The commercial accommodation providers are focusing on integrating the concept of home into the marketing to enhance the customer experience, value, and satisfaction. Airbnb could also implement the concept of home to achieve the massive benefits, competitive, advantages, and revenue growth. The company is an online marketplace where property owners/hosts meet guests willing to rent and access accommodation services. The concept of home is derived from the idea that homes have significant purposes beyond the physical place of residence, building structures and financial assets. It is where one acquires maximum comfort, safety, and welcoming, which allows them to express the best version of self. Moreover, home holds the intangible components such as treasurable memories, freedom, safety, togetherness, connection, and happiness, which exist in the various tangible elements such as furniture, backyard, house, family members, pets, and others. Hence, the concept of home implies the psychological and emotional benefits derived from the specific building structures, environment, people, and other stakeholders in the house. The commercial accommodation providers utilize the home concept through creating hotels in diverse places and designs (place), with customized, old-fashioned amenities and services (product), and at varying customer-friendly costs (price). The integration of home-like features into the marketing strategies result in the personalization, localness, hospitableness, serendipity, and ethical consumerism experiences similar to those derived at homes. Airbnb could emulate the same pattern of providing accommodation services identical to those acquired at homes; this would propel the firm towards expanding the market share and revenue.
Introduction
The commercial hospitality industry is one of the growing sectors owing to the rapid expansions in globalization, tourism, and other business activities. As the industry grows, the competition also stiffens as both commercial and non-commercial accommodation providers seek to attract the highest number of clients and market share. In an industry facing stiff competition, the marketing strategies employed by individual firms play the significant role in promoting the brand awareness, customer persuasion, and attainment of competitive advantages (Sun and Lee, 81). The same idea is utilized by the commercial accommodation providers, which formulate and implement various marketing strategies to dispense their brand information, value proposition, and attract the most customers in the market (Mody, Suess, and Lehto, 2391). Notably, the providers are focusing on the concept of home as the primary message used in advertising the products and services offered at the hotels. Hence, the purpose of this report is to evaluate the ways that the ways that the commercial accommodation providers utilize the concept of home to market their products and services. Further, the report will focus on Airbnb as a single commercial accommodation provider, and assess how and why it can implement the concept of home to market its services and achieve competitive advantage.
Background to Airbnb
Airbnb is an online commercial accommodation marketplace that connects quests to property owners seeking to rent out spare rooms or the entire property. The private company headquartered in San Francisco provides the hospitality services to all global customers through websites and mobile applications (Oskam and Boswijk, 22). The company only acts as a broker that connects guests to hospitality providers without owning the properties or hosting the events. Currently, Airbnb lists nearly 800,000 properties existing in almost 34,000 cities across 90 countries (Midgett et al., 53). In this regard, the company's target market includes guests and hosts situated in regions with high demand for accommodation and hospitality services. The firm generates revenue through commissions, which include 6-12% of every booking from guests and 3% from hosts. Airbnb has recorded significant growth due to affordability and value accommodation, which attract more guests worldwide. In addition to the highly interactive and easy-to-use website and mobile apps, Airbnb brags of the extensive collection of homes, experiences, and restaurants; these facilities contribute to the competitive advantage and revenue of the firm (Midgett et al., 64).
The Concept of Home
The cliché that ‘no place like home' or ‘home is the best' indicates the existence of a deeper meaning of home, beyond the physical place of residence, building structures, and the financial assets. According to Tussyadiah (71), home is the place where one acquires maximum comfort, safety, and welcoming, which allows them to express the best version of self. In many occasions, people have considered home to be the place where they grew up and spent most of the time as kids. In this case, home holds the intangible components such as treasurable memories, freedom, safety, togetherness, connection, and happiness, which exist in the various tangible parts such as furniture, backyard, house, family members, pets, and others (Tussyadiah, 75). According to the survey conducted by the Pew Research Center in 2008, 64% of the 2,260 American adults interviewed, agreed that the place their hearts consider as a home is where they were born and raised, but not their current urban place of residence (Oskam and Boswijk, 26). Hence, home implies the place where a person has full control and orientation in time and space with the utmost safety and comfort; this explains why people prefer separate holiday homes.
The concept of home implies the psychological and emotional benefits derived from the specific building structures, environment, people, and other stakeholders in the house. The deep familiarity with the physical features of one's home influences the intangible benefits, which are the pillars of comfort, safety, memories, happiness, and freedom among others (Tussyadiah, 74). According to Mody (2) children become homesick even when the new residence has improved amenities, due to the different of intangibles derived from the new tangibles. For instance, the treasurable memories and happiness derived from a rural tree-house may surpass those obtained from a modern urban apartment. During vacations, holiday trips, and tourism, people often strive to connect the places or hotels they visit, with their psychological and emotional desires of home (Mody, 2). In this regard, a wealthy family with multi-million dollar home may prefer holiday vacation in an off-grid underground hygge, with the objective of fulfilling their innate desires of comfort, memories, togetherness, and freedom.
However, since people have different emotional and psychological orientations, the concept of home has various meanings for every individual, but the financial asset or building structures are the least considerations (Geiger, Horbel, and Germelmann, 6). As globalization enhances the interconnectivity amongst people, places, commerce, and technology, there is a rising disconnect between people and homes. Despite the rise of trans-national hotel corporations, the disconnection between place and hotels has also increased. On the other hand, tourists, travelers, and guests have developed sophisticated behaviors that enhance the desire to gain meaningful home experiences and connection with the people and places, as opposed to the hotel hospitality (Mody, 2). Therefore, the commercial accommodation providers are also seeking to incorporate the home concept in their marketing strategies to appeal to the guests seeking the home-experience beyond reception.
How Accommodation Providers Use the Home Concept
The accommodation providers in the hotel industry are increasingly indulging in content marketing that communicates the physical and social dimensions and the corresponding valuable home experiences (Mody, Suess, and Lehto, 2386). The modern marketing approach is based on the home concept whereby the accommodation providers seek to offer services and products with similar experience and value as that derived from home. In this regard, the primary features in the marketing message include the tangible components that contain the intangible benefits sought by most guests (Mody, 2). The home existing companies achieve the home concept through place/location, which relates to the selection of diverse and appropriate sites for the hotels (Sun and Lee, 84). Besides, the construction and designs of the hotels are matched with the environment to reveal the localness experiences similar to homes. In ensuring every customer's access to the hotel within the preferred location, the providers are engaging in franchising approach where properties in diverse locations share brand name and image (Sun and Lee, 85). In this regard, a commercial accommodation provider acquires significant subsidiaries in different locations, which meets the localness desires of every guest.
The current providers also integrate home-like amenities such as beach, gym, art, spa, wall paintings, and design that replicate hospitableness derived from home. In this case, the hotel marketing focuses on the additional accessories that maximize the freedom, variety, and serendipity within the place (Oskam and Boswijk, 29). The diversity enhanced in the sizes, the human resource in hotels, and the costs are also prioritized in marketing to reveal the idea of ethics and unstructured community where every guest has the freedom to enjoy the services in a home-like environment. For instance, hotels exist in different sizes including those where the guests have the liberty to personalize the rooms and engage in activities they would prefer at homes (Oskam and Boswijk, 34). Therefore, current accommodation providers utilize the home concept through integrating services, hotel locations, sizes, technology, amenities, franchise, cost, and human resource services that maximize the home-like experiences. In this regard, the home-like experiences include serendipity, hospitableness, communitas, localness, personalization, and ethics, which, in turn, results in freedom, treasurable memories, warmth, togetherness, connection, freedom, safety, comfort, and happiness achieved at home (Mody, 2).
Creating the Home Experience in Airbnb
Currently, Airbnb is a leading accommodation provider in maximizing customer satisfaction and experience (Oskam and Boswijk, 22). As the competition grows, the firm could enhance its brand reputation and market share by integrating the home-concept into the marketing strategies. Regarding the 4Ps of marketing, Airbnb can improve the place or location of the hotels or hosts to enhance the localness required to maximize the home experience. In this regard, the company should focus on having diverse hosts located in different places including airports, rural deserts, mountains, forests, underground, as well as, in various countries in Africa, America, and others. With such diversity in the location of hosts, Airbnb will allow every customer to choose the most appropriate place that provides the desired localness. As a result, guests who derive the localness of home-experience from rural tree-house, underground hygges, river-side, or airport hotels; will have the products/services they desire (Geiger, Horbel, and Germelmann, 9).
The home concept in the place also enables the firm to achieve the sense of communitas through enhancing the diversity as guests can freely interact with the environment of choice. The sense of community is also achievable when the firm breaks the social barrier as the guests select the most appropriate rental or host that meets the ‘home away from home' cliché (Mody, 2). In addition to place, Airbnb can enhance the product/service through integrating home concept to improve the hospitableness, localness, and personalization similar to that acquired at home. This is achievable through setting registrations standards that require every host to offer foods, entertainment, arts, room design, cultural programs, and other amenities that corresponds to the local environment (Oskam and Boswijk, 39). In this regard, guests have the liberty to select hosts whose facilities match the personal desires for home-like amenities. For instance, a Canadian guest in Brazil could have access to hotels or guests with amenities and services similar to those offered in the Brazilian village.
Furthermore, the service delivery policies could also be designed to enhance old-fashioned interpersonal contact unlike the professional reception in luxury hotels; this results in home-like hospitableness and serendipity (Mody, 2). In this case, the hosts are encouraged to prepare their local delicacies and welcome the guest like family members back to their parents' home. On the same note, the room arrangement, relationships between hosts and guests, leisure, and entertainment could also be made authentic, old-fashioned, and simple to create the experience of home as opposed to hotel guest. Through maximizing the authenticity and serendipity in the relationship between host and guest, as well as, all other components of the accommodation, Airbnb would achieve the home-like hospitableness and experience (Mody, 2).
Additionally, the authenticity in service delivery also entails personalization and ethical consumerism integrated into all the accommodation processes. Personalization refers to the freedom granted to the guests to access and manipulate the amenities and the environment to satisfy the personal goals (Geiger, Horbel, and Germelmann, 11). Airbnb could support its hosts in gathering customers' information and then integrate them in customizing the services/products offered. In this regard, hotels /hosts could have modern technology and mobile apps, that enable the guests to review offers, request services, self-guide during the stay/trip, and select amenities and services matching those at their homes and neighborhoods (Geiger, Horbel, and Germelmann, 13). Hence, personalization enables the customers to access home-like services with memories, freedom, comfort, and satisfaction. Ethical consumerism, on the other hand, involves supporting and empowering the micro-entrepreneurs willing to live with the guests in a home-like atmosphere with family-like relationships.
Conclusion
The commercial accommodation industry is increasingly adopting the home concept in the marketing strategies, to express the value proposition and satisfaction similar to that attained from homes. The idea of home is utilized through the creation of the 4Ps of marketing including price, product/service, price, and promotion attributes, which resembles those existing in typical homes. The concept is based on the idea that home is the place where a person attaints intangibles such as maximum comfort, welcoming, warmth, togetherness, welcoming, safety, and happiness from the tangibles such as furniture, art, kitchenware, and others. Hence, through incorporating home-like intangibles and tangible into the 4Ps of marketing, the commercial accommodation providers will enhance customer satisfaction, competitive advantage, and revenues. Airbnb could implement the concept of home through redesigning the 4Ps to improve communitas, personalization, localness, hospitableness, serendipity, and ethical consumerism experiences attained from the hosts.
References
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