“Why is my Airbnb listing not showing?”. It’s the one question that I am asked the most, time and time again. So to answer it once and for all, I’ve put together this helpful little guide.
Your Airbnb listing may not be showing in the search results for many reasons. Three common ones include competition in your location, visibility factors and booking experience. Write a profile that ticks all the right boxes and make it as easy as possible for a guest to book your property. The less filters you have, the more likely Airbnb will reward you in the searches.
My aim is to show you sure fire ways to not only get your listing shown in the searches, but to get it showing near the top. More views equals more bookings and more bookings equals more money!
Here are my tried and tested ways to get your listing showing.
#1 – Why is my Airbnb listing not showing?
Ok, the best way to tackle this question is to bounce a question right back at you. Have you considered it may be showing, but you are looking in the wrong spot?
Airbnb has a great search filter system. It’s a great way to see if your listing is there, plus you can play around with the different search filters.
Below you will see a little snippet of the search filter as how a guest would see it.
This is a perfect way to find out if your Airbnb listing is not showing. If your property is a house, click house. If it has 3 beds, click 3 beds, if it has an air conditioner, click air conditioner.
Ok, you get the idea. Filtering out properties this way will increase the chances of finding your listing.
Another little tip I recommend is using the Airbnb App or website to view the map of listings in your area.
Zoom in to where your house is on the map. If it’s listed, you will be able to find it.
If these two methods don’t work, there may be something else at play. Keep reading.
#2 – Do you know about the pesky snooze option?
I did some digging around on this. Turns out a popular cause for an Airbnb listing not showing is your status showing as ‘snooze’.
This pesky little snooze option slips up the most experienced hosts. The good news is a couple
To turn off, click Listings in the top menu on the Airbnb website. Next, click Listing Details. Once the page loads and then scroll right down to the bottom and click edit where it says Listing Status.
Host >> Listing >> Listing Details >> Select Listed >> Save
If your status is showing either snoozed or unlisted, then it is likely this is the culprit.
Select Listed and also make sure to click everyone right below that. If all goes well, this should sort your problem and you will show in the search results immediately.
#3 – Maybe there is a ton of competition?
The odds are your listing is fine. But what may be the crux of the problem is the fact there is a ton of competition for listings in your location.
A fact many hosts are unaware of is that for ease of display, Airbnb will list only 300 listings at a time, per search. This could be another reason for an Airbnb listing not showing.
Your listing may not have made the top 300 when you ran a search query. This could very well be the reason it isn’t showing in your search results.
The simple fact may just be that your competition are doing a better job than you, as harsh as that sounds.
When it comes to the total listings in your area, there is nothing you can do. But there are ways to make your property stand out from the competition. Luckily, I can show you how.
Here are 11 reasons why you’re not getting Airbnb bookings. Competition is a big one, but there are are many others for you to check.
The next few points below are ways that can help you move up the Airbnb rankings. It may take time, but it will definitely work.
#4 – Do you have Instant Book turned on?
What does instant book mean I hear you ask? It’s a way for guests to book your property without you having to approve their reservation first.
Airbnb has stated they
This is one thing I would recommend doing. I always have it switched on and I have never had an issue with my Airbnb listing not showing in search results.
Now there are pros and cons to this. The cons are that any guest, no matter what their star rating is, can book your property without approval. Unfortunately, this could mean a less than desirable guests booking your property. Guests you otherwise would not have accepted.
On the other side of the coin, Airbnb penalise hosts that reject reservation requests. So while rejecting a guest that rates low may sound like a good idea in the short term, in the long term it may cost you money.
My advice is to switch it on. Airbnb have stated that over 60% of bookings now are from instant book, so guests clearly love the option.
#5 – How many views has your Airbnb listing had?
Another way to test if your Airbnb listing is not showing is to look at your listing views.
Head over to your Airbnb hosting dashboard and click on 30 day reviews on the right. It should bring up an image like the one below.
Here you can see exactly how many page views your Airbnb listing is receiving on a nice shiny graph. You will be able to tell immediately if your listing is showing in the search results. How? Because your page views will be more than 0.
If that figure is above 0, then it’s obvious that people are able to find your listing.
What I love about this screen is that it also shows how many bookings you’ve made in the past month. It will also show your booking rate percentage.
I’d suggest looking at the graph often. It will show the peak periods that potential guests are viewing your listing. I like to use it as a tool to say when I should lower or increase your nightly rate.
#6 – Your price is too expensive
It could be that your price per night is just way too expensive. This is something I see all to often.
If you are starting out on Airbnb, I recommend listing your property at a lower price. Your property is new, so you need to build trust with potential guests in the way of reviews and total bookings. I have an article on how Airbnb price breakdown works.
When a guest comes across your listing and sees you have barely any reviews, but you are the same price as a property nearby that has 150 positive reviews, you don’t need me to tell you which property they will book first…
Start your price low, even if it’s a lower price than similar properties in your location. Get those bookings rolling in and then consider lifting your price.
Another tip I would recommend is to scout out the competition in your area.
For example, you may have a 3-bedroom house with two bathrooms and an air conditioner. Do a search for properties in your area with these same criteria and see what their listing price is set at. It’s a good idea and has worked for me in the past.
#7 – Switch to incognito mode
What you need to remember is that Airbnb has designed a detailed search function. Their aim is to match guests with listings that suit their preferences. The easier it is for guests, the more bookings and that means more money.
One thing I have noticed is their system will remember your search preferences each time you log in. For example, you may be a family of two adults and four kids. Therefore, a common search will be for five bedroom properties with two bathrooms.
In other words, your previous search history will skew the results you see somewhat.
Google has designed it to replicate a fresh search from scratch. It’s a search without any cookies or browser history to interfere in your searches.
Incognito mode will allow you to do an Airbnb search in give you a true reflection of the houses in your area. It’s quite possible that your Airbnb listing may be showing after all.
To turn incognito mode on, click new window on Chrome and then select incognito window. It’s a good way to check for an Airbnb listing not showing.
#8 – How many rooms do you have selected?
Alright, this is self explanatory, but it may be worth checking your search filters.
You may have done recent search for a 4 bedroom house and the search filter has remembered this setting. If your Airbnb house is 1-bedroom, this is why your Airbnb listing is not showing!
As you can see, I did a recent search for an entire place in London in a price range of $114 to $253.
Your property will not show if the price falls outside of the range of this filter. There’s no way it can.
So it may sound silly, but a quick look at the search filters may help you avoid some annoying headaches!
#9 – Try calling Airbnb directly
Sometimes the best thing to do is to just call Airbnb customer support and ask them what the heck is going on.
May be there is a problem with your listing that you are unaware of that they can fix straight away.
It’s likely they can give you some advice on why your Airbnb listing is not showing. Hey, it’s worth a try isn’t it?
Airbnb has recently released a live chat which is helpful. You can connect to a customer service representative and chat away whilst you work.
I have contacted Airbnb customer support many times over the years and they are helpful. Every single time they have resolved my query.
Conclusion
As you can see, there are many different ways that can effect your Airbnb listing not showing.
More often than not, your listing will be appearing in search results. Make sure you try all the methods I have suggested in this article because there’s a good chance they will work.
Check to see if your status is not on snooze or unlisted (as per step two above. Even try running an incognito window to make sure.
If your listing is getting page views (step five) then there is nothing wrong with your listing. It’s likely you are searching the wrong criteria.
Be sure to get involved in the comment sections below as I would love to here from you.