AirBnb, in my opinion, provides one of the greatest services ever sold. To be able to call anywhere your home is such a compelling story. To be able to say you stayed somewhere like Sydney, Tokyo, or Paris for a week and lived like a local is truly amazing.
For a class project for my Social Media Marketing course, we have to create a social media marketing plan and my group chose to do our project on AirBnb. After viewing their few video advertisement efforts, I was able to put into perspective what AirBnb truly offers and what they offer is a life changing experience.
For those who are not familiar with what AirBnb does, AirBnb is the intermediary between home owners and home renters. These homes can be used in place of motels, hotels, or Holiday Inns. The home is often much more economical than hotels and provides a richer experience by allowing users to choose where they would like to stay, near an event they may be attending, or by an area they have never traveled to. The application allows users to view photos, reviews, and activities to do near the location.
This service is life changing because it allows users to travel to places where hotels may not be around, it offers a unique experience, and it can be tailored to fit anyone’s taste. It allows people to travel wherever there is a home available and stay there for however long they are willing to pay for their stay. This service saves so many people money and it can make people money too by allowing others to rent their home. The service model is much like Uber where you find a home, you rent it, you pay through the app and then you leave a review on the home owner and the home owner leaves a review for you.
By renting through AirBnb, users have the ability to have a direct connection to the local area. Users are allowed to communicate to the host before, during, and after the trip. This is useful when planning what to do near the location you are going to visit. It is great when asking what the best restaurants are, cheapest grocery stores, or best places to go for a great night life.
After YouTubing AirBnb, I found that I have never seen any of their videos air on television. They have the opportunity to market towards all sorts of people if they were to create more ads and place them to hit certain market segments in order to promote, raise brand awareness, and even introduce the app give a tutorial without viewers knowing they’re watching a tutorial.
With AirBnb’s growth, I would’ve expected to see more television advertisements by now. Advertisements targeting newlywed, an older demographic, parents in general, or young adults. A newlywed commercial to show the value of a shared couples trip. An older crowd who may think that traveling is too expensive or that they are too timid to go explore and seeing an ad with a user similar to them may make them feel more welcome. Parents think they don’t have time to travel for a trip, but sometimes you have to make time. And young adults can see and show the world that last minute trips are doable with AirBnb.
What follows are a few commercial pitches that would be a hit.
Newlyweds would be a great target because it can really hit all kinds of couples. Who doesn’t enjoy spending time away and having a place to themselves while experiencing new things with their special someone? Picture a newlywed couple flying out to Paris after a budget wedding. They get dropped off at a marvelous place with a view of the Eiffel Tower. They have a marvelous dinner and walk by beautiful Paris scenery. On the flight back home, they close a book saying honey moon getaway with a closing AirBnb logo. This one could just about jerk anyone’s tears from their eyes.
The second pitch towards an older crowd would have an opening scene with an older woman finding her old wrinkled, crumbled, dried up bucket list with a list of places to travel. On the list could be items such as:
Sleep under the stars
A night on the ocean
Explore Alaska
All places that require a lot of traveling. On her calendar it can show her 50thbirthday and jump to a scene with her sleeping in a fancy tree house out in a forest. The next scene is her waking up to the sunrise from the Atlantic Ocean on someone’s boat. From that same scene the camera can zoom in on her phone where she recieves a notification saying her Alaska home has been booked/approved then as it zooms out, she is no longer on the boat, but is startled by a moose while on a hike with locals in Alaska! This piece would connect with an older demographic and relay a message that it is never too late to keep knocking those items off your bucket list and that AirBnb can help. Of course, after the moose scene the screen can fade away with the AirBnb logo.
For the parent’s commercial, imagine a hectic morning with a mom rushing to get the kids ready for school and the dad shoves a stack of work papers and folders into his briefcase with a drawing of kangaroos and koalas at the top of the stack. One of the children is about to spill his cup of milk and while the mother and father both try to prevent the mess, they both just barley miss it. The milk splashes over all three of them and the father’s suit case hits the floor spilling the papers with the drawing on top. The parents both look at each other and laugh and then both see the drawing and they look back at each other. The next scene cuts to the same family on a kangaroo tour as they turn shortly after and spot wild koalas. The kids have the biggest smiles on their faces and both parents look just as happy and relaxed. The camera zooms in on the father as he takes his phone out and starts sending a message to their host thanking them for recommending that tour. The AirBnb logo appears and fades away.
This commercial is fantastic for all the parents that work hard juggling work, children, and daily tasks. It shows the importance of remembering to take breaks. Parents can feel at ease knowing they can book something their children can enjoy too by taking their hints at what they’re currently interested in like the drawing in the father’s suitcase. All kinds of parents would enjoy this commercial because it emphasizes family and bonding. It also shows how much a host can truly help their guests.
For the final pitch towards a young adult audience, envision a young adult looking at their phone receiving text messages from a group chat named, “Spring Break” with beach ball and palm tree emojis. The group chat reads texts saying:
Sarah: “Midterms are almost over, and we haven’t figured out spring break! WTH”
John: “I heard everyone in say they’re going to Cancun, we should go!”
The actor on screen opens the AirBnb app, types Cancun, filters a place for six people, and books it and gets approved. All while a text in the group chat from Sam pop up at the top of their screen saying:
Sam: “Spring break is less than a week away, do you know how hard it is to find a place now?!”
The actor invites their friends within the app and sends them a text message saying, “It was actually pretty easy LOL.” And the AirBnb logo appears saying,
“With millions of homes joining AirBnb every day, there’s always a place to stay.”
This last ad can resonate with a mass audience showing how easy it is to book something even if it is last minute. The message at the end shows that because so many people are joining to rent their homes for AirBnb, there are always new places coming on the market to rent from. This ad can also work as a recruitment into their arsenal of homes.
AirBnb has offers an amazing service, with advertisements like these, I believe they would be able to broaden their user market, raise brand awareness, and show the simplicity of the app.
Hey AirBnb, if you’re hiring, I graduate in May!
Social Media Ad Impact 