As we pass 700 listings in the Google VR beta, I wanted to take a second to provide a very important update. This may sting a bit, but please read this thoroughly to understand the issue.
At this time, we are only allowing users with a Hosted Site (ie. the website engine managed by OwnerRez) to enter the Google VR beta. Yesterday, we reached out to the users who were already in the beta and were not using a Hosted Site, informed them of this decision, and removed their listings from the integration.
This is nothing something we want to do, but it has to be done to keep the integration in place.
Google measures what they call "Price Accuracy" for all the listings in a particular integration. We have access to a dashboard showing us the Price Accuracy of all users and listings from OwnerRez. Price Accuracy is a measurement of how many OwnerRez listings are showing the correct price on Google. Basically, Google wants to ensure that when a guest clicks through to the landing page (i.e. the user's actual website) to complete the booking, the price they see at the end is the same as what was advertised on Google back at the beginning. They also check for availability and branding to ensure the property looks the same and is still available if it is shown as available on Google.
Price Accuracy is a pivotal part of the integration. The integrating partner (OwnerRez) must maintain a high score or risk being delisted, and that means the entire integration, not just one or two specific listings.
The Price Accuracy score for OwnerRez is very low right now, even though we've been working with many individual users and listings for months to analyze and fix problem after problem. We have dropped into a range where our integration (the entire integration for all users) is at risk of being turned off completely. We don't believe it will come to that, but we have to take drastic actions to make large changes and then work towards bringing back new features after the pricing issues are first corrected.
So why is our Price Accuracy score so low? What's the problem?
As we do with all of our features, we built the Google VR integration with a lot of flexibility in mind. We designed the integration to highlight our user's brand and website - we wanted to give each of you the flexibility to showcase your own website so that it's a direct booking experience when the guest comes to your website from Google.
Our competitors don't do this. Our competitors use a single landing page for all traffic (like bookings.mypmssoftware.com), and force all guests to go through that same experience to book. This is what Google prefers and how their system is used to validate Price Accuracy. It's more of a hotel model where they assume all listings are the same. If you search on Google VR for vacation rentals that are listed by some of our competitors, you will see what I mean. Most of them go to a central booking landing page, not the PM's website. This allows Price Accuracy to be uniform and consistent across all listings.
Because our OwnerRez team built our integration to use each user's personal website, widget, or custom landing page, it means that Google has to check Price Accuracy in different ways for each and every user. This has created several problems:
1) Google's verification system is not designed to do this correctly. We have talked to Google exhaustively about many parsing/verification issues that are not actually correct. What they have deemed incorrect on one user's website may not be the same on another. In many cases, it comes down to presentation - do they believe that "this widget to book on" is the same as the listing that was on Google VR at the beginning?
2) In many cases, our OwnerRez users are using widgets or custom website landing pages in ways that do not correctly show the same rates or availability as what Google is looking for. When Google verifies the landing page, they don't see the same prices, so they drop the Price Accuracy score for that listing.
3) Google does not verify everyone, only a random handful of users day by day. As I mentioned above, Google's verification system assumes that all listings within an integration are the same booking experience. If 10 or 15 verifications fail overnight, they drop the score based on those failures and don't verify the other 500 listings. The next night, they may verify 10 or 15 others.
Solutions and steps forward...
It is imperative that we fix the Price Accuracy problem as quickly as possible. We have noticed that most problems come from those using widgets on other websites or custom landing pages because we cannot guarantee that those widgets and custom landing page experiences will show the correct pricing and availability when Google verifies that page. The users using our Hosted Website tend to be the most accurate as our hosted website booking and property pages use the same structure and forms. While they may be styled differently, the underlying property and booking pages are the same user by user, so our Hosted Website landing pages tend to verify at a much higher rate.
Our current roadmap is this:
1) As of this moment, only Hosted Website users will be allowed to participate in the Google VR integration. We have already removed those without a hosted site and are taking steps to put out a quick update so that new beta users don't see widget/custom landing page options.
2) Work with Google to monitor Price Accuracy scoring and restore our integration scores to excellent.
3) Develop a default landing page that all users can use (no matter your website situation) that uses an OwnerRez-provided guest form, which will accept Google VR traffic and ask the guest if they want to book after showing a standard landing page with charges. This will become the new default landing page option when turning on Google VR. All of the current beta users that were kicked out will be immediately added back using this landing page option.
4) Work to establish our own international verifications and vetting process to allow widget and custom landing page experiences. As with all OwnerRez features, we are deeply committed to promoting your brand and website experience, so we will work to get back to this option as time allows. It will be difficult and take time because of how Google verifies things, but it will remain on the roadmap as a goal for Google VR. However, in the meantime, using the default landing page (bullet 3 above) will make it so that all users can get their listings into Google VR without waiting for this.
I understand this will surprise some of you and create frustration. Please understand that this decision is about creating long-term stability in the Google VR integration and opening it up to as many as possible as soon as possible. This integration is unlike any other we've worked on over the years, but we are committed to making it a success.
It is difficult to understand how this was not laid out / understood at the outset of this nearly 10 months ago! Yes it stings somewhat.
We have a hosted website, with OR, willing to do anything needed to help get this past the post.
We are all falling way behind the other sites that are already integrated with Google vr. With bookings down seemingly across the board it would be good to see this avenue taken advange of ASAP.It may make no difference, but we really do need the opportunity to find out.
Before hanging too many hopes on GVR, I'd suggest going to GVR as a traveler, and try to find anything. You may see how unfriendly the interface is (it is definitely geared toward hotels) and how difficult it is to use. Plus, the "paid" channel listings(such as booking . com or vrbo/aka blue pillow) are prioritized in results. To me it seems like Booking. com, only more outdated. And it is widely known that Booking .com interface is not a very good fit for most VRs.
Yes, I have been there and seen some of the issues as a guest looking.
As with some owners, some guests are looking for a different platform to book their vacation accommodation through. It may not make the world of difference, but it is there for a reason and OR is integrating to it for a reason. It doesn't need to make a world of difference but an improvement would be welcome.
Other platforms have their properties listed, currently I wonder how much we are leaving on the table by not being listed on Google Vr.
Comparing it to booking is irrelevant. Booking are just horrendous to deal with as a company - my experience there.
Hi. How do I get added to the beta testing as I have a OR hosted site.
Same I have been inquiring about Google VR and I have my own house design through OR. How do I get in the beta?
Other platforms have their properties listed, currently I wonder how much we are leaving on the table by not being listed on Google Vr.
Comparing it to booking is irrelevant. Booking are just horrendous to deal with as a company - my experience there.
You assume that Goog is better to deal with than BDC? You can already see that price display is screwy on traveler facing side and usually shows for only 2 people which is a hotel room default. But that aside... how much we are leaving on the table? I would say - not that much currently, if anything at all. This whole GVR thing became a great marketing theme for many channel management software providers. But whether it actually lived up to their end users' expectations is an open question. Only you can decide what's best for you.
Other platforms have their properties listed, currently I wonder how much we are leaving on the table by not being listed on Google Vr.
Comparing it to booking is irrelevant. Booking are just horrendous to deal with as a company - my experience there.
You assume that Goog is better to deal with than BDC? You can already see that price display is screwy on traveler facing side and usually shows for only 2 people which is a hotel room default. But that aside... how much we are leaving on the table? I would say - not that much currently, if anything at all. This whole GVR thing became a great marketing theme for many channel management software providers. But whether it actually lived up to their end users' expectations is an open question. Only you can decide what's best for you.
Big assumptions to make when we do not have access to this facility to be able to measure. What are you basing your assumptions on? Booking.com keep bookings on their platform, pay when they feel like it or force you to take payment on arrival like a hotel and make it a nightmare to get listed - that IS based on my experience! Google will seemingly pass the booking on to the owners website and the booking will apparently become a direct booking. isn't that the (partial) wish of everyone with a direct booking website!
What are you basing your assumptions on?
Personal 1st hand experience. Is that good enough?
How can we get in on the Beta Test?
Thanks
Paul Brooks
What are you basing your assumptions on?
Personal 1st hand experience. Is that good enough?
Yep. TY!
So you are on the beta? or on Google VR on another platform?
I also have a hosted site and would like to enter beta, how do I do so?
How do we get added to the Beta list?
I also have a hosted site and would be interested.
People seem to be putting so much value into an unproven and frankly unreliable platform. It's like they think Google is the answer to everything VR.
Do we have anyone reporting first hand experience with GVR showing an improvement in bookings or revenue? Do we even know what kind of traffic google is getting on this beta part of their travel site? It seems like people are in a panic and just ready to jump ship solely to get on GVR.
Quite frankly, as you noted, GVR doesn't even work well functionally at this time. When I tried it out most of the listings weren't able to show pricing at all and many of them weren't actually available for the dates I entered.
I could understand freaking out if OR couldn't integrate with VRBO or ABB but GVR isn't ready and isn't worth losing sleep over at this point.
Personally, I don’t feel that Google VR is the answer to decreasing bookings. If people are counting on a significant increase in bookings, that would be a disappointment.
I agree. I've had my listings on GVR for a long time now through the sites that scrape VRBO/etc. and have not seen any business from there. Google is a great name, but they have a long track record of abandoning projects. Decreasing bookings are not going to be solved by yet another competitor for AirB&B/VRBO/Booking. That Air B&B has been on a tear this last year+ to increase the number of hosts is the problem. Hosts have grown 400% in my region and many come on at rock bottom prices. That is the problem and GVR isn't going to solve that.
As Blue Mountain said, Google will always favor the paid listings over natural results, just like they do in their search results and every other aspect of their business. You'll get on GVR and the next thing you'll need to start doing is paying Google to boost your ranking.
While I'm saddened that this change happened, I understand the logic behind it and Big G's reasoning. Afterall, they can't get the most money for your pricing and listing data if they can't verify it's accuracy. And anyone NOT thinking they'll sell your information hasn't been paying attention to Google since day one when it scanned your emails (and still does) to sell you products and advertising in the corner.
I too have owner Rez hosted websites and would like to be included in the beta as soon as possible.
We would like to be included in the beta program also. We have 4 listings, all using OR hosted website.
Thank you,
Beth
Hi Paul,
I have a hosted website and would like to be included in the beta please. Thanks!
David
Hi Paul,
I have a hosted website and would like to be included in the beta please. Thanks!
chris
I would like to join the beta if possible. I do have my site hosted by Owerrez
Thanks!
Jeanne
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I also have an OenerRez hosted website and would like to join beta. Thank you!
