Vrbo Automated Messages: Built-in Solution and a Better Alternative

Effective communication with guests is one of the most crucial aspects of success for STR hosts who list their properties on Vrbo, an international vacation rental marketplace. But responding to travelers’ inquiries and communicating with guests who have booked their stays is very time-consuming.

Moreover, most Vrbo guests and guests on other platforms that are Vrbo alternatives expect vacation rental hosts to respond immediately. That can be overwhelming, and a late response may result in negative reviews.

Automating communication with guests helps make this process more efficient, saves time, and improves the overall guest experience. There are some possibilities for automating communications on Airbnb. But is there also Vrbo scheduled messages functionality? Let’s take a closer look at what this rental listing platform offers to hosts.

Vrbo Automated Messages: What Options Are There for Hosts?

Busy vacation rental hosts have a lot on their plate, and what you expect to be a side hustle can quickly look and feel like a full-time job. That’s why many savvy hosts prefer to use short-term rental software, such as Hospitable, to streamline their business operations.

With Hospitable, you can automate most of your routine tasks, including communication with guests, managing cleaners, syncing calendars, managing prices across different channels, review management, and more. Our STR super app also features a built-in dynamic pricing tool, included at no additional cost in our Host, Professional, and Mogul plans.

The automated messaging system typically includes at least sending messages on specific events. For example, it may include sending reminders, thank you letters, scheduled messages before and after booking, and check-in and check-out messages. So, can you enable sending automated messages on Vrbo? The short answer is no.

Although Vrbo provides some automated messaging functionality, it’s not what you can expect from a fully automated system. The platform offers mediated communication between potential guests who want to book a vacation rental property and the host. The goal is to prevent sharing unnecessary information between the Vrbo host and guest before a booking is confirmed.

When answering booking requests through Vrbo, hosts can take advantage of two templates. If the vacation rental property is available upon the guest’s request, the “Available Template” is used automatically. If you can’t accept the request, the “Non-available Template” is applied.

Both templates contain plain text that can be edited; however, hosts cannot add email addresses, phone numbers, images, logos, or HTML code. If you try to use such content, it will be automatically removed from the message.

Writing the same messages to guests repeatedly can get tedious, so Vrbo hosts can create custom email templates from their Inboxes. That makes sending messages easier and saves time. You can name each template as you like, categorize templates by type, and add attachments to them, for example, your Vrbo check-in instructions. You can also personalize your message templates with tags, such as guest and host names, property IDs, and relevant dates.

Are There Any Vrbo Scheduled Messages?

Scheduled messages work well for sharing routine information about your rental space. They save you time and ensure that guests always know how to check in, use your amenities, or contact you when a problem arises. So, can you create scheduled messages on Vrbo and send them to guests automatically?

Vrbo sends an automated message with the welcome guide information seven days before check-in to enhance the guest experience. This is the only Vrbo scheduled message sent via email, and it includes all the information guests should know about their stay.

Therefore, hosts don’t have to worry about sending welcome letters for every booking they receive from Vrbo. The information included in a welcome guide is also accessible through the Vrbo app and the web, and it is sent only to those guests who have confirmed their reservations.

Hosts can prepare a welcome message for each of their Vrbo properties. It should include information such as the property’s direction and location, the host’s contact details, parking instructions, check-in and check-out procedures, house rules, and a guide on using amenities.

As you see, automated messaging offered by Vrbo is very basic, and it’s not enough to provide a perfect guest experience or make a host’s life easier. However, you can automate all your Vrbo messages using short-term rental management software like Hospitable, keeping your guests informed from booking through to check-out and review requests.

With Hospitable, you’ll be able to take advantage of our preloaded message templates and use 50+ short-codes and different conditions and triggers to personalize your messages. Our system allows hosts to create three types of messaging rules to generate automatic and scheduled messages:

• Event messaging rules—to automate messages that quickly respond to certain events, for example, when you get a new inquiry, a new request to book, or a new reservation.
• Scheduled message rules—to send messages based on timing, for example, one day after a reservation is made, a few hours before check-in and check-out time, or a day of the week. These typically are check-in and check-out instructions, follow-up messages, reminders, and review requests.
• Question rules—to reply to a question from a guest that the system detects in a conversation. Our system utilizes AI to recognize questions on more than 20 common topics and instantly generates a response using your pre-written answer. Check out our help article for a comprehensive list of question categories.

With Hospitable, 90% of communication with guests on Vrbo, Airbnb, Agoda, Booking.com, and direct booking websites runs on autopilot. But our Inbox AI features can take your messaging automation to the next level.

When messaging your guests manually, you can use the Improve with AI feature to rewrite your message and ensure that it is warm and professional. Provide some bullet points as guidance, and we’ll craft a personalized reply.

You can save time by drafting detailed responses to your guest’s last message using Suggest with AI. With just one click, Hospitable will generate a personalized response based on your booking details and past replies. You can review the draft and edit the message before sending it to your guests.

You can help AI write more effective messages by providing it with additional information to learn from. Create a digital guidebook and upload it to the Knowledge Hub to educate AI about your properties and policies. It will then use this information automatically when creating accurate responses to your guests. You can also turn on Auto Inbox for seamless automated replies and enjoy hands-off communication.

Watch the explainer video to learn more about Hospitable’s AI features.

Final Thought

Vrbo doesn’t provide a fully automated messaging system; instead, it offers limited automated welcome message functionality and the ability to create and edit email templates. However, using tools like Hospitable, which offers advanced guest communication and AI features, you can fully automate your conversations with Vrbo guests, from booking inquiries to check-out. Automating your communication with the help of AI, you can keep your Vrbo guests informed at every stage and make your life easier.