STRA Episode 6: Part Two of How Not to Stay Glued to Your Phone on Vacation

The Short Term Rental Authority Podcast

Episode 6: Part Two of How Not to Stay Glued to Your Phone on Vacation

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[00:00:05] Welcome back to the podcast. This is part. Of how to not stay glued to your phone while you're on vacation. Yeah. So we, we did the first part of that last episode at the lake lures at the lake lure, we were on vacation and so fabulous.

[00:00:21] We were thinking that's a very timely subject. Like let's go on vacation and not have to worry about being glued to our phone. Right. Cause you hear that a lot and you can't, and it is true. This business, you can do it on your mobile device. Like that's one of the. Advantage advantages to the way we have things set up is it is all virtual, but.

[00:00:41] At the same time when you're on vacation, you kind of just wanna be on vacation and not be glued to that phone all the time. Yeah. Cause we've had that experience before, too. Yeah. Because when I'm floating around on the, on my floaty float, yeah. You don't want your phone in a bag or? I don't want John. I got John a beaver float cause he like.

[00:00:59] Beavers beavers are a very noble animal and, and they're awesome. And I don't know. What's funny about that at all. Nothing. It was, it was glorious, but anyway, and I did have a beaver float. Yes. I'll have to post a picture of that, cuz it was great. Yeah. But what we wanna talk about today was. how that, how that works right.

[00:01:21] Is how are we able to do that? And we talked last week about the team team members that we have in place. So mm-hmm, this week we wanted to talk about what the team members actually did, how we trained them to do the things, what they do and the tools that they use to get it done. Yeah. So there's three parts of that.

[00:01:44] It's. Training. Yeah. It's great that you have team members, but you need the training. Yes. Training. Yeah. And then the second part was the, the systems and processes. Right. Which is like how to do the things they do, right? Yeah. So there's a system, there's a process. There's a so [00:02:00] P for everything dare I say standard operating procedure and then it's okay.

[00:02:04] Well, what tools do you actually use to facilitate that, right. Those processes, right? Yeah. So training is, we started with that. I feel like that is very foundational because if you are going to take the time to have bring someone on your team and, and you want them to stay there for a long time, right.

[00:02:30] Mm-hmm so, and by the time you get done, Training them, it, it takes a little while. I wanna say a couple of months to, to train someone up really good really well. And that is the foundation that you can build upon to, to have them stay. to like what they do to enjoy the job because they feel supported.

[00:02:58] Right. So let's talk about the training process and can they even do the job, right? Like how do you want it done? Yes, because that's one of the mistakes we we made in the beginning is we brought people on and didn't, didn't not really train them. Yeah, just kind of gave them the tools. Right. Which we'll talk about.

[00:03:15] Right. I see. But there was no training on what, what is, you know, how do we want it done? Right, right. And you need to think about that in your business too. How do you want it done? What's the, what's the culture there, right? Well, you know, I think that's really key. and the, the way that we started was we were actually the ones doing it.

[00:03:38] That's right. And we built the, the systems too. Yes. And we ran the systems ourselves. Yes. So that's really step one, but yes. Well, let's go back to training. Yes. Right. So training process in our company is, so we've got there's four steps to the training process. So the first one is, watch me do it. Mm-hmm so the second one is do it with [00:04:00] me.

[00:04:00] Mm-hmm the next one is do it by yourself and then the fourth one is, teach someone else. So let's go over each one of those, just touch on each one of those and how we do each one of those in our business. Yeah. And you used to be a waitress, so you're very familiar with that process. And I think a lot of people would be familiar with that too.

[00:04:19] If you've ever been to a restaurant and had a waitress or a waiter in training. You've actually seen this going on. May not internalize it. Yep. It was going on. Yeah. So what's so the first thing you get is you get this job is watch me do it. Yeah. So they're basically walking around with the experience person.

[00:04:38] Yep. Essentially watching them take orders and watching how they enter the orders. Cause you have to go back to the kitchen and enter them. Right. Mm-hmm and then. They're they're literally just following them around. Right. That's that's watch me do it. So, so in our business, watch me do it is a, a lot of it is over zoom.

[00:04:58] I would say mm-hmm yeah. Some of it's over zoom. And another way to do that is simply make a video of you doing it. Yes mm-hmm. so any time that's a very simple thing. You can do simple start documenting these processes. Yes. Is every time you're doing something, no matter how mundane you think it is or how easy it.

[00:05:16] just record it, screen record it. Yep. There are tools out there for it. Loom is one very popular one loom.com, L O O M. Yep. That, that one works very well. Veo, if you've ever, they're kind of like your competitor, YouTube, maybe Vimeo, V I M E O. Yes. They have a tool free tool for doing it. I believe you can do it with Google drive.

[00:05:35] I mean, there are tons of screen, you know, sharing tools. And if you just install one of those and just make it a habit of every time you do something, record it. Yep. At least you have that. Yeah. Yep. Right. And that's so, so easy to do. Just click that, that record button and just record yourself doing it.

[00:05:55] Mm-hmm and so that's the. Watch me do it. And to your point, [00:06:00] sometimes it is okay. Let's get on zoom and, and do it together. Yeah, it is right. And then, but then you record that too, right? Sure. Yeah. Right. For training purposes, this call will be recorded for training purposes. Yes, . Well, it's true. So that's the, the, watch me do it.

[00:06:18] And then the do it with me is a lot over. That that is where zoom probably we use that the most in, in zoom as the, is the, do it with me. It can be. Yeah. And then another way we've utilized that is we'll talk about one of the tools later, but basically we use a tool called slack, which is our internal communications.

[00:06:39] So for a while there, for example, when the customer service people were responding to a. , they would actually write out their re what they were going to say in slack, in, in there mm-hmm and then we would either say, yeah, that's good. Or, or change that or change this before you send it. Right. Mm-hmm so that was a way for us to do it with me.

[00:07:00] Yeah. That didn't involve zoom, right? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. That was really good. And we'll, we'll talk more about slack here when we talk about the tools. So that is watch me do it, watch me do it. And that was do it with me. Mm-hmm and then the third one is do it by yourself. Mm-hmm and, and all this entails is you've been trained and now go to do the job.

[00:07:22] Basically, you go do the job and we are just here to kind of manage things and answer questions as needed and you know, that kind of thing. Right. Help guide, guide the process. Right. So mm-hmm and a lot of that is, is done in slack too. So and then the third, the fourth one is train somebody else. Mm-hmm

[00:07:49] So now that you have trained someone and, and this is going to take several months, it's gonna depends on the job you're talking customer experience. Yes. [00:08:00] But our cleaners don't take months. Well, the cleaners don't right? Yeah. So it depends on, on who it is, what the job is. Yeah. I would say, but. I would say that for most customer experience people, it's gonna take them a couple of months to that's true.

[00:08:14] Yeah. Yeah. To, to really get feel comfortable in the position. Mm-hmm, where they don't have to ask you a billion questions. Mm-hmm like, can I say this? Can I say that? So now that you have someone that. competent, competent, and, and knows a little bit about how the, how the role works and the tools and the processes of things.

[00:08:39] Now they can go train somebody else. Right. And you're not having to do it, which I love that. Yeah. And another thing we have them do a lot of the times is actually create the documentation for us. So even if we're making a video say, yeah, we may make a video of, Hey, here's how to do this thing. And then it's their job to actually watch that video and write it out in text.

[00:09:05] Mm-hmm. And then that also gives you feedback of, did they really understand the video mm-hmm cause it's kinda like read this book and write me an essay mm-hmm so let's watch this video and write, write out the procedure, right? Step by step. Yeah. That, so here step one. You're step two. Here's step three, as detailed as possible.

[00:09:22] Yeah. Right? So that now you have it documented not only in video, but in, in written form. Right? Cause people learn different. and you know, that person truly understood what it was, cuz you've now read through that and said yes, this or no change, this, that type of thing. Mm-hmm . So that, that ends up starts building your documentation over time.

[00:09:44] And then that becomes a training tool as new people come in. Yeah. And, and yeah, that, that's great that, that you are not the only one that is creating those. Those those SOPs, those standard operating procedures. Mm-hmm [00:10:00] so, so let's talk a little bit about that next, cuz that leads us nicely into the, the second thing that we were gonna talk about, which is in fact, these systems and the processes, like what do they do?

[00:10:13] Right. Mm-hmm so if depends on the job, right, right. So let's, let's break that down into. The different team members that we have in place. Right. So let's start with the customer experience specialist, then we'll talk about the operation specialist and then we'll talk about the cleaners. Okay. Yeah. So let's do it that way.

[00:10:34] And we're separating processes from tools. Is that right? Yes. Correct. Okay. Those are easy to confuse. Yeah. Yes. So the that's so a really good thing to talk about. So why don't you. Talk about what the difference between those things is. Got it. So your processes tend to be the thing, the, the, the, you know, the, the thing that's getting done, it's the, the process, meaning for example, if someone let's go to the customer experience side, if someone inquires and asks for a discount, the process ends up being okay.

[00:11:11] Here's what we asked. so we may ask them, what discount were you looking for? Right. Or we may say, what was your budget? Right. You know, there's lots of responses you could have, but that's the process, right? And then we have, you know, basically a list we go through to determine, you know, we can give you this off.

[00:11:29] We can give you this off, or there's no discount available. And, you know, how do you determine that? Well, there there's an SOP for that. Mm-hmm , but that's different from the tool of how we're actually communicating with them, right. Or where those procedures are stored. That's a tool mm-hmm, , it's not really the process.

[00:11:49] Right? So the tools tend to facilitate the processes and make those processes easier. Another example would be the cleaners. Obviously their job is to come. and have a [00:12:00] checklist and that's the process. And then if there's a problem, they report it to us. But the tool then becomes what facilitates that, what facilitates the checklist, what facilitates the quality control, what facilitates the feedback to them.

[00:12:15] Right. Right. And that tool could brain from anything from, Hey, I call them on the phone and schedule them all the way to, well, I'm using a tool that automates that process. Like we do. Right. So that that's the tool, right? Yeah. So, and they're very closely tied together. Cause sometimes the processes enter this in the tool.

[00:12:33] Right. right. But it's not the main thing it's the, the tool can change. The process tends to be. And I think the, the tool will change as you grow and scale too. We've noticed that that happens, happens true. And your process has changed as well as you fine. They, they, yes. As you were fine over time, certainly did not start off with.

[00:12:54] Well, same things we have today. Yeah. Yeah. Well, the extensive systems and processes that we use today, for sure. So it, it is very, it is very much a, a fluid thing to, yeah, it's an iterative process. Always going to be. Changing and mm-hmm and growing and, and making it better all the time. And it usually comes from some mistake.

[00:13:16] Yes. Or something that happened that was experience. Yes. Not perfect. Right. Which is probably the wrong thing to say. Cause it's hard to be perfect, but it's something that, okay. If we had this, then this wouldn't would not have happened. Right. Right. Right. And then that becomes a procedure or that becomes a okay.

[00:13:32] What tool do we need to make sure that procedure gets followed? Cuz sometimes it's that. The procedure didn't did not get followed. Like they didn't, there was something on the cleaning checklist that wasn't done. So what tool can we use to make sure that happens? Yep. Right. So that's just an example. Yeah.

[00:13:50] So let's talk about the. how to okay. Of it. So, and let's start, we're gonna do the customer [00:14:00] experience specialist, then we'll talk about the operation specialist. Then we'll talk about the, the cleaners. So, and if you're talking about the, the customer experience specialist, now, this person is, we've talked about this last week, but this person is the, really the glue that holds.

[00:14:20] This business together. Yeah, there's a hub. I think they remember there's a hub of a wheel. Cause they, they are the ones that are responsible for things like. messaging the guests. Mm-hmm, communicating with the guests. They're responsible for communicating with the cleaners. They're responsible for communicating and organizing and scheduling any kind of maintenance that needs to happen.

[00:14:45] Mm-hmm so this person is really a key role in your business. So how do they, how do they do their job? Mm-hmm is. so is all SOPs, I would say. Yeah, it is everything in the business should be. Everything is, everything should be documented is, is SOP driven. It is. Yeah. So, so that they know exactly what to do and how to do it.

[00:15:17] And it all starts with SOPs. Right? So that's an example of a procedure. Say the cleaners coming clean and this just happened. And the, they, they discovered that the blinds are yep. Broken and they report that back to customer service customer experience team. Now what, that's their procedure they're done.

[00:15:41] They don't fix blinds. So what's the customer service to do well. Their procedure is reach out to maintenance and, and relay that, Hey, this needs to be. and then find out and coordinate for them to go, you know, fix that before the next guest comes. Right. Or if they're not gonna be able to, to then, okay.

[00:15:59] [00:16:00] Reach out to the guest proactively and say, Hey, we know this is a problem. Is it okay if maintenance comes after you arrive to fix it? Right? So they, they end up communicating with all three of those pieces that don't necessarily directly communicate with each. and they, they need to be in the middle because it's a customer driven customer focused experience.

[00:16:21] So they really need to be in a, in a, in a large sense so that they know what's going on so that they can anticipate, okay, a guest comes and they tell you, the blinds are broken. Well, you already know. Right. Or you've already reached out to them hopefully, or whatever it is, whatever the, whatever the problem was.

[00:16:39] That was just an example. But they, they are the. So that's, that's an example of a procedure. Do you wanna talk about the tools yet or like how they do their job? I, I feel like that would be a natural progression of things. Okay. Well, I'm just saying, did you want to talk about the other team members first?

[00:16:55] Did you want to talk about cleaners? Did you wanna talk about, well, it would make more sense if we, you did the tools to go along with that. Okay. So for our communications internal communications, I mentioned earlier, we use a program called. It's free. It's very much like messenger. It's kind of like a group chat if you will.

[00:17:15] And there are different channels, so you can break up these chats into, so is this one big, long group chat like you might have on your phone, like with a text or something? They're actually different channels. So we have a channel for cleaning where we only talk about cleaning. We have a channel for each property where we only talk about.

[00:17:33] Things that are associated with that property in that channel. So it helps you organize your communication as well. And then we have an internal team. We have an operations channel where it's really us and customer experience. So because they are the hub that tends to be the only people in there. The cleaners are actually in there.

[00:17:51] We have a cleaning channel. That's where they can talk back and forth through the cleaners if need be. So that that slack [00:18:00] communications channel is great because you're going to have more than one customer experienced person eventually anyway. And what you need is a centralized place so that when the next person comes on shift, they now have access to all the communications that have happened.

[00:18:15] Yep. So it's part of, that's not organized, so it's all transparent. It's also all informed. Everybody's informed. Yep. And it's organized and it's. now there is a paid version of it that eventually you're gonna want as you scale. But it's, I, I like to start with tools that are free especially when you're just starting out.

[00:18:34] Well, every penny counts. Sure. And a lot of large corporations use slack. It's not like it's, that's true. You know, it's, it's a well functioning product. So slack is our internal communications. That's how that would have happened. So the cleaners may have reported a problem. They may have notified customer service in slack.

[00:18:53] Rather than texting. Right. Cause that, that is now stuck on your phone. Yep. Right. So we've remember, we don't wanna be, nobody knows about it. The phone, we want it out here somewhere. Yeah. So it's in slack. They talk to customer service in slack. Customer service can talk back to them and actually perhaps even talk to maintenance, maybe there's a maintenance channel in there, or it may be that your operation specialist, which is the person that goes out to the unit when somebody needs to go out, that's.

[00:19:19] You know, a maintenance issue or a cleaning issue, maybe it's something they can address and, and go do, cuz it could be something like the cleaners. Just tell you, Hey, we don't have any more toilet paper. We'd love to put some out for you, but you don't have any. Well, now that becomes a, that comes back into customer service customer service then would talk to the runner or operation specialist and say, Hey, can you take some toilet paper over there?

[00:19:42] Cuz the cleaners didn't. right. So it becomes your hub of communication. So slack is a big tool that we use. Yeah. Like all the time, every day. All the time. Yep. Now for the cleaners they, we actually have a program. We call we call we that is called turnover. BMB that we use there, there are several, there's another one [00:20:00] called properly.

[00:20:01] We happen to like turn over BMB. , but what it does is it allows us to not only automatically schedule cleaners, so you can hook this thing up to your calendar. Yeah. So that when they're in, cuz you're always cleaning on checkout, always on checkout. Oh that's part, day of checkout. You can actually have it automatically schedule you're cleaner to come on checkout.

[00:20:23] So now you've, that's a piece of automation actually that helps you not have to call your schedule your cleaners. Right? Right. Remember, I'm trying to get away from my. And it also, because it's automated, it eliminates or helps to eliminate mistakes. Like we forgot to schedule the cleaner. Right. And what it also does, it allows them to verify that yes, they're coming cuz they accept the cleaning job.

[00:20:48] Yep. And then when they're cleaning, it also provides them the checklist. Yes. That then they can check off and then it allows them to upload pictures of the things they. So now we've in this one and it pays them automatically too. It will pay them automatically. So in, within this one tool, we have documentation that things got done.

[00:21:11] We have the procedure of how to get it done. We have the scheduling done and we have a way to quality control it. Remote. by having them put those pictures in there and then automated, I thought of it because they can actually also report problems in there. Mm-hmm yes, they can. So if not slack, they can put it in turnover.

[00:21:30] Yep. And mark that as a problem. And then customer service again, would get it from that channel. So turnover B and B is a big one for the cleaners that we use for our operations specialist. We actually scheduled them on a calendar and we automate that through. Through Trello and a and a in Zapier.

[00:21:48] So Zapier is a program that allows you to tie programs together that aren't necessarily connected otherwise. So what it does is it ties our calendar to a tool called [00:22:00] Trello, which is free as well, which is free as well. And it assigns a due date for them to go do tasks when things need to get done. Like for example in our houses in Charlotte, well, somebody has to take the trash down every Sunday and Monday, depending on the place that gets scheduled for the runner to do.

[00:22:17] Somebody has to in the, in the Charlotte properties, the runner goes to every checkout, cuz they're also the one running the linens back and forth to, to the linen service. So they get scheduled for every checkout. Inventory inventory is on there as well. Yep. So Trello become. Actually, we do all of our documentation on Trello as well.

[00:22:36] All the SOPs are housed all the, the SOPs live there. And, and again, that's just the tool. You don't have to use Trello, but it's what we use. And it's free again, which is what I, I like to always start people on something that's free. And you may graduate from an eventually, but it's a great tool. So tho those are the three main ones that we use a lot as far as.

[00:22:57] the operations of the business beyond, you know, pricing and some there's some other tools that we use for other things, but as far as operations and getting everything done, it's mostly turnover, B and B and Trello, and then, and slack. And then the third, I would say the fourth one, that's a big one is a program called hospitable.

[00:23:18] And what hospitable is, it's now the communication to the gas. Because remember they're not in slack, right. But we are on multiple platforms. So what it has is it has an, an integrated inbox so that if something comes in from Airbnb or it comes in from VRBO, or it comes in direct, even mm-hmm, , all those communications are there in centrally inbox, inhospitable, and it has an automation component as well, so that it can automatically send out, for example, thank you for your reservation when someone makes a reservation or thank you for your inquiry when somebody makes an inquiry or here are your checkin instructions two days before, or the first morning of we [00:24:00] say, I hope everything's okay.

[00:24:01] You know, please let us know if anything, all those automations are done through hospitable and it gives the customer service a way to have that unified inbox and respond when they need. Because not all communication can be automated. Right. For example, that's very true discounts. Yes. We can generically respond to discounts, but we can't approve or deny them.

[00:24:23] We still have to communicate, or they have a specific question about certain things that, well, that's a main, how far is this from? From wherever they're going, right. Or, you know, can I park my RV in your driveway? You know, those types of things are manual. Can I bring a chicken? can I bring a chicken that's happened?

[00:24:42] We did allow it for a pet fee. We did. We, we did chickens. Aren't that bad. We've had a pet chicken pet chicken. But yeah, so those that's, that's one of our big tools as well. That's that's really helpful in the business. And in, you know, in the course material, we have a lot more detail on actually how to use all of those.

[00:24:57] Right. We can coach you on exactly how to set all this up. Yes. And how it all works together. Cause they are tools, but you have to set them up properly and correct. And. Learn how to use them expertly, let them all hook together properly and all those kind of things. Yeah. Yeah. So that's the major tools that we use, I would say to facilitate those processes.

[00:25:16] Very good. So we hope that you found some value in this episode be sure to like, and follow and we will see you next time onto the next, onto the next.

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