Airbnb views itself going all-in with a plan to compete with
the giants of the accommodation world --- online travel agencies.
CEO Brian Chesky made the comments during an interview with
PhocusWire, Travel Weekly's sister publication, shortly after the company
announced updates to its platform and services at an event in San Francisco
this week.
"Our competition is two companies -- Expedia and
Booking.com -- and I'm extremely excited about what the next ten years have in
store," Chesky says. "Make no mistake: We are going to run this
company for decades, but in a certain way."
The "Airbnb way" is how the company has approached
all its offerings -- starting with its core home-share product and expansion
into ventures such as Experiences and, more recently, its foray into hotel
distribution -- and how it plans to secure more than one billion annual guests
by 2028.
The forecast on guest numbers comes as the company confirms
it is still looking at some kind of flight element for the site.
Ambitions with expanding the platform
The platform's newest features -- the launch of four new property
types; Airbnb Plus and Beyond by Airbnb; Airbnb Collections; and a Superguest
program -- add more elements to rival OTAs, all in pursuit of giving customers
what Chesky calls the "best trip."
"The product in travel is trips," he says. "We
believe the way we're going to win or the way we're going to win over hundreds
of millions of customers is to have the best trip.
"We don't need to beat our competitors; we just need to
make sure that if you're seeing incredibly local, personal, magical experiences,
and if you see everything -- eventually -- in one app, you're going to be able
to come to Airbnb."
Chesky believes Airbnb has a number of advantages over OTAs,
including unique inventory, a passionate community of people ("community
is very hard to copy") and multiple experiences in one app.
"We have Homes, Experiences and Restaurants -- none of
them do in the same way," he says. "We're a more vertically
integrated, end-to-end, full-stack ecosystem powered by people."
A key differentiator for boutique hotels, which now can list
on the site through third-party distributor SiteMinder and are part of the
company's seven property types -- is Airbnb's lower commission rate, which
Chesky assures will remain lower than Booking.com's.
Boutiques also stand to benefit from the soon-to-launch
Superguest program and the Airbnb Plus initiative.
"Superguest is basically like a guest loyalty
recognition program. This will allow a local boutique to compete with a large
hotel chain that has a loyalty program, and [the boutique] doesn't even have a
loyalty program because we can give them all the benefits," Chesky says. "We
can democratize many of those benefits just through our platform, and we can do
it by offering another channel for them."
Pledging advantages for properties
Boutiques will also soon be allowed to apply for Airbnb
Plus, which affords hosts top placement, in-home services such as design
consultation and premium support, to give them increased visibility over OTA
listings.
"Right now on a lot of OTAs, they're pushed to the
bottom, and the big chains will get the distribution," Chesky says. "[Airbnb
Plus] will allow us to feature and highlight [properties] to stand out."
The real ticket, Chesky says, will come when Superguests
book Airbnb Plus listings. "That's going to be a pretty powerful combo,"
he says. "I think we'll stand out in the hospitality industry, I'll say
that."
The next step in Airbnb's dominance against OTAs will be
activity around flights, which Chesky confirms the company is looking into but
has no formal announcement.
He says a number of companies in the airline industry have
reached out about working together through a guest membership or loyalty
program -- which, coincidentally, Airbnb soon will with Superguest.
"As we're building up the Superguest program, I'm
looking at [partnerships]," Chesky says. "I don't know if they'll be
one of the initial partners, but there might be opportunities that might be a
prequel to something down the road."
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Source: Phocuswire