Brokerage of vacation rentals

The project involved digitizing the onboarding process for vacation rentals at SkiStar.

The accommodation brokerage department at SkiStar strives to increase the number of vacation rentals and beds, while competition is growing. One of our goals was to reduce the time it takes from an owner expressing interest in renting out to guests being able to book the accommodation.

What can I earn?

The most important question for owners considering renting out their vacation home is what they can earn. Therefore, we prioritized developing an e-service where owners only need to enter the address of their vacation rental to get an estimate.

The revenue calculation

To make it easy for owners to calculate what they can earn by renting out their vacation rental, we developed a mobile-adapted, location-based calculation service.

By converting an address to a position, we can calculate a distance based on a series of rules and provide an estimated rental value based on historical data and nearby rental properties.

This way, owners can explore how much they can earn by renting out their current vacation home or, for example, speculate when buying a new vacation rental. The only thing an owner needs to provide is the address of the accommodation; we then make an estimation based on the information we have regarding rentals in the area. We also suggest and pre-fill information such as the number of beds so the owner doesn’t have to enter that information.

Expression of interest

For owners interested in taking the next step, we have developed a digital expression of interest form that can be completed in under five minutes. This provides a low threshold for owners to submit an expression of interest while SkiStar receives the necessary information to make an initial assessment of the property to quickly assist the owner.

Manage your vacation rental

After submitting an expression of interest, owners can log in to My Pages to add more information about their accommodation. A hypothesis we have worked with is that this will create shared responsibility for the accommodation between the owner and SkiStar and change internal work processes, where time can be spent on sales and other qualified tasks instead of manual handling of accommodation information.

Manage your pictures

As part of adding more information, owners can themselves manage the pictures of their vacation rental. The pictures are then used by SkiStar to make an initial assessment of the accommodation, which makes the process of bringing the accommodation into brokerage more efficient. If the pictures are good enough, they can then be published on skistar.com to present the accommodation to guests. Furthermore, this leads to increased efficiency and cost savings as photographers previously always had to be hired to take pictures of properties.

To help the owner take good pictures, we have also designed a photo guide where owners receive guided assistance regarding photography.

How we proceeded

Different needs

SkiStar manages holiday homes for thousands of owners, each with unique demands and expectations. To create the best solutions, we developed fundamental personas based on both qualitative and quantitative analyses derived from data surveys, questionnaire results, and interviews.

Owners as private individuals

Hut owners who live further away from their cabin often rent it out to cover costs and view it as an additional income. They handle most of the maintenance work themselves between seasons and want to ensure the cabin is rented out.

Owners seeking flexibility

Owners who live close to their cabin and want to use it spontaneously and often. They rent out their vacation rental sporadically and seek returning guests. For them, the rental is a welcome additional income, but they are not financially dependent on it.

Owners as businesses

Owners who view their vacation rental as an investment and operate the rental as a business. They are interested in maintaining a high standard but do not want to handle the maintenance themselves.

Impact map

We facilitated workshops to create an impact map that provides a common understanding of problems, opportunities, and solutions that help us achieve our goals. Stakeholders from the business and representatives from the development team prioritized the work based on complexity and value. Here are some examples from the impact map we worked with:

Impact goal

Improve the onboarding of new owners.

Key performance indicators

Increase the number of incoming inquiries via the expression of interest form on the web to x from y.

Opportunities/Problems

It takes a long time from expressing interest until a property is listed on the web
Directing new customers to call
Difficulty finding information on the web

Solutions

Create a clearer digital entry point
Rework the information on the web

We identified solutions that primarily involved system development and business development, as these areas needed to go hand in hand to succeed with the digitalization journey.

It’s important to emphasize that we absolutely did not overthink here and get stuck in “analysis paralysis”; instead, the focus was on getting started, working together, and learning along the way.

Product Demos & Change Management

The new onboarding for owners entails changes in workflows. We worked with leaders in accommodation brokerage to support the organization through this change. Previously, it has been difficult to engage employees in further development. Therefore, we introduced 30-minute demos every three weeks, which has increased awareness of changes and led to continuous feedback.

Continuous product discovery

We conducted continuous research in the form of interviews and user tests with vacation rental owners to understand their needs and conditions. We regularly tested solutions and prototypes with SkiStar employees. As the digital solution for the onboarding experience took shape, we tested the actual developed system to ensure that our solutions meet the users’ needs.