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My Airbnb page generates a $1,129 CPM

josephsofaer.tumblr.com

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Re: My Airbnb page generates a $1,129 CPM

#23
post #15

This might just be my conspiracy radar turned to 11, however, it seems very suspect that a blog with only 1 post ever, is using that post to rave about AirBnB right in the middle of their storm. I want to supplement this by saying I really admire AirBnB and have no doubt that they will over come this security lapse with the killer product and marketplace they've built. However, this suspicious orphan blog post has my…

Definitely not conspiracy.

AirBnB is probably flailing around trying to figure out what is the best way to get to turn around this month long PR nightmare.

Orphan blog post probably sounded like a brilliant idea, until it hit hacker news and everyone sniffed it out.

Re: My Airbnb page generates a $1,129 CPM

#24
post #13

Just checked out my Airbnb stats, they're equally impressive. All Page Views: 246 Money Earned: $1,249 Total Bookings: 2 So less than 1% conversion rate though.

Page views and site visitors are usually different metrics. I don't know how the Airbnb stats are calculated, but I'm guessing you've had fewer than 246 visitors—which means your conversion rate would be higher than 1%.

Re: My Airbnb page generates a $1,129 CPM

#25
Are you sure you want to use your real name on this blog? You are advertising the fact that you are breaking the law in San Francisco (short term rental without a license) and violating your lease (subletting your apartment).

Re: My Airbnb page generates a $1,129 CPM

#26
post #15

This might just be my conspiracy radar turned to 11, however, it seems very suspect that a blog with only 1 post ever, is using that post to rave about AirBnB right in the middle of their storm. I want to supplement this by saying I really admire AirBnB and have no doubt that they will over come this security lapse with the killer product and marketplace they've built. However, this suspicious orphan blog post has my…

I know Joseph Sofaer personally and can confirm the details in the blog post. But I agree, it would look shady if you didn't know him.

Re: My Airbnb page generates a $1,129 CPM

#28
post #9

Are you saying you are generating revenue from something other than people renting out rooms?

No, it's just renting out the rooms. I know the "CPM" analogy doesn't really fit perfectly but the point is that the Airbnb service is so effective at driving traffic it makes me more than a dollar per pageview on avg. Of course it's their site but you can think of it sort of like an e-commerce platform where I can open a store and sell my extra space. It works super well.

It's not the traffic that's earning the revenue, it's your property which allows you to charge for the rent. A more sane metric would be to compute your "profit", which is your income, the rent, minus your expenses in renting out the property:

  - amortized property deterioration
  - administrative time dealing with the tenants
  - opportunity costs (the interest/ROI that you could expect the principal to bring
    if it was not tied up in your house)
and then you can compare this profit and the fees AirBNB is charging for it against other channels (such as making your own page and driving traffic to it via Adwords).

Just because I'm selling $10'000 diamonds at 50% discount on a website which brings me 1 sale every 100 page-views doesn't mean that each pageview is worth $50.

Re: My Airbnb page generates a $1,129 CPM

#29
post #15

This might just be my conspiracy radar turned to 11, however, it seems very suspect that a blog with only 1 post ever, is using that post to rave about AirBnB right in the middle of their storm. I want to supplement this by saying I really admire AirBnB and have no doubt that they will over come this security lapse with the killer product and marketplace they've built. However, this suspicious orphan blog post has my…

Yeah, I drafted the post a few weeks ago and was going to write a few more before I started the blog but figured I shouldn't wait.
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