Experience environment: Redmi Note5A

Experience time: 2018.5

Experience person: Cinnamon

Open the app, Airbnb and Xiaozhu The initial interface is generally relatively simple and elegant. Airbnb's initial interface uses a gray background, with a gray logo (an inverted hand-shaped heart) occupying the central position, highlighting the theme. The initial interface of Piggy uses a white background (with a gray diamond grid and a gray Piggy logo above and below the grid). The red Piggy logo in the center is added with "Little Pig" next to it, which also highlights the theme. The initial interface is still more like Piggy. The warm-toned logo not only highlights the theme but also looks more comfortable. Airbnb is all gray as a whole. Although the gray of the logo is slightly darker, if it is changed to a bright color, it will look more prominent and warm.

When you come to the homepage, the overall style of the two is very similar. The search box at the top and the buttons at the bottom are relatively conventional. There are also some subtle differences: 1. Airbnb’s search box has a prompt like “Please try ‘Seattle’” every time, and the recommended locations are updated every few seconds, which is a very considerate approach. The prompt of Xiaozhu's search box is just "search destination", which feels like it doesn't make much sense. 2. The pictures on Airbnb’s homepage are basically small pictures, while the pictures of piglets are mainly large pictures. Users can slide left and right to view (it can be made into a carousel), making the user experience better. At the same time, Airbnb The "love" in the upper right corner of the picture is also well done. When users see what they like, they can click "love" to create a wish list, and finally compare (Xiao Zhu needs to click on the picture to collect it, in "My "View inside"); 3. Judging from the buttons at the bottom, Airbnb's "Wishlist" and "Stories" are more sentimental, while Xiaozhu's ones are more practical.

(1) For landlords: B&B is not only a way of accommodation, but also a new life philosophy and financial management method (***economy).

Renting for retirement: For some elderly people who need retirement care, they can rent out their spare rooms through online rental platforms and use rent to support their retirement.

Renting to support renting: Many renters have begun to improve their living environment by operating B&Bs, and have made many new friends through short-term rentals, while earning considerable profits.

Rent-to-support loan: For some house slaves, renting out unused rooms and using the rent to repay the monthly loan reduces the pressure on life.

Rent to support travel: There are some travel experts who share their spare rooms and sofas to meet friends who also love traveling. The rent from renting a house can be used as a travel fund and shared with like-minded friends. The experiences during the journey make travel more meaningful. (Baidu)

(2) For guests: It has higher cost performance, can better experience local customs and food, and make more local friends, so more and more people choose B&Bs.

As can be seen from the comparison in the above figure, Airbnb and Xiaozhu are currently not very high in the rankings, and the number of users fluctuates greatly. Among them, the number of Airbnb users reached its lowest point in May 2017. In addition to maintaining a relative balance from February to April, the number of users fluctuated greatly from May to October. The number of Xiaozhu users increased significantly from May to June, but continued to decline from June to October, and reached a low point in October.

Airbnb: 3.2 million+ listings worldwide, real-name verification of hosts, 24-hour Chinese customer service, feel free to stay! Whether you are in Japan, the United States, Taiwan, Shanghai, or Xiamen, if you are looking for clean and safe cost-effective accommodation, apartments and villas suitable for family travel, or to enjoy sea-view rooms, gardens, tree houses, castles and other special accommodations, Airbnb will not let you go. You are disappointed! (Baidu)

Xiaozhu Short-term Rental: Xiaozhu is a well-known short-term rental homestay booking platform in China, and it is also a social accommodation community with a human touch. We have more than 200,000 housing units in more than 300 cities, including B&Bs, courtyard houses, bungalows, hotel apartments, seaside cabins, tree houses, flower shops, bookstores, etc., allowing you to fully experience the beauty of accommodation, the warmth of human kindness, and the joy of sharing. And experience Xiaozhu's philosophy in living - living liberalism.

(Baidu)

Landlord, Tenant

(1) Landlord: a. Easily publish housing information;

b. Housing information is widely promoted;

c. The tenant’s true identity and the safety of his or her property.

(2) Tenants: a. Accommodation with better value for money, more humane touch and family atmosphere;

b. Real and reliable information about the property and landlord;

c. Safety of one’s own personal and property.

(1) Landlord: Make more friends while earning a considerable income

(2) Tenant: Make friends while having fun.

As can be seen from the comparison in the above figure, the users of the two apps are mainly female, reaching more than 60%, and male users also account for more than 30%. The proportion of male and female users is almost the same.

As can be seen from the comparison above, the age distribution of the user groups of Airbnb and Xiaozhu is also very similar. People aged 31-35 account for the largest proportion, exceeding 35%, of which Airbnb accounts for about 40%. The proportion of people under 30 years old is higher than that of people over 36 years old. Overall, more than 95% of the user population is under the age of 40, which shows that the main user group is still young and middle-aged people.

It can be seen from the above figure that the geographical distribution of the main user groups of Airbnb and Xiaozhu is also very similar. Most of them are in the economically developed coastal areas, and some are distributed in the more economically developed areas in the central region.

Summary of user groups: Generally speaking, a large part of the user groups of Airbnb and Xiaozhu Short-term Rental overlap. Most of the user groups are young women living in more economically developed areas. . In order to retain users for a long time, for landlords, the platform must ensure the reliability of tenant identity information and ensure that the publicity of the property is in place. For tenants, it is also necessary to ensure the authenticity of the property information (safety first), followed by the tenant's service attitude, high cost performance and the quality of the property.

Airbnb: A service-oriented app that connects tourists with homeowners who have vacant rooms for rent. It can provide users with a variety of accommodation information.

Xiaozhu Short-term Rental: A short-term rental B&B booking app that provides users with cost-effective short-term rental and daily rental accommodation services; allowing landlords to share unused houses, rooms, sofas, and tents for short-term rental And get considerable profits.

Airbnb:

Xiaozhu Short-term Rental:

The above pictures are the process page diagrams required to register as a landlord. From the comparison of the above pictures, you can It can be seen that both Airbnb and Xiaozhu pay more attention to the authenticity of the landlord's personal information. The personal information must be completed before the listing can be published. This approach is good for both landlords and tenants. After completing the real personal information, users can publish properties.

Airbnb will allow users to complete the property information: the type of property, how many guests can live there, the type of bed, the number of bathrooms, the address, etc.; more thoughtfully, in order to protect the guest information, Airbnb Only guests with confirmed reservations can know the exact location of the property. (Xiaozhu needs to complete his personal information to view the process of publishing the house, so there is no comparison. However, judging from the house introduction, the information is relatively complete). In general, both platforms pay more attention to the authenticity and reliability of landlords’ personal information and property information, while also paying attention to the protection of users’ personal and property information.

When users complete their personal information and publish listings, Airbnb provides relatively more step-by-step prompts. For example, when users are required to choose the type of listings to publish, it is equivalent to having already sorted them out for the user. category, the user only needs to select it. At this point, Xiaozhu independently set up the "Host Guide". In comparison, if I were a user, I would still prefer Airbnb's method of teaching users how to publish listings, and would not choose to go out of their way to See the Landlord's Guide.

Summary: Airbnb and Xiaozhu app pages do not occupy a particularly large proportion in this section of the landlord’s page (nor do they need to have a large proportion). What is more focused is the page presented to guests. . Both apps pay more attention to the authenticity and reliability of tenants and listings, and also pay more attention to the protection of tenants and listing information. Only by ensuring these conditions will more landlords be willing to publish on the platform. Listings.

As a tenant, the first and most basic requirement is accommodation conditions, the second is cost-effectiveness, and the last is human touch (a warm stay). First of all, when choosing accommodation, users will look at the accommodation style.

Airbnb is better than Xiaozhu in terms of the diversity of listings, with more than 3.2 million listings, while Xiaozhu only has more than 200,000 listings; in terms of price, the two The prices are almost the same. Judging from the accommodation facilities (air conditioning, separate bathroom, WiFi, etc.), they are basically complete. Finally, there is the landlord's service. High-quality service not only makes the tenants comfortable, but more importantly, makes the tenants live warmly. The new place feels like hometown, and the landlord with a good service attitude is like an old friend whom he has not seen for many years. In this regard, I see that most tenants in the comments mentioned the landlord's service attitude, which brings the user experience to a higher level.

? For landlords, the protection of personal information and property information is more important. If an accident occurs, who should bear the landlord’s losses? Considering this, I saw a policy for landlords on Xiaozhu Tenants’ “piggy insurance”, but landlord insurance currently only covers mainland China, which also means that some non-mainland tenants may be lost. But I didn’t find similar services on Airbnb (there may be some, but I didn’t find them)

For the promotion of listings (except for advertisements, purely from the page style), the pictures of the two apps Exquisite and delicate, the overall style is relatively refreshing and simple. Among them, Xiaozhu also uses a large section to launch short video advertisements, which will not make users feel disgusted, but will feel very novel. In addition, the facilities, equipment configuration, address and other information of the house are relatively detailed. Secondly, it is also a good choice for Airbnb to promote it in the form of "stories" written by guests.

Summary: Generally speaking, if a platform wants to retain more tenants, it must also regard landlords as important as tenants. In other words, the real customers of the platform should be landlords, and landlords The real customers are the tenants. While ensuring the profits and safety of landlords, there will be more housing, and naturally there will be more tenants.

? From the perspective of guests, you must first find a place you like. For example, I searched for "Yunnan" where I want to go. Here are the search results of Airbnb: The classification of housing types is very detailed ( There are special recommendations), users can manually select the price range, room type, room equipment and facilities, dates, etc. If the user likes this accommodation, he can click "Love" to collect it, and the collected accommodation will appear in the "Wish List" for easy search. The second is the positioning function, which allows users to view the environment around the accommodation.

Also search for "Yunnan" in Xiaozhu, and the page that comes out is like this: There are specific city classifications and the number of housing distributions (considering that this is a domestic place name, then search for foreign locations, See if there are specific city classifications). The same search for Japan also showed city classifications and housing distribution numbers. Looking at the search results of Airbnb again, we can see that the classification of Xiaozhu's section is better than that of Airbnb, and the classification is more detailed. Guests who are not sure about the destination and just want to go out may choose A place with more detailed classifications and more listings.

When I click "Kunming", the interface that comes out is like this: the classification is detailed, and the user can also view the surrounding environment of the accommodation. Others are similar to Airbnb: check-in time, facilities and equipment configuration, Click "Love" in the "Collection" of the "Me" section to view and other functions.

Summary: Generally speaking, the search results of both apps are quite satisfactory, with detailed classification and complete accommodation information. But in general, I still prefer Xiaozhu. When I search for a big place name, it will divide the big place name and provide the number of B&Bs in each small area. The second is its classification. In comparison, Xiaozhu’s categories are more detailed, such as “high-quality products”, “superb new homes”, long-term rental discounts and other small categories, which are more convenient for users to choose. Airbnb also has a better point of searching for housing. Sometimes there is a "tenant selection" option to save users time.

Both apps have a function for tenants to leave messages (evaluations) for landlords. This function not only provides a reference basis for subsequent tenants. It also deepens the communication between guests and hosts.

However, if you only rely on user reviews, it may not be so detailed, and Airbnb's "Story" section becomes useful.

As for the story-writing guests themselves, they can share their travel stories with other people who use the app and get likes from others (most of the users of these two apps are young people who are willing to share socially). It has a certain publicity effect. There is no sharing function on Xiaozhu (not found yet).

Summary: Generally speaking, Airbnb has many types of properties and is distributed in a wide range of locations, which is a major advantage. However, compared to Xiaozhu short-term rental, I think its search classification is not as good Piggy is so detailed. Airbnb has a little more fun than Xiaozhu, and I still like its “wish list” and “story”, while Xiaozhu is just a short-term rental B&B booking app.

? Generally speaking, Airbnb and Xiaozhu Short-term Rental have done a good job in booking B&Bs. It can be seen from the ratings that user evaluations are still relatively high. Among them, Xiaozhu Short-term Rental has a comprehensive The evaluation is almost as high as 5 points, which shows that it is indeed doing very well in terms of functionality and user experience. As a landlord, many homestays will be listed on several B&B booking platforms at the same time to increase visibility and revenue. As a tenant, generally only one is enough, so whether it is Airbnb or Xiaozhu App, there are a large number of pages The content is all for tenants (my understanding). If you really want to retain guests, you must retain a large number of landlords to ensure the diversity of listings. If you want to retain a landlord, you must ensure that the landlord has a guaranteed income. Nowadays, many rent out B&Bs full-time, so it is very important to ensure the landlord's income and safety. Another point is that except for the community-like "Stories" section on Airbnb, the two apps have no other functions except booking B&Bs. Although the theme is highlighted, each user cannot go out for an average of one year. After a few times, the app will not be opened at other times, so it is recommended to add some community-like functions to better retain users.