Mike Bayer
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Without further delay, here's your host, Heather Bayer.

Heather Bayer
Over the last 14 years of doing this podcast, I would always record a solo episode around this time of the year, where I'd look back on a high season and talk about the highs and lows of the summer. I can't do that now, I don't have a company anymore. So in today's episode, I've asked Jennifer Whaling, who is the founder of CottageStays in Ontario, to come join me and it'll give me a little bit of a trip down memory lane and also help her share some of the issues that she faced and hopefully help you out as well.

Heather Bayer
This is the Vacation Rental Success Podcast keeping you up-to-date with news, views, information and resources on this rapidly changing short-term rental business. I'm your host, Heather Bayer, and with 25 years of experience in this industry, I'm making sure you know what's hot, what's not, what's new, and what will help make your business a success.

Heather Bayer
Well, hello and welcome to another episode of the Vacation Rental Success Podcast. This is your host, Heather Bayer, and as ever, I am super delighted to be back with you once again. It's a glorious Fall here in Ontario; absolutely fabulous colors and we're heading into [Canadian]Thanksgiving this upcoming weekend. Yeah, it's just very, very beautiful.

Heather Bayer
It was always at this time of year when I was in my property management company that we would use this time for reflection, and look back on what happened. What happened in the summer? What happened that we did really well at working out? And what happened that perhaps we didn't do so well and we need to work on for the next year? It was always those discussions, that rehashing of events and issues that helped us formulate the plan for the following year.

Heather Bayer
We could get together as a team and brainstorm what we could have done better and what we will do better the next year. It was always a fun time. We used to end the meeting with what we called 'cake time'. There was always the one issue of the summer that was just so completely totally crazy that we would never have imagined could have happened. It may have been a difficult guest or a very difficult owner, perhaps, but whatever it was, we would give them the 'Margo Award' and we would have cake.

Heather Bayer
The Margo Award was named after a particular guest who had just a whole raft of issues about the property she was staying in. It was many, many years ago and it was in our early days, and it went on and on and on. Not just for the time she was at the property, but for the weeks and weeks afterwards, and she never let up. We christened this the Margo Award and it was given out in the Fall of every year. I don't know whether they still do it; it would be fun if they did. I've actually logged out of every Slack account, so I'm not seeing what's going on in the business anymore, although I do have connections with the team and my business partner.

Heather Bayer
We still talk quite frequently, but I will have to check and see if they're still doing the Margo Award. Anyway, I would come every year on the podcast and talk about the summer of rentals. This year I can't. I don't know what I did last year, but anyway, this year I can't do it, so I've invited my friend Jennifer Whaling from CottageStays, also in Ontario.

Heather Bayer
Jennifer and I were on a committee together on the Ontario Cottage Rental Managers Association. We're on a membership committee. We've worked together in the past. She's a great person. She's got massive vision for her company, and she's going to tell us about her summer, what she learnt, what she would do better next time, and what perhaps she won't do at all next year, and what she's learnt from a summer of rentals. Let's go straight over to my interview with Jennifer.

Heather Bayer
This is very special for me. It's been a couple of years since I was able to come into an episode and talk about the year or the summer I've just had in my cottage rental business. Well, I can't do that anymore, so I have invited Jennifer Whaling, who is the founder of CottageStays in Ontario.  Somebody I know, somebody I've been involved with on committees and in a manager's association and I've invited Jennifer to come on and tell me about her summer. This is going to be a little bit of a trip down memory lane for me, Jennifer. Part of it I'll be thinking, Oh, my gosh, I'm glad I wasn't there, I'm sure. But thank you so much for joining me. It's such a pleasure to have you with me.

Jennifer Whaling
Oh, wonderful for me too, Heather.

Heather Bayer
So could you tell a little bit of your story, where you're located, how you got into this business in the first place? It's the question I ask everybody to start with.

Jennifer Whaling
So I started about seven years ago. We are farmers in Southwestern Ontario, and we decided we're looking to start retiring.  Sold the chickens, got rid of the pig barn. We thought let's get a cottage. Now we're not locked down to our farmhouse here, I bought my first cottage. I used an agency and I thought, You know what? I can do this better and make it more personal and really connect with my guests.

Jennifer Whaling
Because it's scary when you're hosting guests and using an agency and you don't know who's coming or you know how many people are maybe and if there's pets. But it's quite scary. So the second year I started CottageStays. There was my cottage, my cousin bought a cottage, a neighbor. I went on Kijiji. So that first year I had five properties, which is great. Then you know you're doing something for real and we need to get proper processes and communication in place and we can have lots of fun with it.

Heather Bayer
Wow. How many properties do you have now?

Jennifer Whaling
About 45.

Heather Bayer
That's great. Your story is almost the same as mine and the same as many other people. You start off with your own and then it's a relative and a neighbor and yes, take on board anything and everything to start off with. It's beyond that when you begin to get a little bit more specific about who you want. We'll go into that a little bit more because I love these stories of how small companies begin to grow. We're going to delve a little bit more into that. But tell us about your location and your business model. I know when I was in the business and when I started and somebody said, Oh, you'll only rent July and August and you won't do anything else. I'm quite interested to hear what your business model is up in your area.

Jennifer Whaling
I focus in on a certain area within about 20 to 30 minutes of my house. That way I can drive by, I can attend to any issue. I wasn't really confident in dealing with septic issues over the phone.  Right? I used to be in a technology company where I did telephone internet service, but I still wasn't confident helping that person reset the water heater over the phone. I'd rather just drive there and fix it myself. We even had it where the septic alarm went off in the middle of a snowstorm. The trucks were pulled off the road, but there are these two old ladies and the septic alarms are so loud. So there we go, my husband and I, in the tractor, off there to hit the reset switch for these ladies. And that's the service I wanted to provide, just to provide that extra level of comfort.  So we mostly focus in on the municipality of Bluewater, which is the village of Bayfield.

Jennifer Whaling
So we have two types of vacations. There's the normal beach-type of cottage vacation, and then we have the village of Bayfield location. It's a charming historic 'Hallmark' village, which is popular basically any time of the year.

Jennifer Whaling
All of our properties are pet friendly, which..... people don't always tell you if they're going to bring a pet anyway, so let's just cut that question out. And we really lean into it too. We have a housekeeper who makes homemade doggie treats out of the pumpkins that I grow here. And you write a little special card saying special treat for Fido. And we put their name in. People eat that up. They don't really care if we write a special card for them too. Welcome Jane and family to blah, blah, blah. But when you write a special note to their dog, they literally eat that up.

Heather Bayer
I think that's amazing. I've talked a lot about the whole pet-friendly side of this business, because so many people want to go on these vacations because they can bring their pets. This is the beauty of, what we used to call in England, 'self-catering'. You bring your pets, you bring your food, you do your own cooking. It's like taking your house and putting in somebody else's house. I've just finished reading, and I'm probably going to mention this in every podcast for the next six months, one of the best books on hospitality and customer service I've ever read, and that's Will Guidara's... Oh, having said that, I've just completely forgotten the title.... Will Guidara's Unreasonable Hospitality. And he talks in that about something....., a couple of...., well loads of stuff. It's one of those books that I've got highlights all over the place.  Tiny doses of excellence and just those little things that can make such a difference. He says in there that you can make these grandiose gestures of hospitality that cost a huge amount of money, and it doesn't give, sometimes, anywhere near as much joy as those tiny doses of excellence do, like those dog biscuits.  That was a long way of going around saying, I think that's amazing. I love that.

Heather Bayer
What's unique about your location, particularly in the Ontario market, is that the majority of agencies or property management companies have very widely dispersed properties. We had 200 properties, but they were all over the Province. So we were relying on... we used to say it's like herding 200 cats, because every single property had its own cleaning team, its own maintenance people that we could call on. It was tough. I love the idea of keeping it all close, close to your home, close to your heart, obviously.

Jennifer Whaling
Yeah. It means it opens me up to... In a certain area, there might be a certain thing that happens. So three years ago, we're all located on the Bluff of Lake Huron, and Lake Huron is known for the most beautiful sunsets in the world. However, being on the Bluff that one year the lake levels were so high and we lost how many... All these beachfront cottages no longer had stairs and they weren't going to be repaired. But it meant the same message going out to a whole bunch of people and a lot of bad news. We also had short-term rental licensing come through and that hit three-quarters of the properties in my area. So you have to pivot and stuff. But when things go wrong, it's like there's a flavor. One week it'll be all doorknobs, and another week it'll be all umbrellas. So we can prepare a team and do proper training and say, Oh, go to this place and do that umbrella, then this one and this one and this one.

Heather Bayer
So not just you and your husband, you have other people within your team?

Jennifer Whaling
Yes. So it's just myself. My husband, he's an emotional support.

Heather Bayer
We all need one of those.

Jennifer Whaling
Yes. And then I have Lee. She's been with me right from the beginning. She is the one who handles the uncomfortable emotional situations. So you know how when guests arrive, I talk about caring for Mom. What are the things we can do for Mom? Because she's the one who's envisioned this wonderful vacation. And when she gets there, she's got to make the beds, and the kids are hungry and they want to run down to the beach and Dad's sitting there with a beer and it's not turning out how she wanted. So when you get that first eight o'clock complaint, Lee is the one who can handle and go there and give Mom a hug. Or if the guys are parked all over the yard, she'll give them the Grandma stink-eye.

Heather Bayer
I love that. Every company needs to have a Lee.

Jennifer Whaling
Yeah. Exactly. We also added Shauna. So she's our guest services. It has been a godsend because I can go home and I can breathe. I don't have to run home and see what are the emails and what are the texts? What are the issues that I've got to deal with? She tells me what's important and what's not and make sure that guests are cared for. So on changeover day, while I'm dealing with a broken toilet seat and then all of a sudden, there's three umbrellas that are broken and there's no more umbrellas in all of Ontario to be bought. She's the one who's still making sure that incoming guests know that, Yes, there will be a milk jug and you'll be able to find it in this cupboard here.  Right? Because in Ontario we have milk jugs.

Heather Bayer
Milk jugs. Yes. And for those listening who wonder, why do you have milk jugs? It's because our milk still comes in bags. We do get cartons of milk, but I still buy my milk in bags from Costco. Saves me a dollar and that's important.  So it sounds like you've got a good team in place.

Heather Bayer
Let's talk about this past summer. How different has this summer been from the craziness of 2021? Well, it was in fact, 2020, 2021 and 2022.... Seems like forever ago now.

Jennifer Whaling
Yes. So this year I would say that guests have been... They're not demanding, they're much more happier, but their expectations are higher. We'll never return back to the days where guests have the optional cleaning fee. That was only three years ago, and here we are now. That's just a regular part of the services that we have to offer.

Heather Bayer
Yeah, that was always an interesting one, because we were way behind the rest of the US, except perhaps for some parts of the Eastern shoreline where bring your own linens and do your own cleaning, that stayed on for a long, long time. But now, I remember seeing just every year those expectations getting higher. Because people were going different places, going to Airbnb in the south and finding that they walk in, there's no having to make beds, and when they leave, they don't have to clean, which to me is the perfect way of having a vacation. It's just taken a long time to filter its way north.

Jennifer Whaling
Yes. We still have linens as an option. This year, Southwestern Ontario was quite wet and we've had more septic issues than ever before. That's never fun. And owners.... it's kind of hard. They've never had to pump their septic. This year they had to do it three times and they're not here. So when I say to them, Yeah, it needs to be pumped, they don't always believe me. So we don't have linens. It's optional, and then I take the linens out of the cottage and we have to wash them elsewhere and keep that water out of the septics.

Heather Bayer
Yeah. I think for those of us who are coming on our type of vacation [in Ontario], most do understand it. They do understand the different elements that are involved. What else was a difference this year, as opposed to the crazy years?

Jennifer Whaling
So I've only been in business seven years, and there's never a normal year. So how am I supposed to compare that? I thought I had it all figured out, and then we had the year of all the Bluff failing and septics and all kinds of stuff. And then COVID hits. So you assume 100% occupancy. And then this year comes along, and you've got everything booked. And then there's not nearly as many cancellations as COVID, but there were a lot, because the traditional three-bedroom, one or two bathroom, that appeals to a middle-income family, and they were getting scared. So we had to change things up. And I swore I would never do less than seven days at some properties, and we did. But the revenue was there, so it all worked out in the end, but it's seeing the storm coming and making changes.

Heather Bayer
Yes. Well, it sounds like you've been pivoting along the way. Well, of course, pivoting brings changes and some changes will become permanent, some maybe not so permanent.

Heather Bayer
So thinking back over the last seven years, what changes have you made that have been successful in improving your efficiency?

Jennifer Whaling
Efficiency number one, would be adding a guest services agent and learning to rely on my team. I have a whole bunch of housekeepers, and most of them are not professional housekeeping companies; I prefer that. The 'I'm a retired lady who just wants to clean one or two cottages a week' - and she saves up to go on a birding trip. Or the single mom who can bring her child with her and clean a house too. And then the kids, those are great because we send them to the cottages that have 150 steps. So great, You kid, you go down to the beach, make sure that there's no broken chairs and nothing in the fire pit that we don't want.... make them do all that work, right?

Heather Bayer
So you've got the guest services person. What else has improved your efficiency?

Jennifer Whaling
I use OwnerRez as my property [management] system; it's my godsend. So one of the things this year that we did, we implemented the SMS texting, and that has really improved the communication with guests. And we've taken it a bit further. Before I had OwnerRez, I would ask people, Can you tag us in your photos or whatever, in Instagram or Facebook? And nobody ever did. So then we tried, Well, send us pictures of the sunset. Well, then we get all these sunset pictures and my phone will be dinging and my husband's going, What is going on? Well, that's the sunset pictures. We can't re-post that many sunset pictures, though. So then we had it with OwnerRez, If you are bringing your pet - which most are- on day three of your five or more day stay, you'll get a text that invites you to send me a picture of Ginger playing at the beach. And that's why, if you ever see my Facebook or Instagram, you'll see on Wednesdays and Thursdays, there's like 10 photos of dogs having the time of their lives.

Heather Bayer
Well, you touched on two things, the sunsets, people, everybody... I mean, I've done it myself when I'm down in Gulf Shores - and we have some amazing sunsets - and I'm taking pictures and every picture is the best picture that has ever been taken of that sunset. There's a gazillion people out there taking the same picture of that same sunset, but the one you took is the best. That is a brilliant marketing ploy, and certainly the dogs.  You've touched on it with the natural treats; people love their dogs. I honestly think that a lot of people love their dogs more than they love their children.

Jennifer Whaling
Yes. Well, dogs don't talk back and they don't know how to swear at you.

Heather Bayer
That's it, and they don't normally leave Cheetos on the couch that will go under the cushions. But yes, I love that, asking them to... That texting, that was revolutionary for our company when we implemented it a couple of years ago, and it made things so much more personal. Do you feel that? It's just a really personal connection with the guests.

Jennifer Whaling
Yes. So we're implementing right now, it just says, send us a picture of your pet. Well, now this year we can split that out, and we can make things with OwnerRez's help and all the custom fields and things you can do make things so personal. We even have it set up to send out garbage reminders. And we've used ChatGPT to make the messages a little bit more friendly. So, say for instance if you arrive on Monday, then on day five, you'll get a text at seven in the evening saying, Hello, Eco-Friendly Legend, Garbage Day is tomorrow.

Heather Bayer
Excellent. Yes, I remember years ago I went to a session that Matt Landau ran at an event somewhere, and I can't remember where it was; there's just so many. But he asked us to get into groups and just talk about what revolutionized our business and what we did in the way of communication. One lady there said, I only text my guests, I don't do anything else. I thought there was something really wrong with that. Maybe she should have been a little bit more flexible and to appeal to some guests who didn't text maybe. But I was so anti this whole idea of texting, and then I just switched, did a complete 360. Texting is great, and people will respond to a text so much more than they'll respond to email because it's so instant. But I love that.

Jennifer Whaling
And the nice thing is with the OwnerRez, or even if you're using Touch Stay, or StayFi texting capabilities - we use OwnerRez - it's separate from my personal phone, which really eat up at me. In the first few years, you think of everything yourself and you're giving everybody your personal cell phone and there's no split when you need that downtime.

Heather Bayer
Yeah, that's great.

Heather Bayer
I'm going to take a short break just now to hear about our sponsor, PriceLabs, directly from one of their clients. We're going to be right back with more from this great interview in just a few moments.

Dolly Duran
So I'm Dolly Duran, and I'm very much involved in the short-term rental space by being a community leader for Airbnb, as well as a Superhost Ambassador helping others. I did all my own research when it came to pricing. I also know that I was leaving money on the table, because I would pick one price and that was the price and that was it. And then, of course, Airbnb has their own tool. But I knew from the beginning that that was not very good. So I never relied on it so much.

Dolly Duran
PriceLabs has helped me, and one of the things I love about it..., if you were to ask me, What do you like so much about PriceLabs? What is it? What is the 'T', if you will, is that the price is constantly fluctuating. It's like all of that research that I was doing to pick one price, it's on a daily basis. That price is always moving. It's always changing, and I don't have to lift a finger. So if someone is booking my place, any of my places, three months out, well, they're blocking my calendar three months out. They're going to pay a premium.

Dolly Duran
That's okay, because that's how you maximize revenue. But if my place is free now, there's no one there, there's no sense in me charging what's being charged three months from now. That traveler who's looking now, they're looking for the absolute best price. And that's what dynamic pricing has allowed.  Right? Because now I get a lot of last minute bookings. I used to never get last minute bookings. All of my bookings used to be at least a month out in advance. I never got anything within two weeks. And now I see that that has increased.

Heather Bayer
Thank you so much for that testimonial. It was great to hear how PriceLabs is working so practically with their clients to help them achieve success. Let's go on right back now to our interview.

Heather Bayer
Let's just go back on this past summer, because I always did this - the worst thing that happened and the best thing that happened. What was the summer like for you in terms of your customer service experience and guest... behavior perhaps, and even how your owners reacted? What stood out for you in terms of the best and the worst?

Jennifer Whaling
So the worst thing that happened was a septic that backed up, and I had told the owner to empty out the septic, and he didn't. And of course, that also caused a ripple effect. So the septic gets full and then the baffles get clogged and then the basement toilet, which has a pump, the pump quits and it's running all the time and it ends up going into the shower and you've got it fully booked and the owner is not even in the country, and that was awful. And there's nothing I could do. It just sucks, right?

Jennifer Whaling
The best would be having a guest services person who I know cares about the guests just as much as I do. And she was able to take care of all the funny situations that we had happen. But guest behavior this year has been, touch wood, really good.

Heather Bayer
Yeah, that seems to be bucking the trend, because I'm sure you're out there on some of the Facebook groups and hearing some of the stories that have happened this year and people saying, Is it just me or has this year been the worst ever? I am so happy to hear that you had a great experience. So where are your guests coming from? I know that you've got a great website, a Jodi Bourne designed website. So you do direct bookings. What's the proportion direct bookings versus OTAs?

Jennifer Whaling
So that's different this year. Last..., how many years? It's been 90-99% are direct bookings, but this year was about 80% in the end for summer, just because of having to pivot and fill up those shorter stays. So I did rely mostly on Vrbo and a little bit on Airbnb.

Heather Bayer
Yeah. Was that new for you, or had you been testing out Airbnb? Because I know from my time with networking with other managers, the majority were doing direct booking, but all beginning to pick up Airbnb and Vrbo for their orphan days and their shorter days. So how long have you been using Airbnb?

Jennifer Whaling
So I have been using Vrbo since day one, and that was to push the off-season rate. Vrbo allows us to have video. So most of, well all of my beachfront properties have nice drone video. And then we also have added Airbnb at the same time, although they're still a different guest.  We know when it's an Airbnb guest, they're not going to empty out the garbage, even though we've told them. But the communication is there and we have the opportunity of educating them and turning them into a lifelong CottageStays guest.

Heather Bayer
How do you do that?

Jennifer Whaling
So with our OwnerRez communications and our SMS texting, you can right away.  We're communicating from day one. We also get their email address right away. We have to have that for the rental agreement and that allows us to further market to them down the road. And also, when they send us pictures of their dog, they end up re-sharing them on Facebook, which then a year later pops up on their memory. It's all, 'If we can get their dog's photo, we've got them.'

Heather Bayer
I think that's going to be the short video of this episode. 'If we can get their dogs video and their photos, we've got them.'

Jennifer Whaling
So one of the promotions that I had done, I have to tell you this while I remember it, but I took a course with Yvonne Halling last year, and she helped me do some really good promotions and really got me into taking videos of myself, which I hated. And in the most watched video is me explaining this promotion I was doing. And I'm sitting there and in the background is this bird feeder. And my cat, Cookie, comes along and he sneaks up. And then in the background, he's swatting the bird feeder.

Heather Bayer
Those are the best..... they're natural.....

Heather Bayer
I see that Yvonne Halling is a speaker at Jen Boyle's Direct Booking Summit. There will be information on the Direct Book Summit on the Show Notes. I'll be checking out Yvonne's contribution to that.

Heather Bayer
I just want to go back a bit because I had written something down here. Oh, yes, we talked about July/August being this is the summer season, and me being told years ago, you'd only rent July and August and you won't do anything else. Then you said you've got your waterfront properties, but then there's also the village of Bayfield. When I started in the business 20-odd years ago, 23 years ago, [Ontario] rentals were only water. People would say to me, You will only rent something if it's directly on the water. And of course, Airbnb changed all this because it made virtually anything and everything rentable. Do your in-village rentals get more out-of-season bookings?

Jennifer Whaling
It depends on the events that are going on in the area. So, in the village is very popular through the summer because there's lots of stuff to do. So that appeals to that type of family who wants to rent bikes and walk up town and do lots, go to the bookshop, all that. Everybody ends up in Bayfield at some point. Just depends on what you're wanting to do. However, in the off-season, they are extending it. So Bayfield is known for their Christmas in Bayfield. And we have the Disney carriage here, and Santa comes to visit. Now that can be just a season. Well, now they're extending it and there is Winter Wonderland. So you can come to Bayfield and there's all kinds of nice lighting and lots of events happening as well. But that's only, say, Thursday to Sunday. The trick comes in extending their stay.

Heather Bayer
So what are you doing to capture those out-of-season rentals in terms of marketing?

Jennifer Whaling
So summer is easy. So I like to go back to my ideal guest. So my ideal guest is Mother Hen. And Mother Hen in summer, she wants to gather all her chicks together. And in fall, Mother Hen wants to get together with the other hens and cluck, cluck, cluck. They want to get together and create memories and eat well and just have lots of fun. So when I look at the off-season, we look at amenities that would appeal to that Mother Hen getting together with the other hens. When you think of Mother Hen, she's the one who worries about everyone else. So she looks for all the amenities in a cottage that her chicks will want in summer and her hens will want in the off-season. But what I like, I guess I would say the most important amenity when you look at cottage photos, is the dining room table, because maybe you remember, have you ever seen the packing list that some of these people come with? And it's all centered around food. So Mother Hen has this picture perfect vacation, and that dining room table and that kitchen needs to be equipped with frying pans that aren't rusted-out and flippers that aren't melted and a nice big dining room table that everyone can gather at and play games and eat.

Heather Bayer
So how do you go about capturing those hens?

Jennifer Whaling
So we have through our social media.  We look for video, and we were using stock photography and stock video. However, last year with my guest services, she is in the 30-ish range, so we've actually started sending her to cottages with her friends. So she'll be in the hot tub in the winter with their touks on, and having nice charcuterie boards, so that people can see that real women are gathering. We like to do more of that as time goes on in those larger cottages and have varied age ranges of couples and women getting together. It's really easy to market that 2-3 bedroom, one couple vacation, where you show a cup of tea or coffee and a book, and a fireplace. But it's creating the memories. You can make more by renting with the larger cottages. And we have StayFi devices in all those cottages that attract more than one family. So that means that we're getting...., not only are we getting Mother Hen's contact information, but we're getting all the other hens' contact information. And we use that in our email marketing as well as in meta-advertising, which is not as in-your-face. So even if they didn't subscribe to my campaigns, they still can get it through the meta-advertising.

Heather Bayer
Can you describe the meta advertising a bit more?

Jennifer Whaling
I just feel recently, in the last few months, that I've got a handle on it and I know what I'm doing. It's very similar to when you're in your Facebook and you see the Airbnb ads or the Vrbo ads. So we're playing with video and similar type of ads too. And we're also interspersing in with it. Instead of the main cottage feature photo, we're interspersing in who I'm trying to attract. So the one we're starting with next week will be older ladies who are sitting around a campfire and eating at a dining room table. Nice videos like that.

Heather Bayer
I think that really is the key, is getting people to see themselves. That's exactly what I want. That's exactly what I want to be doing. I have used a photo many times from a property in Costa Rica I went to with Mike and Andrea. Oh, gosh, it must have been nearly 12 years ago now. There was this fabulous villa and it had an infinity pool. In the picture, there was a lady lying on a floatie in this infinity pool, just lying back, sunglasses on, and all you could see was the end of the pool and the ocean. That was me. I want to be the person in that picture. I'm going to be lying on that floatie looking out over the ocean. I think so many people don't see that you've got to start with the person that you want to attract. Because once you've got that 'persona', you know who that person is, then you can design anything that is going to appeal to that persona.

Jennifer Whaling
Yeah, exactly. And I found that real video works better than the beautiful stock photography we can get from Adobe or Canva. And that was hard to switch that, because I've got extra weight, extra, look at all the gray hair. But everybody.... those are the videos of myself when 'Coming Soon', they get the most hits, which is funny.

Heather Bayer
Yeah. When I talked to Kerri Gibson at Chalets Hygge in Québec, and we talked about her use of exactly that. I'll put a link to Chalets Hygge in the Show Notes if you want to go and take a look at Kerri's site, because it's very similar. There are people in these photos and they are people doing the things that her guests are going to want to be doing, sitting there with a cup of coffee in front of the fireplace or riding a bike through the Township. And it's simple, but it is time-consuming, though, Jennifer, isn't it?

Jennifer Whaling
Yes, but you can reuse it year after year. So when I look at the upcoming season, I already have a lot of social media in place. We have The Pie Trail. So there's literally a map that we provide, and you'll see it on my social media too, of the places that you can go to The Pie Trail. And you have to end at Zurich's Meat Market because they have a pie menu. So you walk in and there's a menu of all the pies you can get.

Heather Bayer
Oh, gosh. Now I'm feeling the need to come to Bayfield. Yeah, great marketing tactics there. You've mentioned doing more videos for 2024. Is there anything else you're going to do differently for next year?

Jennifer Whaling
I'm going to get more regular with my email campaigns, because I've invested in the StayFi devices. We've done it once a month, but I think we can easily do once every two weeks, and we also have the capability. I used to sell contact management systems. So my gold mine is my contact manager. So when I first started, I started with five. The next year, I bought a company which had 12 properties. The value in that company to me was not the properties, because he was all concerned about the properties and the owners, and that's wonderful. But I knew there was five years of emails that he didn't have this contact manager. So I spent all winter going through all those email addresses and who's a potential owner, who's a potential guest. Now, when you ask them, What is your purpose of coming? And you're trying to vet them? We keep track of what they do for a living. So if it's a ladies group, or it's getting together with your sisters, right? Now I can pull that out and send a specific email just to those people. If we have a novelist coming into town, then we will send an email to all the teachers, professors, novelists.

Jennifer Whaling
We have three Harlequin Romance novelists who book in the off-season. When was the last time you read a Harlequin novel? They still get them, right? So we'll let them know whenever a novelist is going to be in town. Yeah, that's what I would get more targeted on.

Heather Bayer
Yeah, that's perfect. In my Tipping Point episode this week, I talked about rich guest data, following the breadcrumbs in emails. There's always a breadcrumb in every email, and it could be that you've got to follow up on. I went to Barcelona earlier this year for a conference and I dropped so many breadcrumbs into my email.  I am traveling on my own to Barcelona. That's the first thing. I have only been there once before. I'm traveling on my own or I've only been there once before, and I'm going to a conference. Now, those to me were three very specific breadcrumbs that told them a lot about me and they did nothing with it. And it's just so frustrating that I would have loved to have had some information on how to get from the property I was staying in, in the middle of Barcelona, to the conference center. They told me how to get to the place from the airport, but they knew I was going to a conference, they knew where it was. They also knew it was a vacation rental conference, so they missed that amazing opportunity.

Heather Bayer
But yes, breadcrumbs, for those of you listening, if you haven't listened to Monday's Tipping Point episode [Oct 2 - VRS518 - Rich Guest Data], which I think I've called stepping up the guest experience, then go back and have a listen to that, because there's a lot of nuggets in there about exactly what Jennifer is talking about, about collecting this information and then storing it so you can use it next time you target these people.

Heather Bayer
I love that you're doing all this, Jennifer. It really is so impactful for everybody. It's for you, for your guests, for your owners. So just for a moment, how do you build your relationships with your owners? Always interested in this one.

Jennifer Whaling
If I can meet a potential owner face-to-face, they will most likely sign up for my services. I've tried a number of ways in the past to communicate with them, but they're like everyone else, they're not reading. So we do weekly owner statements, and in there I'll include information on what marketing plans we have in place, what promotions we're doing. We even give them examples of the guest communication that we've given to... Like when there was a particular heat wave, I sent the owners what the text was that guests got on how to keep their cottage cool. Because a lot of, especially lakefront cottages, don't have air conditioning. So shut your doors, shut your blinds. So we wanted to let owners know about those avenues. I spent months putting together an owner's guidebook and I thought everybody would use it like the Bible. They don't. They still call me all the time. But I struggle there, too. Do I say to them, Oh, just look in the guidebook? But no, because I still want them to come to me to create that relationship. If they only need a book, then they can go somewhere else as well and figure all out themselves.

Heather Bayer
Oh, that's so interesting you say that. We went through it for years. How do we get owners to read stuff? We created a... Oh, my gosh, we got these folders and I spent hours and hours putting all this stuff into folders, handed it to them. They never opened it.

Heather Bayer
I think we used some contact management system and they had a knowledge base. So I tried putting everything on the knowledge base. And then we went to using the Touch Stay guide. We used that as the owner manual. You can only go so far, you can take the horse to water.

Jennifer Whaling
Yeah. And the owner's guidebook, though, is helpful for all the new owners. So, yes, you still get a lot of questions, but a lot of them have already... The basics are there. So we still have trouble with owners deciding to stay until 4:00 PM on the day that we're trying to get in and get ready. But the general gist they're getting and understanding by having that guidebook in place.

Jennifer Whaling
We're also going to be doing annual meetings, and that's where I reached out to you, because coming off of that summer high, I was so happy with. We have Operto VR-Scheduler. The teams and the housekeepers, they're all on board and they're reporting issues, and we were able to fix umbrellas all the time and replace remotes. I now carry universal remotes in both of our vehicles so that I don't have to run and worry when a dog has chewed this remote. I carry an extra Firestick and a Roku. Because it's cheaper for me to have that $35 piece of tech and give it to the guests than worry about and try and figure this out before the next guest comes.

Jennifer Whaling
So I'm trying to after all that hubbub, we had it where one owner called and he was really upset because the cutlery drawer was disorganized and the pots and pans weren't stacked the way he likes.  And there was a piece of trim loose and a doorknob loose. And I was like, Oh. So I thought, just take a breath. Ten minutes later, I got an email from another owner. This is a more luxury property, and the big screen TV in the fun house was broken. You couldn't tell. It was when you turn it on, there's a big crack through it. And then I just broke down and I thought, we have been so on it. What is going on? Then I have to stop and step back.

Jennifer Whaling
That first owner with the utensil drawer, he's a heart surgeon. So when you think of it, I want my heart surgeon to notice everything else going on around there. So if he's upset, you know what? That's okay, right? But it's hard to put on that helmet when you're riding this high and you're feeling so good and everything's tickety-boo.

Heather Bayer
You sound like you really handle it well and you've got a great team. We're just getting towards wrapping up-time, but I want to talk a little bit about the Ontario Cottage Rental Managers' Association. This was something that Craig and I started out way, way back and it started out very quietly and then began to grow just a couple of years before we sold our company. How do you find being able to network with other property management companies?

Jennifer Whaling
Well, it was interesting because when I first joined, everybody else was so huge, and I was just a little fish in this big pond, and I had all my cottages were in one little area and you all had cottages everywhere and seemed to know what you were doing and add it all together. So it's neat to be able to get to know everyone and realize, Oh, we all have the same bear that's driving, right? And the geese problems and the skunks.

Heather Bayer
Yeah, I think that's what did it for me. That very, very first meeting we had, and it was in an hotel in Orillia, and there were four or five of us, and we all came in together and said tentative hellos, because we'd never met face-to-face. And then we sat down and four hours later we just had not stopped talking. And you suddenly realize that you all have exactly the same issues. And just getting somebody else's perspective on it was second to none. That was a lifesaver for us at that time.

Jennifer Whaling
Yes, for sure. For my business last year, another cottage rental agency member started with water sports equipment rentals. Now I can't do canoes because I'm not going to ask you to drag this canoe 100 steps down. But I can do paddle boards and lake mats, because there's no rental place in my little area. They had closed down, they had all ratty stuff. But I can provide this and that would be something that we would deliver on Sundays and pick up on Thursdays. So it's been another service that we're able to provide to our guests. And this year, I don't know if you were still there, but insurance has become an issue in Ontario if you're renting out your cottage. A lot of companies don't want to touch that, or they assume that you're an Airbnb and you rent 350 days a year, which isn't the case. A lot of my owners only rent three or four weeks and that's it. So we were able to find a company, a local company, and we all now have been able to offer our cottage owners here. You can contact this company or that company and they've got great cottage plus insurance plans, right?

Heather Bayer
That's brilliant. That is the power of collaboration, and I love to hear that. Okay, just wrapping up now. You've mentioned a lot of things in your tech stack. You've mentioned OwnerRez, StayFi, Operto VR-Scheduler. What am I missing?

Jennifer Whaling
I use HubSpot as my contact manager.

Heather Bayer
Right.

Jennifer Whaling
Now, I'm not married to it. As long as I had a contact manager, I can make it work, right? I got it because it has two users and you can have unlimited contacts. You're limited in your marketing contacts, but we changed the flavor of our marketing anyways. So right now it'll be I can pull out all the ladies groups and it fits within your marketing.

Heather Bayer
So are you still using the free version?

Heather Bayer
No, I use paid version.

Heather Bayer
Okay. And you'd mentioned Touch Stay. Are you a Touch Stay user as well?

Jennifer Whaling
Yes.

Heather Bayer
Okay. So I've got StayFi, Operto VR-Scheduler, OwnerRez, Touch Stay, HubSpot. That sounds like a really powerful tech stack.

Jennifer Whaling
I used to be in the tech industry. I used to own a company in Stratford. In fact, when you read or watch Justin Bieber's biography, you'll see, Oh, his Mom had a low-paying job. That was me. I hired her.

Heather Bayer
That's brilliant. His Mom had a low-paying job.

Jennifer Whaling
It wasn't low-paying. It was a great job. But you just graduated not knowing anything about website design. I take offense to that.

Heather Bayer
Great claim to fame there.

Heather Bayer
Jennifer, it's been an absolute pleasure talking with you. I wish we could do it longer. I really want to get back into the OCRMA in some way, so we should connect again at some point in the future. Are you heading to the Women's Conference in Nashville?

Jennifer Whaling
I am not.

Heather Bayer
That's such a shame.

Jennifer Whaling
But I am doing the Direct Booking Success.

Heather Bayer
Well, both of those will be listed on the Show Notes for anybody who wants to go and have a look at that, the Women's Summit in Nashville in December and the Direct Book Summit, which is this week if you are listening to the podcast on the day of publication.

Heather Bayer
Thank you, Jennifer. It's been an absolute pleasure. I really enjoyed this.

Jennifer Whaling
Thanks, Heather. It was nice seeing you again.

Heather Bayer
Thank you, Jennifer, so much. That was so much fun. I really enjoyed catching up. Something that Jennifer said just as we finished and said our goodbyes and she said, Oh, no, I forgot to mention PriceLabs! She said, We use PriceLabs for our dynamic pricing and we could not do without them. I have invited Jennifer to do a testimonial for PriceLabs given that they are our sponsor at the moment, and that should have been the upfront platform on her tech stack list. That was my fault. I didn't do my proper research beforehand. But anyway, you've heard it now. PriceLabs is part of Jennifer's Tech Stack.

Heather Bayer
That conversation went on a little tad longer than I would normally expect, because I was enjoying it so much, and that's really what matters. I'm just going to do a quick sign off now to say thank you so much for listening. Wherever you are, if you're doing a changeover, if you're on an airplane heading to a conference, which a lot of people are doing right at this moment, I do hope you enjoyed that. It's always a pleasure for me to talk to property managers, find out how they run their companies and how they have scaled from nought to whatever.

Heather Bayer
As I mentioned in the episode, make sure you go and listen to our Tipping Point episode this week. Listen to all the Tipping Point episodes. They're only 10 minutes long and each one of them has a real learning point and every one of them comes with some really useful downloads. I really encourage you to go and listen, or watch on YouTube. You watch on YouTube, you get to see the slides as well. And if you're on YouTube, please subscribe. We're trying to grow our subscriber list. I would absolutely love it if you would subscribe to our YouTube channel as well as the podcast. Also, finally, please come join us if you're not already joined us on the Facebook group, The Business of Short-Term Rental and Property Management. I will have the link for that in the Show Notes too. That's it for me. Thank you and goodbye.

Mike Bayer
We hope you enjoyed this episode of The Vacation Rental Success Podcast. Don't forget to check out our sponsor, PriceLabs, and their dynamic pricing and revenue management tools. Click the link in the description of this episode for more information.

Heather Bayer
It's been a pleasure as ever being with you.  If there's anything you'd like to comment on, then join the conversation on the Show Notes for the episode at vacationrentalformula.com. We'd love to hear from you and I look forward to being with you again next week.

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