We recently referred a friend to list vacation rentals on VRBO.com and VacationRentals.com.  “Why in the world would you do that – they’re your competitors?” they said!  These two sites are owned and operated by HomeAway based in Austin, Texas.  We think these vacation rental advertising sites are high quality and compliment the Furnished Homes site – The Place to Find Furnished Rentals.  They are probably 2 of the most popular vacation rental websites on the internet.  Our friends added their vacation home rental to both sites and they called for advice as to the placement of their ads.   We want our friends to succeed!  We consider you our friends too!  We say “Advertise here and Advertise there for success!”  So here’s how the discussion continued about advertising our friend’s vacation home rentals. 

Our friends were adding the 227th property listing for their city.  The Vacation Rental by Owner ad cost nearly $350 and included 8-10 images and the other was roughly $200.  In order to get to a higher search placement on the first VRBO site they would need to add an additional 6 or 7 photos (more money) to move up the list to somewhere like 10th placement.  They noted that if they did not upgrade to the 16 vacation rental images that they would be relegated to somewhere down to the 200th listing.  If you added your listing in 2001 your listing would take precedence over other listings unless another vacation rental homeowner paid more to add more photos. 

It’s kind of like the internet search engine Guru’s preach – if you are not in the top ten or 20 at Google, Yahoo or MSN and the likes, then who really cares or really takes the time to find you?  They say that most visitors only look at the first 1 or 2 pages max in a search engine.  If this holds true for search engines it stands to reason that as a very popular destination gets crowded with vacation rental listings visitors will not make it past the first 50 or so?  We do not know the exact number that a visitor will sort through – but it seems probable that they will not go down to the 227th listing.  Especially if you have to click on the listing to see an image?  As an aside – this is why images are so crucial – take good pictures and make the visitor want to see more info.  Put up a poor image or images and travelers will skip over to the next furnished listing.

Point 1:  All non-featured vacation home listings with Furnished Homes are randomly sorted below the featured listings.  So if you are the 100th or 200th listing to be added in Breckenridge, Colorado you still have a chance of being pushed back to the top randomly each time a new search is initiated.  At Furnished Homes we think you deserve a better chance at having your listing viewed other than to have your listing relegated to the bottom of the list just because you came to the party later than others.  The list view also includes a pretty good size image for travelers to view even before they open the vacation rental details.

Are you in a highly popular vacation destination that has hundreds of vacation rentals?  Do not despair – your listings at Furnished Homes will not be at the bottom of the list all the time.  If you need even more exposure – We still allow for featured listings in each city for an incredibly low price – $30 for 6 months and $60 for 12 months. 

POINT 2:  It is more imperative now than ever before to increase your advertising! - At Furnished Homes we’ve been saying this for a long time!  See our past blog post – Down Go the Sales and Up Go the Rentals – Increased vacation rental competition like never before due to the housing slump – Can’t Sell it then Rent It .  If you are a vacation homeowner or property manager looking for reservations for vacationers and travelers you need to be listed on several top vacation rental sites.  You should be listing and linking to Craigslist.  You should put your home rentals on sites that allow for a personal link to your professional website.  Advertise your vacation rentals on as many quality sites that you possibly can!  This is what we tell our friends and we’re happy to tell you the same!

Of course we think this is good advice too!  Furnished Homes offers 6 months free listings, 25 BIG IMAGES, LINK to your personal website, LINK to your calendar, GUEST reviews and pretty much what all the big vacation rental sites offer.  If you choose to renew after the 6 months trial it is only $39 for the year!  We’re here to stay and we Welcome you to Furnishedhomes.com.