The Battle for Brand Recognition: Who Gets the Credit for a Five-Star Stay? with Michelle Gilliland of Savvy

Michelle Gilliland 0:00

I think the challenge with a lot of operators too is the rules are changing constantly on Airbnb and Verbo. What do I do if the rules change? Well, I would say make OTAs in your life a nice to have, but a need to have.

Alex Husner 0:11

There's people that are entering this industry that they're all coming in at different points. So somebody who's been doing this for 30, 40 years obviously is gonna look at things differently than somebody that just came in a year ago and they've got one property. And this is a side hustle.

Annie Holcombe 0:22

So how do you cut through that noise and how do you become a channel that people want? Because that's one of the things that I work with people a lot is to look at their channel mix. And a lot of times they're just like, well, I just turned all of them on and none of them are working.

Speaker 1 0:36

My name's Mike Nord. I'm the director of third-party partnerships at Inhabit. My role is basically to sign new partners and help them grow within our ecosystem. We've been integrated with Savvy going on about four years, and it's been a great partnership from the beginning. They're everything and anything that you want in a partner. We attract the most forward-thinking PMs, the ones that are tech savvy and the ones really looking to increase their direct booking presence. We're always looking for great new OTAs to come in and kind of help enhance that direct booking strategy. And Savvy's been the perfect partner to kind of help us encourage our PMs to get more direct bookings, retain their guests, and really keep more money in their pocket. PMs are really heavily reliant on a couple of channels. And so the industry in general have been hungry for another partner that can capture new travelers, capture new bookings. And so a partner like Savvy is exactly what PMs are looking for in terms of getting more of those direct bookings, getting more of those travelers, and retaining those travelers going forward. Right out of the gate, Eric has been in the industry a long time. He recruited some of the best talent in the industry to help him along the way. And I think that's part of the ingredients of what makes a successful channel is having that industry knowledge within your staff. They came out of the gate knowing what they were doing, having a plan, and really going after it. I really appreciate the partnership that we've had with Savvy, watching them grow from sign-up to over 200 PMs. They basically set the record in terms of property management signups in their first year, and then they started getting the bookings that backed up what they promised. They've been really incredible to work with, and I really look forward to what's next for both of our companies together. Would I recommend Savvy? Yes, I would definitely recommend Savvy to any property manager looking to get more control over their direct booking strategy, get more guests, keep those guests, get more repeat travelers. I think they're a great portal, easy to set up. So 100% I would recommend savvy.

Alex Husner 2:29

If you're looking for a distribution partner that's actually built for you, not around you, check out savvy at savy.com/slash Alex and Annie. Welcome to Alex and Annie, the real woman of Vacation Rentals. I'm Alex and I'm Annie. And we are joined today by Michelle Gililand, who is the VP of sales for Savvy. So good to see you, Michelle.

Annie Holcombe 2:52

It's so awesome to be here. Good to see you too. Yeah, we're excited to have you. We haven't had that like a one-on-one conversation in a while. So this is good. But before we get into the meat of it, why don't you give everybody a little bit about your background? Just to remind everyone who is Michelle?

Michelle Gilliland's background at Vrbo, Expedia Group, and Savvy

Michelle Gilliland 3:06

Sure, I'd love to. So I'm Michelle Gillaland. Um, as Alex already said, I'm the VP of sales at Savvy. I've been in the industry going on about 15 years. I spent the first, I'd say, decade or so at Expedia, Virgo, part of Expedia Group, doing the exact same thing I'm doing here, basically helping property managers be successful on platforms like a Virgo, Airbnb, uh Savvy. And at Savvy, I'm doing the same thing. So I've spent the majority of my career essentially helping property managers uh be successful in the marketplace, uh, on platforms with their

Why property managers deserve greater brand visibility

Michelle Gilliland 3:43

businesses.

Alex Husner 3:43

Great. Yeah, no, I mean you've you've been in this industry for a long time. And I think you've you come from a unique background and really most of the team at Savvy. You guys have been doing this in kind of different capacities and for many years. But we've had Eric on the show before, and as Annie said, we've been excited to have you on and to kind of dive into a little bit more of kind of the secret sauce behind Savvy, and maybe not even necessarily the secret sauce, but some of the things that you have learned that have worked for your brand that are really applicable for other vacation rental companies. I mean, you're you know the hybrid OTA, but you know, the the same principles of marketing in a lot of ways, you know, are relevant. So I think today the main thing that we want to really explore is how you build a brand that is recognizable. And, you know, from your perspective, you're competing against the the biggest of the big guys. You've got you're competing against Rebo, you're competing against Airbnb, booking, Expedia. So, I mean, you can't just have like a Mickey Mouse strategy here. You've got to have something that's really gonna make you stand out. Um, and you guys have done some really cool things over the years to do that. And I think it's kind of a dual-prong approach of it's getting the inventory from the property managers, but then also building something in the minds of the guests that actually get them to remember you. What's kind of like, if you had to sum it up as far as your strategy, what's like what's the core thing that you guys are always trying to remember every day as far as trying to achieve that goal of staying, you know, different and relevant within both sides of the industry's minds?

Michelle Gilliland 5:12

Well, I think the number one thing is allowing the property managers, the operators, the hospitality providers that list their properties on our platform to showcase their brand. That's really the number one thing. And, you know, back when I was at Virgo Home Away before we moved to Virgo, that was one of our major uh sales pitch selling point was you get to showcase your brand. You get to showcase your logo and your phone number and your website and all the stuff. So people can find you on our site and either book through the platform or book direct. And when all the platforms sort of removed that opportunity for the hospitality provider to showcase their company, they lost that sort of main character, I guess, um, angle, right? So the main character when you book an Airbnb is Airbnb. The main character when you book a verbo is Virgo. On Savvy, the main character is the property manager. And I think that's really the number one thing we've we've tried to stay true to and focus on is really give the person that's providing all the amazing experiences and the beautiful homes uh and all these great markets all over the world a place where they can showcase

Airbnb's direct booking links and what they mean for operators

Michelle Gilliland 6:21

their brand.

Annie Holcombe 6:21

So, what is what is your take now that you know Airbnb came out with their direct booking link? And so it feels very much like we know we talked about they've kind of assumed the um the segment and allowed you know the narrative and and smart on them. I mean, they did a great job marketing and you know, the consumer just adopted their name as the segment. But now it feels like they're trying to take direct booking from us. You know, they're trying to say like we can do direct booking. And I mean, and and that's exactly what you guys are trying to do is to help managers who cannot compete, you know, in digital the digital world with the direct market, the direct booking. So we what do you what do you guys make of that and and their stance or I guess their attempt to to take over direct booking?

Michelle Gilliland 7:05

Well, I think my answer will probably surprise you, and it might be different from some of my colleagues at Savvy. Um, I think it's a brilliant idea. I think Airbnb is, you know, if you think about the majority of the folks that really need their platform or folks that are like my mom who who rents out her condo. She refuses to use Airbnb, by the way. She's she's exclusively on Verbo, but um, she uh she needs the tools, the calendar, the payment processing. She needs the tools that uh the OTA platforms provide. Um, the professional property manager that's been in business for 30 years doesn't, right? They have their own website, they have their own tools, they don't need that. And so I think that Airbnb's introduction of this direct booking link is great for Ferbos, great for folks like my mom, great for small operators that need those tools, and probably not so great and probably annoying and frustrating to folks that don't need it, because to your point, um uh Annie, it's not actually a true direct booking. It's a direct booking back to the platform, but not to the operator.

Annie Holcombe 8:08

Yeah. Do you think though? I think, and I agree with everything that you just said, because I, you know, I kind of came out and I was like, this isn't this isn't focused on the guy that has 400 properties on the, you know, this is focused on the guy that has two or three, and this is all they do, and they're never gonna build a website and they're never gonna do a direct. But I guess where I'm going at it with is like, you know, there's been so much push with the direct booking days and the hashtag direct booking. And so like the industry's tried so hard to make the consumer understand direct booking. Does that muddy the waters for the rest of the people that are out there doing it and ultimately skew the opinion over that direct booking is indeed booking direct on another channel?

Michelle Gilliland 8:49

I think it absolutely muddies the water totally. Yes, it's confusing. I think one of our biggest challenges that I've had throughout my career is really figuring out what or either training or educating or figuring out what the traveler wants or needs because it's different for a hotel, it's different for a vacation rental. And we're all so accustomed to the hotel side of the business that we think that we can sort of like one size fits all and put vacation rentals in that same category and it and it's they're not. Um, but yeah, I think it muddies the water just in terms of really educating the traveler, the person that's staying in the property, uh, what their options are. And I think they they probably assume that they don't know what a direct booking is. They're not using the same, they're not hashtagging direct booking is right when they're posting their vacations. So yeah, I think it definitely muddies the water. But back to the original point, I think it's still a brilliant uh move on Airbnb's side because I think that Airbnb does a great job muddying the waters. They do a great job muddying the water with the bees that are hidden. They do a great job muddying the water, explaining a lot of the other things. Um, you know, I think another thing that's frustrating is operators really want to sell the kayak or the ski rentals or the additional products that they have during, you know, travel insurance during the checkout flow. And Airbnb is sort of taking over all of that too. And I don't think that they realize that they're taking that business away from all of the operators that are supporting the platform that are on the platform. And the reason why Airbnb is so successful to begin with is because all of these professionals are doing all these amazing things. And so, yeah, I think it's it's a big challenge and it's another way that they're muddy in the water. But I don't think we're gonna solve it. I don't necessarily think we're gonna change Airbnb. I think we need to um continue to educate travelers the way that we are. And I think the travel hack is sort of what we've focused on lately is guess what? You can check a couple of sites, you can check a dozen sites if you want to, or you can go to one site, find it, and book direct.

Alex Husner 10:50

Yeah, no, I mean it makes perfect sense. And I think, you know, with any type of business, and this is one thing we don't really talk about enough, but it's like there's varying levels of understanding of what a term means or a way of referring to the business. And it's like, you know, direct direct bookings for these smaller hosts. For them, if they've never, if they don't have a website or have never invested any time or research into this, for them, that sounds like a direct booking because they're sending the link out to their friends and family and somebody's booking on it. But, you know, as you evolve in your education and as far as vacational marketing, you understand like that's not the same thing. But I think it's, you know, there's there's people that are entering this industry and have been, you know, in great proportions over the last five plus years, six years since COVID, that they're all coming in at different points. So somebody who's been doing this for 30, 40 years obviously is going to look at things differently than somebody that just came in a year ago and they've got one property. And this is a side hustle. And, you know, I think the one thing that we've been talking about a lot this summer is there's there's no right or wrong answer. I think it depends on what your business goals are and what you're trying to do for whether it's your company or a side hustle or investment, whatever, however you're looking at it. But yeah, I think we need to almost like stop fixating on what we're calling it and really focus more on what the experience is. And you know, that benefits everybody at the end of the day. So whether you think it's a direct booking or not, whether you're a one-host operator or you have 400 properties, what are the things that will stay the same? The hospitality or that's that should stay the same. That the guest is getting a great experience when they leave. So, from your perspective, I mean, what what is what is one thing that you feel like when a guest checks out that they should really remember that a guest booked on savvy? Like what's what's the thing that you think makes people stand out the most?

Why consistency matters throughout the guest experience

Michelle Gilliland 12:33

Well, I think uh I think the thing, and it's funny because I was thinking about this earlier today. Uh, this was the VR, when you guys were walking around VR Nation, I can't remember if it was last year or the year before, and you were asking folks like if you could change one thing about the industry. And my answer was consistency. It's just inconsistent across multiple operators because they're different businesses and different markets. It's not inconsistent with hotels. And so um, I I would say, you know, it's not really up to us, Virgo or Savvy or Airbnb, to make the experience more consistent. It's up to the property managers. You know, what would you expect if you checked into a hotel? You would check, do you expect the room to be like it's advertised? You expect to be greeted with a friendly staff, you know, you expect to um everything that the listing described or the website described, it's all true. That's same couch or a better couch, but definitely not a worse couch, right? Like I think consistency um is really up to the operator. We try to on uh at Virgo and at Savvy, really try to make the booking experience easy and consistent. And I think that was that's another big gap with property managers, is it's you know, if you go to one website versus another website, you're not always gonna get the same booking experience. I tried to book a vacation rental several months ago in one of my favorite little ski towns, and the it was loading and loading and loading forever. I couldn't actually get the dates to come up. And it wasn't me because I had already looked at several other websites that were working perfectly fine. It was the operator's website. And so, what is that traveler gonna do? What am I gonna do? I'm not gonna wait and miss my opportunity to book. I'm either gonna book somewhere else, like on Airbnb, savvy, verbo, or I'm gonna book another property altogether. Um, but I think, you know, I think consistency across the pre-booking and like discovery stage, consistency with the booking itself. And then, of course, I think Alex, I didn't I sort of skipped past your question, but when you arrive, consistency with you know, greeting the guests and providing all of that hospitality that you're able to do, because obviously that's that's your job, right? That's the main goal of any operator is to provide excellent hospitality. The one thing that that you can do with Verbo and Savvy is you get all the contact information straight up front. So you're able to establish that relationship and really build that relationship before the say happens. Um, I think that's a big uh part of trying to make the experience more consistent across vacation rentals that everybody could buy into. It's free, right? To establish and sort of build that rapport and that relationship before the say actually happens. And then it makes the say even that much better. I mean, just like when we were chatting before the call, we're friends. So it's easy for us to get on a call together and talk. So, how much easier would it be to welcome a guest to your home if you've already established a great relationship with them beforehand? Anyway, that would be my advice.

Alex Husner 15:29

Yeah. Before we get back to today's episode, let's talk about the moment that can shape a guest's entire stay getting through the front door. They've traveled all day, the kids are tired, everyone's carrying luggage, and when they arrive, one of two things happens the door opens or your phone rings. And that's a lot riding on the block. It's why we want you to know about Dormacamba. They manufacture commercial grade access control systems built to perform in hotels, airports, schools, and specifically for vacation rentings. These aren't consumer smart lines with a different logo. They're engineered for the realities of hospitality, including self-air, postal humidity, outdoor exposure, and the constant turnover that comes with short-term rentals. In fact, some dermacable lines have been operating on Oceanfront properties for more than two decades. Desk codes can be generated directly from reservations and automatically expire at checkout. Staff access is traceable so you can see who entered, where, and when, and you can manage more than the front door. Pool gates, amenity spaces, common areas, and owner closets can all be connected through one system. For properties without a front desk, that means no key handoffs, no lock boxes hanging from railings, and no shared code that should have been changed last season. Their newest lock, the Sapphire Evo, takes it even further by building the controller directly into the lock. There's no separate hub sitting in a closet where it can be unplugged or tampered with. Access may be the first part of the guest experience, but it shouldn't be the first problem of their stay. If you're ready to take security and access control more seriously, visit Dormakava to learn more about their products. Click the link in the

Should the vacation rental industry establish clearer hospitality standards?

Alex Husner 17:00

description. Now back to the show.

Annie Holcombe 17:02

Consistency is a big topic related to kind of do we have tiers within the industry? Can we establish tiers within the industry and who is in charge of enforcing those tiers, if and when you know you could actually establish them? Do you think that that's something that if, say, VRMA as an example came and said, okay, we we we have these guidelines. We think these are the baselines of what you operate in in various tiers, luxury, economy, whatever. Is that something that you think savvy as a channel could help to enforce? So that if somebody's out there saying that they're luxury, you look at them and you're like, it's not luxury. So we wouldn't put them in a luxury category. I think that that's where some of the challenge happens on some other channels is that, you know, managers can say whatever they want to say and nobody's there to really kind of say yay or nay on it. It obviously the the reviews will tell the truth later on. But there's been some discussion I've seen as of late on LinkedIn about, you know, is it the channel's responsibility to really make sure that what the consumer is seeing is in fact what they're seeing?

Michelle Gilliland 18:07

That's a great point. I don't know that I have a good a good answer. I know that we pride ourselves, we did it verbo for many years until we didn't. Um at Savvy, we provide we pride ourselves on allowing the property manager to operate as they normally do, showcase their brand, you know, use their cancellation policy, their rental agreement, whatever. We don't that we don't sort of put them in any sort of category. And I think as a platform, we'll continue to do that simply because we want to support the property manager in that way. We want to be very pro-property manager. All that to say, we do a pretty robust ID verification and company verification prior to someone being able to lift on Savvy. So we do make sure that it is an actual real property and that the properties are real. Uh, you know, so if you book something on Savvy, you're going to stay in the place that you booked. But other than that, you know, I can't, that's a great question. I think that Airbnbs try really hard to do that over the years, try to sort of compart to minimize all of the different aspects of a booking to try to make it more consistent. But I don't know that it's really the right way to do it because every operator, depending on the market, depending on the place of the world there that you're in, you know what I mean? It's different. So I don't know, it's a great question. I think we should all that should be a whole nother episode.

Annie Holcombe 19:25

Yeah, I feel like it's funny. It's like you there's a lot of questions that I get asked often. And I feel like there's so much in our industry that the answer is always it depends. Because it's so hard to say. Um, you know, my husband works for a boat and they've got three different markets. And yes, they're luxury, but like each one of those markets runs completely different. And you look at like the luxury there versus the luxury on 30A, totally different experience. And not necessarily a different customer, but there's probably some crossover on a Venn diagram. But I think that that's what is so challenging about our industry is it's not cookie cutter like hotels, where you can say that the hotel rooms are all laid out the same, the same FFNE, like is everything about it is same, same, but we're not. And so that's where I struggle with this notion that you can and you can lay out some parameters that everybody would agree on because I just think that there it's just it depends on so many factors. Totally does agree. Yeah. Well, good. We covered that.

Alex Husner 20:22

So yeah, yeah, there's so many different ways to look at this. And I feel like this summer, or just it's not even summer anymore, it's end of September right now. But this year in particular, I've got really gotten my feet wet in a totally different way than I ever have of booking a lot of vacation rentals when I travel that it's been a lot of you know, short distance travels to North Carolina and Virginia. And um, and in most cases, you know, I try and give the destination I'm going to the best opportunity that I search first for, you know, Kernersville vacation rentals, but there's no vacation rental companies around. Even Asheville, which is a larger area for sure. There was a couple organic, you know, companies that I had heard of, but they didn't have anything that was available or not met our needs for um the stay. And so, of course, you know, end up on Airbnb. But one thing that I've noticed that is different, and I don't know if you have any insight on this, Michelle, but was looking at a property last night that it looked like it was gonna be perfect, but it was not available for the full three nights that we needed it for. And she went ahead and it was a request to book property, but she went ahead and sent uh like an approval for me basically to go ahead and book it anyways. And so I keep getting reminders to book Kate's place, but it's not even available for the dates that I was trying to search for. So I'm like, I'm not gonna do that. But like, is there any strategy behind even if that does happen, whether you're listing on, you know, savvy or verbo or like, is there a strategy behind that? Do you think? I mean, this was new

Making it easier for travelers to connect directly with property managers

Alex Husner 21:48

for me to see that.

Michelle Gilliland 21:49

Well, you know, uh, I think that it's easier on a little bit easier on Virgo than Airbnb, and a little bit easier, I would say a lot easier on savvy because we put the property manager in Information right out there. So you could have very easily just picked up the phone and called and said, Hey, what's up with this? You can't do it on Airbnb. You know, um, I have a good friend and property manager that I helped sign up about on Virgo about 12 years ago. We were just reminiscing about her first days on Virgo when we were at a different another conference in Mexico last year. Um her name is Judy and she runs my whole tuco vacations. And uh she basically, with her website, she has like multiple ways that a traveler can get in touch. They can call directly, someone always answers the phone, they can text, they can get an assistant, they can get an AI assistant. I mean, there's basically, and so she's like, I want to be able to meet the traveler. I don't know where you're coming from, I don't know what time of day it is for you. I don't know if you're searching in the middle of the night because you can't sleep. I don't know if it's early in the morning and you're at work, whatever it is. But like, I want to meet the traveler where they are. So I have all these opportunities for folks to reach out to us. And every time someone answers the phone or responds to a text, it is a person that is familiar with all of the properties and a salesperson. So it's not the one size fits all person that's, you know, cleaning the toilets, but then also restocking the towels, but then also answering the phone. It's the person that's actually really specialized in selling the properties. So whatever question the person has, there's an answer. I think that's a great strategy for property managers. We don't obviously have that strategy on staffing because we don't know everything about every property manager that lists on our site, but we do put all that information out there for the traveler to find. And I think uh, I mean, if if every property management company operated like Judy did, then travelers would have the best experience. And then in that particular example, in that case, they'd recommend another property that was available if theirs wasn't available. And so that's, I mean, I think another thing within our industry that some operators do really well, but others don't because it's like a competitor. So they don't want to send the guest to the competitor. But what they don't realize is that sending it to a vacation rental and that person having a great experience could actually mean a return guest for you. Not giving them an option is probably gonna put them in a hotel or another accommodation that gives it's less likely that they'll come back and maybe book with you. But what a great experience. If your property wasn't available and someone recommended another vacation rental that was, yeah.

Alex Husner 24:21

Awesome. Well, I mean, you know, we do that at larger scale as far as enterprise or larger property management companies. If you're in a destination, that you're all, you know, you network and you know each other in business. But I almost feel like that's a huge opportunity that hasn't been explored yet of how do you get these hosts together that are in a certain area to be able to create that kind of stickiness of, you know, you're referring each other, but you're also saying, you know, I know this person, I'm also validating beyond just reviews that you see, that their properties are what they say and that they're good people and that you're gonna have a great stay. So that that could be interesting.

Michelle Gilliland 24:52

Yeah. And you're keeping it within the vacation rental ecosystem and potentially sending them out somewhere else. So

Collaboration, community, and building local brand awareness

Michelle Gilliland 24:58

that would yeah.

Annie Holcombe 24:59

Yeah. That's yeah, that's that's been a conversation that's been happening on, especially as we head into VRMA is like the hotel world versus the the VR world, and like how do we how do we get them more intertwined? And so I think it's like that's a that's a whole DMO conversation that needs to happen. But if if more operators looked at other operators as part of the family instead of competition, and like Alex and I always talk about it's co-opetition, it's like we need to work together for the industry that obviously you know helps us all out. I did want to touch on like we talked on branding from like the manager's perspective, but savvy and the savvy brand. So you guys started out one brand and you switched over to savvy, and you've been kind of doing some really different things. I think the the biggest eye-opener was when you did the campaign with the Hearse and I think it was like the death of the fees or something. I can't remember exactly what it was, but I think what's fun is your team is always thinking like just really outside the box. You do different things. I mean, your booths are always a lot of fun. The Star Wars booth at VR May last year was a lot of fun. I can't wait for this year's. But tell us a little bit about the thought process behind branding savvy and and and why you choose to do things that maybe aren't the standard.

Behind Savvy's unconventional "Death of the Middleman" marketing campaign

Michelle Gilliland 26:05

Well, I think first and foremost, so we we did this stunt during South by Southwest, which is a really popular festival here in Austin. Our company is headquartered here in Austin. So anytime anyone, whether it's Savvy or a vacation rental manager, has an opportunity to get out and support the community and do something really cool within their city, like, why not? So that's kind of why we picked it. We're like, okay, Death of the Middleman was actually what the theme was. We had a uh New Orleans style funeral procession through South by Southwest during South by Southwest, obviously. And so it wasn't just the hearse. We actually walked a casket and we had horn players, and it was very cool. It was very um sort of New Orleans, like I said, sort of jazz and fun. Somber in a way, because that was sort of the vibe was Death of the Middleman. But uh I think ultimately it was a great opportunity for us to get out and and sort of showcase the brand, but also I think more importantly, supporting the our city and supporting our community. You know, I know um, Alex, I would mention to you, uh I think it was Life in Paradise, how they do they, their community, it's a very small, uh tightly knit community in Puerto Ranzas. And they were having trouble with neighbors of vacation rentals complaining that there was a party or it was too loud or too many cars were parked or whatever it was. And see, he's like, listen, I want everyone to love that our company is here and that we have the vacation rentals here. I'm gonna do something for the community. I'm gonna wrap and brand um safety cars and have them park in front of the home before a new person comes to stay. Tell the neighbors that you've got a new guest coming to stay. They've got three kids and a dog, or whatever the case may be. I mean, what a cool way to get involved in the community. And so I think um just sort of piggybacking on what Savvy did to for brand awareness. I think that's another opportunity uh for anyone in this industry to build more brand awareness for their company by just participating in like community stuff. So, anyway, um, yeah, we did it really to because we wanted to be out and about in our community and do something cool.

Alex Husner 28:24

Yeah, you guys are are never short on ideas as far as cool marketing stints and conference, different setups. So that's you guys have really become known for that, which it makes you stand out for sure.

Speaker 28:36

My name is Miller Hawkins. I'm the president and broker in charge of Boo Realty, as well as the Atlantic Resort Group. Both are under the Monarch Collective umbrella. I was asked several years ago while I was on the VRMA board of what my exit strategy is. Kind of hit me of, you know, I'm approaching 60 years old at the time and I'm not ready to retire now, but at some point I've got to have an exit strategy. I was introduced to the Monarch Collective a little over three years ago. I did not want to sell and give them the keys and leave. I wanted to stay on board for three, four, five years. And that's what their MO is. They don't want to buy a company from somebody and automatically go in and assume operations. They basically said from the get-go that when we do partner with a company, we work with you and support you in your current role as president to uh make life easier for you. We will support you and work alongside of you until the day comes when you do decide to leave. Before acquisition to after acquisition, as far as the brand, nothing has changed at all. The only thing they've done is support it. They brought in the resources, what they brought in, the support team, everything on the back end marketing, revenue management, financial, accounting, everything. They want to free up our time so we can grow our company, run our company like we've done without the burden of all the back office things. We have grown a number of owners. We've grown financially. The loyalty and the attitude with our owners, the attitude with our guests, the attitudes with our employees has done nothing but go up. The advice I would give to a vacation rental owner who is remotely thinking about selling their business in the next five years. Don't wait until that time to start the conversation with the Monarch Collective. Reach out to them now. They have an acquisitions team that will fly to your location, they will meet with you, they will get to know your business. I strongly suggest you reach out to the Monarch Collective now. The best business decision I ever made was to buy Bu Realty back in 95. The second best decision I have ever made was to partner with the Monarch Collective the way we did.

Speaker 3 30:42

If you're curious about what the next chapter for your vacation rental business could look like, Monarch Collective offers a free, no pressure conversation to help you explore your options. No strings attached, just a straight conversation with people who deeply understand this industry. Visit gomonarch.com slash partnerships to learn more.

Alex Husner 31:02

One thing that's also unique that we've learned about Savvy in this process is that you are really leaning into the whole referral program as well to get guests to refer booking on Savvy. So, which is genius. But I mean, how how does all that work?

How referral incentives can encourage more bookings

Michelle Gilliland 31:17

Well, basically, uh we incentivize folks. If you refer someone and they book, then you get a discount on your stay. And we don't take it out of the property manager pocket. We actually fund it, fully fund it through Savvy. And the idea is, you know, a property manager is ultimately paying us to list their properties. If they get a booking, they don't obviously don't pay anything unless they get a booking. But if they do get a booking, then they pay us. And we're reinvesting all that money back into getting more travelers. Why do people list on Savvy? Because they want more bookings. How do we get more bookings? We incentivize more travelers to come to the site to book. So it's pretty simple. It really is just say uh if you refer someone and they book, then they both get, I can't remember what our promotion is right now, if it's 50 bucks or 150 bucks, but um basically they just can apply that to their say.

Annie Holcombe 32:07

It's very, very smart because I think I think not enough people are thinking in those terms because you do you do have to, I mean, let's face it, consumers gonna go wherever they're gonna get the best deal and the best incentive. So, like if you can continually build that up in their mind that they're like, I gotta always go to savvy and I can get something good, like it makes good sense. And on that, how you know, going back to like there's just there's a lot of channels, there's a lot of choices. And I think, you know, you guys have purposely chosen to work with the professionalized. And and I know that that the host side of the business, the SDR side of the business, sometimes gets a little insulted by saying that feeling that we're inferring that they're not professional. I just think it's like we're you're more enterprise. So, like people that have, you know, 50 properties, multiple markets, maybe that type of thing. So you you purposely wanted to work with that segment, but you know, the larger channels are working with that segment as well. So, how do you cut through that noise and how do you become a channel that people want? Because that's one of the things that I work with people a lot is to look at their channel mix. And a lot of times they're just like, well, I just turned all of them on and none of them are working. Well, when you have all of them on and none of them are working, it's because none of them are optimized or probably a good chunk of them aren't even right for your inventory. So you have to kind of make sure that you're speaking to the right people. And so, how does Savvy become the channel that makes sense for managers and get leap above all the other channels that it feels like they're just popping up all over the place?

Savvy's approach to brand visibility, distribution, and guest relationships

Michelle Gilliland 33:26

Yeah, that's a great question. And I don't know if I have the you know, the silver bullet answer to that, but I will say that, you know, we the property manager brand forward approach that we're taking is, I would say, probably the biggest way that we can support property managers. So we're seeing really incredible growth since our rebrand, since earlier this year. I mean, we're looking at 30 plus percent month over month of growth. We finally hit a few months ago our first million dollar TBV month, and we're growing and we've gone up and up since then. Is that impressive compared to some of the other platforms? No, not necessarily. Is it great for us? Yes. And for the property managers on our platform that are getting bookings, yes. But at the end of the day, if you're not, if you're if you're a property manager on our platform and you're not necessarily getting a book, a platform booking, you may be getting exposure through your logo and your website and your socials and all the other ways that we allow you to promote your brand on our site. And it helps with your SEO, it helps with your uh your place in this space, right? So that's really what we're focused on and what we're doing uh to support property managers and um differentiate ourselves. We don't have a communication tool between travelers and the hosts on our platform. We we don't. We have we have no plans to build one. It's literally when you book all and and and going back to the professional part of it too, operators with one property can list their properties, list their property on Savvy. They just have to have a software. So we're getting all of the real-time rates and availability to the software. And then that's another way that we can stay so lean and mean um and still provide the amount of bookings that we're providing, is folks when they book direct, the traveler information goes right into that BMS. The property manager treats it just like a direct booking. They communicate with the guests right away. So there really isn't any sort of like redacted communication or on-platform communication. So we don't have to support that in our product. And we don't have to support, we don't really have a lot of traveler support. We really push all of the travelers directly to the property manager. And I think property managers, most of them anyway, really prefer that. They want to have that relationship right up front. So um that's I would say the biggest difference. And uh, you know, I hope, I hope that we can continue doing that and hope continu we can continue growing and sending property managers bookings. But there are, there's a lot of competition out there. So we'll see.

Alex Husner 35:58

Yeah. And how exactly does that work? So if a guest does want to send a message to a host or property manager, are they able to click a link that at least that that email goes through directly to the property manager? Or like, are you keeping track of any of that? How does that work?

Michelle Gilliland 36:13

We track all the clicks, yes. So if someone clicks email or clicks um website or clips phone number, we can we track all those clicks. So I can tell you, Mr. Property Manager, you've gotten 25 clicks on your phone number. So we could assume that 25 people called you or at least saved your number in their phone. Uh, we do track all of that, but we don't charge or monetize for any of that. So that's all just free uh brand exposure. The only time we charge a property manager is when the reservation happens on savvy and the reservation is completed on savvy, but still, we still don't have any communications tools behind the scenes. All of that goes right into PMS, and then the traveler is able to communicate with the property manager right away.

Alex Husner 36:53

Gotcha. So it's actually well, probably dependent on the PMS, right? If there's if they have an area and like a unified inbox where those messages go, or if they don't, does it just get emailed to them? Because that's got to vary, I would think.

Michelle Gilliland 37:05

So when they click email, then it pops up an email window and it'll say property request from savvy or something along those lines. I can't remember what the exact subject is. So the property manager will know that it is an inquiry from the site, and the traveler will have direct communication with the with the property manager. Okay, but it's just through email. So we don't have, since it's not our communication tool, we don't have any line of sight into the fact other than the fact that they just clicked it.

Alex Husner 37:30

Gotcha. Okay. Well, you're doing a great service to the industry, and you're probably not getting nearly as much credit as you could be. Um, but I love what you guys are doing, and I think your whole team is very passionate about it. And I think, you know, just the whole morale morale and the theme behind the business is is really strong. So we've loved supporting you guys and and definitely recommend anybody reaching out if you're trying to diversify. I mean, you guys are a great option for another place to put listings.

Building a business that is less dependent on major OTAs

Alex Husner 37:58

So thank you.

Michelle Gilliland 37:58

Yeah, we're trying really hard. This is a really big um deal. It's very important that there is an alternative platform that actually produces bookings and that is property manager forward. Uh so, and you know, I I it's funny, we were talking to um some folks uh a couple of weeks ago at another conference. And I think the challenge with a lot of operators too is the rules are changing constantly on Airbnb and Burbo. And um, what do I do if the rules change? Well, I would say make OTAs in your life a nice to have, not a need to have, right? So if you have all of these other opportunities to get bookings from other platforms or directly, uh, then you know, if the rules change a little bit, then it's not that big of a deal. It's not going to affect your business that much.

Alex Husner 38:48

Yeah, don't build your house on someone's land.

unknown 38:50

Yeah.

Annie Holcombe 38:51

Yeah, absolutely. Well, Michelle, if anybody wants to get in touch with you and find out how they can get their properties listed on savvy, what's the best way to get you?

Michelle Gilliland 39:00

It's super easy. Michelle M I C H E L L E at savvy.com. They can also uh email join at savvy.com and we'll respond. Um, if you go to my LinkedIn or any any of my socials, my phone number's on there. Perfect. Oh, a good old-fashioned phone call too. Yeah.

Annie Holcombe 39:17

My dad just told me last night he's not doing any text anymore. He only wants phone calls or physical visits. So I think we all want to get back to like the analog world, you know, like we're actually talking to people.

Alex Husner 39:26

Yeah, like picking up a landline, like the red phone that I've got behind me. Right.

Michelle Gilliland 39:30

Yes. I love it.

Alex Husner 39:34

That's awesome. Well, thank you for joining us, Michelle. And super excited to, we've got another couple opportunities coming up this year with Savvy that you're going to be participating in. So excited for that. But in the meantime, if anybody wants to get in touch with Annie and I, you can go to alex and anniepodcast.com. Until next time. Thanks, everybody.