Be one of the first hosts to try Optimize for Airbnb

This is one of those times where I needed ChatGPT to “help me not sound like a jerk” LOL. 

What I wanted to write: “No one asked for this… This is horrible for hosts… This makes Hospitable seem ‘bought out’ by Airbnb… The ‘ask’ is monumental and the ‘give’ is basically a coupon… the statistics are an insult to our intelligence…”

But instead, I get to diplomatically say:
 

I appreciate the transparency and the effort to bring new tools to hosts, but I’m struggling to see the value of this one.

From a host perspective, the tradeoff feels extremely lopsided: giving Airbnb exclusive control over high‑demand dates in exchange for a 1% rebate (only if the stay books) is hard to justify. The example math works out to about $10 on a $1,000 stay, which doesn’t meaningfully offset the opportunity cost of blocking other channels.

The performance claim also feels a bit misleading. Saying “listings that were exclusive to Airbnb got more Airbnb bookings than listings that weren’t exclusive to Airbnb” doesn’t really demonstrate increased demand — it just reflects the mechanics of exclusivity.

I worry that this may not align with what most hosts actually need, and I’d love to see Hospitable’s development efforts continue focusing on features that strengthen multi‑channel distribution rather than limiting it.

With sincere care for the well-being of Hospitable, its team members, and its customers,

-- Tom

“After punishing you with our new commission structure we’ll give you 1% back if you block out other channels”. Yeah, that sounds about right. 😭

I have to admit, seeing Hospitable spend development time on this feature hurts a little.

The “don’t worry, you can still book direct” part from Airbnb is also pretty ironic… probably because blocking direct booking entirely would not even be legally acceptable in many places.

More fundamentally, the battle between channels is not really the host’s problem. That’s Airbnb’s business challenge — not ours.

As hosts/property managers, the goal is usually:

• maximize visibility
• diversify risk
• maintain control over distribution
• avoid dependency on a single OTA

That’s exactly why many of us use a PMS/channel manager in the first place.

So seeing multi-channel distribution intentionally restricted for a 1% rebate feels very misaligned with the interests of professional operators.

Could not agree more with all the comments above. The focus in my business is doing exactly the opposite to this idea - ie I want to get away from AirBnB having so  much control over my business. 

Whoever thought this was a good at Hospitable has seriously misread their client base in my humble opinion. 

Andrew