey there.
Gil: So I appreciate you you sharing that with the, the group here.
Mark: Yeah, Gil, thanks for having me out, man. It was a really fun conversation and a little bit different than I’m used to. So yeah, I really, really enjoyed it and would always love to come back on anytime and chat again in the future.
Gil: Absolutely. You know, things are gonna change in the next 12 months. Again, we don’t know what’s gonna happen, but it’s gonna change and definitely wanna, uh, get your perspective on things then.
Mark: Yeah, the only thing we can guarantee is that you and me will still be grinding away, making things happen. And uh, that’s pretty much it.
Gil: For sure, for sure. On that one take, man.
Mark: Thanks, Gil. All