14. The Data Behind 3.5 Million Bookings

Most short-term rental operators are sitting on a goldmine they completely ignore: their past guests. In this episode, Petar Ojdrovic and Steve Haase of Yada break down the massive data profile of over 3.4 million guests to show you exactly how much money you’re leaving on the table by relying too heavily on OTAs. 

We dive deep into the industry's "growth gaps," benchmark current repeat booking rates, and walk through a real-world case study of an operator who generated nearly half a million dollars in direct revenue just by reactivating their existing guest database. If you want to turn past stays into a predictable, automated revenue engine—especially to fill those dreaded shoulder seasons—this episode is your blueprint. 

Key Takeaways & Benchmarks

• The OTA Trap: Across Yada platform data, only 6% of bookings are happening directly. 
• The Average Repeat Rate: The current baseline repeat booking rate sits at just 5.6%. However, top-decile operators are hitting 20%+ repeat booking rates, proving there is a 3x to 4x growth opportunity for most businesses. 
• The Database Asset: The average operator has 9,887 past guests in their database (median is 3,715), and roughly 75% of them are fully reachable via email or phone. 
• The Financial Upside: Transitioning a guest to a repeat, direct booker doesn't just save on commission fees: top operators see a +24% increase in direct booking value and increase stays per guest from 1.11 to 1.73. 

The "Growth in a Box" System

Petar and Steve map out the 5-step loop required to turn guest data into hands-off revenue without adding to your daily busywork: 

1. Capture: Gather data from inquiries, WiFi logins, forms, and direct booking signals. 
2. Segment: Group guests by stay history, lead stage, booking source, and timing. 
3. Automate: Use multi-touch flows across Email, SMS, and WhatsApp. 
4. Reward: Set up loyalty programs, referral prompts, and direct incentives. 
5. Rebook: Funnel that owned demand directly into your low and shoulder seasons. 

Real-World Case Study: B2 Vacations

Think past-guest marketing doesn't work? We break down the exact numbers from B2 Vacations' recent campaigns using Yada: 

• The Single Campaign: By emailing 2,331 guests, they generated 136 bookings and $186,615 in direct revenue—averaging roughly $80 in revenue per email sent. 
• The Big Picture Results: Across 14 winback campaigns (Email + SMS + phone), they secured 335 repeat bookings totaling $491,596 in attributed revenue. 
• By implementing an intentional database strategy, B2 Vacations boosted their repeat booking rate to 16.8%—3x the platform average. 

Your 30-Day Operator Action Plan

• Week 1: Pull the Guest List – Export your past stays, inquiries, property history, and contact consent. 
• Week 2: Score the Opportunity – Audit your data to find follow-up gaps, lapsed guests, and open-date demand. 
• Week 3: Launch Two Automations – Prioritize a post-stay nurture sequence and an inquiry/no-book recovery flow. 
• Week 4: Report and Iterate – Track your revenue, conversion attribution, and keep refining what converts. 

To see how easy Yada makes this plan, visit yada.ai/demo

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:02

Hello, everybody. I'm Steve Hossey from Yada, here with my co-founder and CEO, Peter Oydrovich. And this is the Fully Booked STR podcast. We're here to help you make smart choices and grow your business in an intelligent, effective way. And we have been at this for a while. So we have a lot of data on past bookings, what led to those bookings, how you get more of those bookings to come back as repeat guests. And so we're going to dive into it. We have data on three and a half million bookings, and we found some interesting insights that we want to share with you. Welcome, Peter.

SPEAKER_00 0:37

Yeah to see you. Thank you. Happy Friday. It's a big data day today. Um that rhymes. That was good. Does it data day today? Data day today.

SPEAKER_01 1:02

Let's jump in. So we have a screen share here. If you're watching on YouTube, you can see it. If you're listening to the podcast, we'll talk through each of the points. Um, Peter, tell us how you got these points and what they are pointing to.

SPEAKER_00 1:16

Yeah, so we have 3.4, we have over 3.4 million past guests in the Yada platform. Uh 5.6% of those are um are repeat bookings total. Uh, our best operators and the ones that are having the highest like RevPAR and occupancy rates are running at a 20% repeat booking rate. Uh, that means for most folks, there's about a three to four X uh space. There's there's about, yeah, you can you can grow but you can but 400 to 300 to 400 percent of your repeat bookings and still have room to grow. Um, and the numbers support that. So that 5.6 includes like the operators that are doing 20%. So it's probably closer to you know 4% or 3.5% uh system wide that are you know for folks that are not doing anything to drive repeat bookings versus the ones that are. So realistically, it's closer to like a five to seven X uh opportunity there to increase your repeat bookings to go from somebody who's you know doing nothing to actively increase repeat bookings uh to get to a point where you're matching the operators that are doing uh a very active job of driving repeat bookings. There's a lot of money in it.

SPEAKER_01 2:22

Absolutely. And the interesting thing about this here, I was, as you were talking about it, just thinking um there are a good number of businesses that are on the Yada platform that are not using it for marketing. And so that's why some of those numbers are smaller than others. Um, also, when we started, a lot of the work was more manual. So you had to go in and create campaigns and send the campaigns, and now a lot more of it is automated. So as uh as more of the people on Yada start using the marketing and as more of those automations start doing their work, we're gonna see that number tick up as a whole. But what's interesting about this current data set is that it reflects realities in the short-term rental industry on a broad basis, right? We have a lot of operators who have signed up for you know data migration purposes, for AI messaging purposes. And so we get a pretty good cross-section of what is the current status.

SPEAKER_00 3:23

Yeah, yeah, yeah. So it's it's you know, we have a lot of very good data to support this, and a lot of that repeat booking rate uh data that we have is looking at folks' databases before they start using Yada and then after they start using Yada and do some comparisons that way. So it's a very comprehensive data set that we've gotten here. Um repeat revenue is key. And there's four pretty easy ways to grow it. Uh, you know, first we think everybody should be trying to win back lost inquiries. If somebody expresses an interest in booking or booking again or interacting with you, uh sequences and outreach and messaging around that are super critical. So following up on anybody that's increased or that's uh uh that's expressed interest in booking, uh, that's something very tactical that that folks can start with immediately. Um obviously reactivating past guests. So taking everyone in that database and emailing them, messaging them through SMS, giving them a reason to come back, like whether it's seasonal promotions or offers or discounts or loyalty levers, like you have to reactivate your past guest database. It's the most important asset you have after the real estate itself. Uh, and then of course, like capturing more referrals. So, like if somebody books with you, try to get the email address of everybody else that booked as well, and everybody else that traveled with them as well, same with phone numbers. Um and then, of course, like all this goes to uh the result of not only filling uh high season, but also uh mitigating some of the uh uh the pain that comes along with shoulder season and off-season. So being able to influence shoulder season and off-season uh instead of just waiting for the OTA to send guests to your portfolio, to your properties on shoulder and off-season.

SPEAKER_01 5:16

And this is what we see our top operators doing is actually taking that past guest list and introducing them to why they would want to come back.

unknown 5:28

Right?

SPEAKER_01 5:28

Yeah. It's about planting an idea in someone's mind, planting a seed that will turn into an intention and then turn into action. And so if you just leave it up to the guests to say, hey, maybe I'll come back to you know the Berkshires in uh winter, you're like, yeah, good luck. Good luck with that. Because you say, Hey, did you know that the Berkshires are amazing in winter because of these five reasons? You're like, you actually stand a chance of bringing them back to the summer vacation uh at a different season.

SPEAKER_00 6:04

For sure. Let's go on to the next slide because there's a couple of really uh let's skip this one uh because I really want to focus on the data. Um uh and really just highlight the opportunity. I I really just want to show like how important it is to do anything possible to increase uh repeat and direct bookings. Um, you know, for for most of our operators, they have about they almost they have almost 10,000 um guests in their uh in their portfolio, of which 75% are reachable by email or phone. So this is a phenomenal customer list. Most companies would be stoked to have 7,500 reachable loyal customers that have already spent money with them in the past. This is a phenomenally powerful, phenomenally valuable asset. Um even system-wide. Uh, so this includes everyone that's that's doing very effective marketing with us at Yada. It's about one stay per guest, sometimes 1.05, 1.1, essentially. Every single person that stayed with you, if you're not doing anything to bring them back and waiting for them to come back organically and book organically, they have like a 90 plus percent chance of never doing that. With Yada, they have a 75% chance of booking again. So just within the first year, they're starting to, they're almost doubling their direct booking rate within one year from 1.1 stays per guest. And again, that 1.1 includes everyone that's doing it, so it's probably closer to like 1.03 or 1.04. So going from like a 1.04 stays per guest to 1.73 stays per guest for folks that are driving direct bookings and using outbound marketing journeys, campaign signals to drive direct bookings. And this not only increases the average stays per guest, which is really, really, really important, it also increases the value of those stays. Because if someone's booking on Airbnb or an OTA, they already have a set amount of money or dates in their mind that they want to travel for. So they're looking at Airbnb for Friday night and Saturday night leaving Sunday morning. When you're doing outbound, you can get people to interact with you in a way and think about stays that are not just like weekend, Friday, Saturday, Sunday stays, but maybe like Wednesday through Monday. So the average direct booking is worth 24% more than the OTA booking at net value, right? And that doesn't even include the like the fees. So it's closer to like 30 or 40 percent more uh value per direct booking as opposed to waiting for somebody to come through the OTA. So the numbers are like undeniable. It's it's it's unequivocally critical to drive direct bookings and to drive repeat bookings.

SPEAKER_01 8:55

And also, if you just think about the sales angle here again, let's say you have a midweek opening, those annoying gap nights that just kind of sit there, or even you know, a weekend that's usually booked, that's you know, also just sitting there. Rather than selling kind of the standard, hey, bring your crew here, hey, have a big family vacation. You could sell, wouldn't it be nice to just get away for a few nights during the yeah? Yeah, you can work remotely here, you can just take a dip in the lake, right? Selling those more impulse buys or local proximity. Um, you're you're just creating more opportunities for people to say yes when they otherwise might not be thinking about it.

SPEAKER_00 9:40

Yeah, absolutely. It's uh and it's and this isn't like wishy-washy hand wavy stuff. Like this is real numbers, like real data supporting this idea that giving people these offers and putting the right offer in the right hands to the right person can really drive uh some staggering results. Uh let's let's continue on with the data because I think this is um I want to stay here, just go back one slide. Uh, I think this is like really, really important to highlight that this type of marketing is a loop and a life cycle. It's not like one-off siloed events. Um, essentially, like every time somebody stays, you're collecting context and permission to market to them again. Uh, over time, your system gets enriched with their like persona, with their preferences, with semantic data about like what they said in messaging or what they said on reviews and things like that. Every possible opportunity, you have to be enriching that guest persona. Like, where do they come from? Why do they travel? What their budget is, what their family situation is, et cetera. If you can do this in an automated way, like with Yada, for instance, even better. But having this data is super critical. Um, once you've enriched and personalized uh the guest profile, and and one, you know, once you have enough data about the guests, like all you really need is an email and a phone number. But again, like the more data you can have on them, the better. You can start rewarding them for being a part of your ecosystem. So this includes like discounts through email, enrolling them in your rewards programs, like giving them perks, like referral prompts, etc., uh, outbound marketing, like tips for what to visit next, like places to local things to do, things like that. These are all parts of that reward mechanism. What that does is it it leads to this probability of them booking again. And then when they book again, they stay again. You can enrich the profile a bit more. There's always some more information that you can collect. You make their stay even more memorable. Uh, they remember you better, you remember them better, more rewards, more feedback. It's a feedback loop that keeps on building on itself.

SPEAKER_01 11:52

Because if you think about your favorite brands, it's not just about buying the product, it's about the whole ecosystem. Yeah, you become a user of that product. You can even become a you know proponent. If you just think about the last time you sold somebody on an item, I was talking to my brother last night and he was selling me so hard on his car. He was just like, dude, my car. And he was just going off on it, right? It's not just the purchase, it's the whole experience of being with that brand. And um you want your guests to be doing that for your brand, not just you know, with themselves, but with their family, with their friends, on their social media, like this is where I go for my vacations because of how they make me feel, because of how great these properties are. And and your marketing will help them do that. There, the likelihood of someone just doing that on their own is on the low side. But as you connect with them, as you invite them into your social media uh presence, um, as you offer them loyalty rewards, as you give them reasons to come back, the likelihood that they will not just take you up on that, but help you spread that word and really become an ambassador uh grows and grows.

SPEAKER_00 13:10

Oh, completely. Completely. So uh let's dig into one of the actual campaigns. Um really good uh user of ours, B2 Vacations, emailed uh 2,300 past guests. This is just a couple weeks ago that generated 136 bookings, so that's like a six percent uh conversion rate. That's insane, like 5.8, but still. Um, that's $80 of revenue per email sent. And with Yada, like the reason why that conversion rate is so high is it's because of all of the multi-touch follow-up that happens uh after that and like within the context of that campaign. But this drove $186,000 of revenue. Um this these this is this is very important to highlight that when people have stayed with you, they want to stay with you again. Like, unless they left like a really bad reviewer, they had a really bad experience, like they stayed because they wanted to have a good time, they stayed because they wanted to travel, they picked you out, right? They like they went to the OTA, they went on Airbnb, and they chose your hotel room, they chose your properties, they chose your brand to spend money with. That is like a 9.9 out of 10 signal strength for hey, I want to do this again. So letting them know uh that you have an offer or that you have a good reason to travel or anything like that, even if it's to a small uh list size, like 2300, which is like really not that huge, being able to drive like 186,000 in revenue from campaigns like this is really powerful. It's it's a strong signal that people that have spent money with you in the past want to do so again.

SPEAKER_01 14:54

And the interesting thing here is there are some markets that are vacation destinations, they have their loyal customers and people just come back year after year. If that's you, you should absolutely be doing marketing, right? Like that's that's uh such a no-brainer for exactly what we're seeing here. This is making sure that your best people don't go back to the OTA and choose a competitor. This is making sure that that money stays in your pocket and doesn't just pad Airbnb's balance sheets for their next earnings. Um that's the approach if you're kind of a repeat destination, vacation destination.

SPEAKER_00 15:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:29

If you're more of a bucket list or work traveler location, you might see different results, but over time, you will still see that uplift from marketing because of the reasons we mentioned before. Maybe someone won't come back again, but if you're still top of mind and you bring back that great experience that they had, the likelihood that they'll tell a friend or that they'll make a booking, you know, as the office manager or whatever it is, uh, grows rather than them starting the search from scratch. So um marketing, regardless of the path that somebody might take after their stay, will still boost your business over time, which is you know critical if you actually want it to grow.

SPEAKER_00 16:14

For sure. What have we got on our next slide? Because I think we have a couple of uh data points that we want to highlight. Um, again, like we really just want to take this opportunity to uh highlight the data that we have and and and really use it as a as a as a as a proof point um so that everybody knows, like, you know, whether you market with Yada or you market it with anywhere else, like you need to be marketing. Um, this is an example of a of a really, really successful Yada customer. Uh about 28,000 guests in their database, 21,000 are reachable or so. Um this is that 75% is pretty consistent across our uh our database. Um this individual had sent 14 uh campaigns via EM email and SMS. Uh this drove 335 direct bookings for about a half a million dollars and an average booking value of 1.781 uh or one thousand seven hundred eighty one dollars. Um, so our platform average for direct booking. So this includes the folks that are doing marketing are 5.6 percent, uh, excluding the folks that are doing marketing. So, you know, everybody that's not doing marketing is closer to three or four percent. Uh, these guys are at 17% direct booking rate. So there is, you know, just a five to six X to 7x in some cases delta between what your direct booking rate can look like when doing outbound marketing and not doing outbound marketing. This is undeniably um, it is undeniably important to market your properties, to activate your past guest list, and to do something about the fact that you have tens of thousands of pieces of contact info in your database that are just sitting there unused.

SPEAKER_01 18:06

Which kind of brings us to the end of the conversation. I mean, the the the takeaway from all of this is market to your past guests, right? It works, it prevents you from losing them to the OTA, paying and paying a 15.5% fee as a result, um, or even worse, losing them to a competitor because your brand wasn't top of mind. So we try to make this as easy for you as possible with uh really helpful campaign suggestions. We have our weekly uh customer success marketing mastermind, only for Yada customers, where you know we're kind of sharing best practices, and then, of course, all kinds of automations across the guest life cycle, as well as trying to match the best guest with the best property opening and give them the right message to have them say yes to coming back to your property. So that is that is our mission. Um, if you have found activities that work even better than what we shared, maybe it's on social, maybe it's uh in terms of phone calls or guest communications follow-up, maybe it's direct mail. We want to hear them. We want to hear them because those are the things that we are going to be building over time. Because the really what we're what we're creating Yada for is so that every STR manager can go from that three or four percent to that 20% in repeat bookings and bring people back to Act.

SPEAKER_00 19:35

Yeah, and and and um you know if you have any other ideas for for you know what's been working, as Steve said, shoot them our way. We we always like to incorporate that into the automations and the systems that we're running. Um but the most important thing is to just market to your past guests, activate the list, use the list, make sure that it it drives results, make sure that it's not sitting in your PMS or that it's sitting anywhere unused. Um like do something with it. It's the easiest, fastest, cheapest way to grow your uh your revenue.

SPEAKER_01 20:12

There you go. All right, thanks for listening. We'll see you next week.

SPEAKER_00 20:18

Thank you so much until next week.