Member LoginSite Search |
Vacation Rental Book/CD Package: Table of ContentsHere is what in publishing circles is called the "TOC" (pronounced "tee-oh-see") for our vacation-rental book/CD package. This will give you an excellent overview of the contents of the book and the CD that comes with it.
Introduction Making Money from Your Second Home Part 1: Preparing Your Property Listing Chapter 1: Using the Internet to Boost Your Rental Income The Masses Have Arrived Chapter 2: The Components of an Online Property Listing How Renters Search for Listings Chapter 3: Writing a Property Listing that Sells! Taking the Time to Do It Right Chapter 4: Enhancing Your Listing with Great Photos Simply Appalling Photos! Chapter 5: Adding a Calendar and Guest Book Opening a Rentors.org Account Part 2: The Big Four Vacation-Rental Sites Chapter 6: VRBO Getting to Know VRBO Chapter 7: CyberRentals Getting to Know CyberRentals Chapter 8: Great Rentals Getting to Know Great Rentals Chapter 9: A1Vacations Getting to Know A1Vacations Part 3: Marketing: Inexpensive Ways to Spread the Word Chapter 10: Leveraging Your Listings E-mail Signature Files Chapter 11: Creative Marketing Rates and Special Offers Chapter 12: Advanced Marketing Techniques The Virtual Tour Part 4: Managing Your Rental Property Chapter 13: Rates and Other Financial Matters Setting Your Rental Rates Chapter 14: Furnishings, Amenities, and Services Furnishings Philosophy Chapter 15: The Booking Process Responding to Inquiries Part 5: Vacation Property Owner's Toolkit Chapter 16: Forms and Checklists Vacation-Rental Logins & Property IDs Chapter 17: Essential Software Shareware--The Short Explanation Comments and Suggestions TOC, Part II, More Details Part 1: Preparing Your Listing In this part of the book you'll learn that an online listing is very much like a four-color brochure. It consists of hundreds of words, three to four color pictures, and your rental rates and contact information. (Click here to see a sample listing.) Next we'll show you how to select those words and take those pictures to make people want to rent your place instead of someone else's. You'll also learn how to add the identical availability calendar to all four leading sites. This is a huge convenience, because it means you won't have to update four separate calendars each time you get a booking. Part 2: The Big Four Vacation Rental Sites As noted earlier, there are literally hundreds of vacation-rental Web sites and no easy way to tell them apart. The ones we call "The Big Four," however, had such a long head start that they now have more listings than most of the others combined. That's important, because prospective renters want the largest selection available. Should you take our advice and list your property on all four sites, your total yearly cost will be less than $600. All of them charge a flat fee. None of them takes a commission. And all of them promote their sites in print and online. (As you will learn in Part 4, Rentors.org, an entity created by the Big Four, also makes it possible for most owners to accept all major credit cards.) Part 3: Marketing: Inexpensive Ways to Spread the Word At the click of a mouse, an online listing displays a four-color brochure devoted to your property. You need only tell people where to go on the Web to view your "brochure." You no longer have to pay by the word to describe your vacation rental in a newspaper ad. All you have to do is include the Web address for your property's listing. The chapters in this part of the book are chock-full of proven techniques for applying this kind of marketing leverage at little or no cost. (We even show you how to create elegant, custom notepaper featuring a line drawing of your property.) And then there is the advanced marketing chapter, where we show you how to create a five-scene 360-degree virtual tour (There are photographers who will do it for just $60!), a Web site, and a CD-based, auto-play brochure with music and narration. Part 4: Managing Your Rental Property
The chapters in this part of the book address these and many other questions people ask when considering going it alone. Managing your rental, even from a distance, doesn't have to be a big deal. And doing so can save you thousands of dollars in rental agent/management commissions. Think about it: If you've built a network of reliable service and cleaning people in the area, having an appliance replaced or repaired in your vacation rental property is no more difficult than doing so in your main home. Even if you want to continue with a property-management company, the Net and the tools you'll find in this seminar-in-a-box will empower you to negotiate for lower commissions. For example, you might contact your current rental agent or property manager and say, "I'll handle the marketing and booking process, but I'd like to buy your appliance-repair-service component. What would you charge?" Part 5: Vacation Property Owner's Toolkit CD This last part of the book is designed to acquaint you with the forms and software on the CD that comes with the package. The first chapter presents the printable forms and checklists you'll find on the disk. These documents are provided in both plain text and in Microsoft Word format, so you can easily customize them for your particular needs. We have developed them over the years to make managing our own vacation property as easy as possible. (For more information about the contents of this disk, please click here.) The second chapter focuses on the supplied software, some of which is free and some of which is try-before-you-buy shareware. These are the programs cited in the text to help you produce mailing labels, tweak scanned photos, take screen shots, and build CD-based slide shows of your property. |
