Learn more at www.oneskyapp.com Deep tactical dive into the 3 main global marketing tactics Airbnb used in the early days and continues to use now to win 190+ markets and completely dominate the hospitality industry. Want to go global yourself? Visit www.oneskyapp.com to see how our localization team helped Airbnb expand internationally. Questions? Comments? Contact us at hello@oneskyapp.com

2. HOW ?
In just , Airbnb got into ….
8YEARS
190+ 34000 2M+
COUNTRIES CITIES HOMES

3. Airbnb is now among the world’s
TOP 5 MOST VALUABLE
private companies at
USD
$30B

4. Its valuation is
HIGHER than
all major
hotel chains
right?!
Unbelievable,

5. VALUATIONVALUATION
$23.2B
$18.59B
$12.4B
$10.2B
$8.9B
$6.9B
$2.9B
$23.2B
$18.59B
$12.4B
$10.2B
$8.9B
$6.9B
$2.9B
REVENUEREVENUE
$340M
$2.9B
$3.6B
$1.4B
$1.58B
$1.56B
$1B
$241.5M
$340M
$2.9B
$3.6B
$1.4B
$1.58B
$1.56B
$1B
$241.5M
COMPANYCOMPANY
Hilton Worldwide
Marriott International
Starwood Hotels
Accor Hotels
Wyndham
Hyatt Hotels
Choice Hotels
Hilton Worldwide
Marriott International
Starwood Hotels
Accor Hotels
Wyndham
Hyatt Hotels
Choice Hotels
$25.5BAirbnb
Airbnb vs Hotels
- Q3 2015 -
https://skift.com/2016/05/03/state-of-travel-2016-airbnb-vs-hotel-rivals-in-6-charts/
Check out
their valuation
Crazy huh?

6. $9.9B
That equals
might seem like a
small number… but
the hotel industry
is a $550 billion
revenue pie.
1.8%
https://skift.com/2016/05/03/state-of-travel-2016-airbnb-vs-hotel-rivals-in-6-charts/
Demand for Airbnb Accomodations as a
Percentage of Traditional Hotel Demand (U.S.)
AUGJULJUNMAYAPRMARFEBJAN
2015
DECNOVOCT
2014
1.2%
1.4%
1.6%
1.8%
1.0%

7. 113% in 2015
89% in 2016
Airbnb’s
revenue is
growing
rapidly
each year
http://www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2016/09/01/airbnbs-revenue-soars-compared-to-hotels.html
Airbnb vs Public Competitors
- Revenue Growth -
Marriott
Expedia
HomeAway
Airbnb 113%
Wyndham
8%
20%
24%
-2%Starwood
6%

8. Part of this growth was
spurred by a crisis
in their mission in
2011

9. Brian Chesky, Co-Founder and CEO
international is really important
we had to be international —
we had to be a GLOBAL travel network.
By early 2011, we were primarily an American company. But it became very clear that
We’re a travel company. Us not being international is like your phone not having email…
So it became very clear that

10. After Airbnb started
expanding worldwide,
they became
unstoppable.

11. Brian Chesky, Co-Founder and CEO, Airbnb
We were international much sooner than
any other company we had heard of, or seen…
WE WANTED TO BE TRAILBLAZERS.

12. And trailblaze they did.

13. 201520142013201220112010
$0
$5M
$10M
$15M
$17M
Number of Summer Airbnb Guests
http://dadaviz.com/i/4869/
Here’s Airbnb’s
353x
GROWTH
in 5 years’ time
Yes, you read
that right.
353x !

14. Airbnb’s
reach really
took off after
they started
tackling the
GLOBAL
MARKET
201520142013201220112010
$0
$5M
$10M
$15M
$17M
Number of Summer Airbnb Guests
http://dadaviz.com/i/4869/
Beginning of
international
expansion

15. 201520142013201220112010
$0
$5M
$10M
$15M
$17M
Number of Summer Airbnb Guests
http://dadaviz.com/i/4869/
Beginning of
international
expansion
Aggressive
international
acquisitions &
new global offices
Airbnb’s
reach really
took off after
they started
tackling the
GLOBAL
MARKET

16. How did they do it?
What’s their
secret weapon?

17. - T WO WO R DS -

18. Yep, it’s that simple.
Your client sees
your marketing first.
That’s how they’ll
judge if your product
is a hit or miss.

19. Global
Marketing
usually
involves:
TRANSLATION PRICING TWEAKS
PRODUCT
CHANGES
LOCALIZATION
EVENTS
CHANGES IN
GRAPHICS
ADVERTISING &
PROMOTION
CUSTOMER
SUPPORT
DISTRIBUTION

20. TRANSLATION PRICING TWEAKS
PRODUCT
CHANGES
LOCALIZATION
EVENTS
CHANGES IN
GRAPHICS
ADVERTISING &
PROMOTION
CUSTOMER
SUPPORT
DISTRIBUTION
Do you notice
a common
thread?

21. TRANSLATION PRICING TWEAKS
PRODUCT
CHANGES
LOCALIZATION
EVENTS
CHANGES IN
GRAPHICS
ADVERTISING &
PROMOTION
CUSTOMER
SUPPORT
DISTRIBUTION
They all focus
on the
Local
Market

22. your client will feel disconnected
If your global marketing is
too foreign one-size-fits-allor
They won’t stick with you

23. Alfred Lin, Partner at Sequoia Capital & Board Member of Airbnb
We’re trying to fill the
immensely global & local missions
of the company at the same time.
GLOBAL
LOCAL

24. Airbnb convinced
2 MILLION
households to
welcome strangers
into their homes.
That’s powerful
marketing at a
global scale.

25. Here at ,
we’ve helped 1,000+ companies go global.
We’ve picked up a few tips along the way.
We
Would
Know.

26. Let’s dive into how they did it.
now

27. Airbnb’s
STRATEGIES TO
GLOBAL MARKETING

28. Commit to
Locally-Inspired
Content Marketing

29. a story that
works well in one country
might be ineffective
— or worse, offensive —
in another.
but
Great marketing
drives growth,

30. &top-down strategy
bottom-up strategy
A mix of
Airbnb’s
solution?

31. Airbnb used high-level data on
their user base to craft messaging
for each market’s needs.
Strategy
Top-Down

32. MARKET-SPECIFIC
VIDEOS
C AS E ST U D Y

33. 1. Search for a listing
2. Book a room
3. Create a wish list
4. Contact hosts or Airbnb
In East Asia, Airbnb
found the most popular
searches were”how-tohow-to“
M A R K E T-
S P E C I F I C
V I D E OS
C AS E
ST U D Y

34. M A R K E T-
S P E C I F I C
V I D E OS
C AS E
ST U D Y
SolutionSolution
They put together a video
that features a young local
planning a trip,
dealing with all these questions.

35. Jasmine Maleknia, Social Media Manager, Airbnb
Voiceovers are part of Airbnb’s
localization strategy,
“because cultural nuances are
lost in translation on subtitles.”

36. The best localized content
will always come from
local partners.
Bottom-Up
Strategy

37. Dennis Goedegebuure, former Head of Global SEO, Airbnb
The real challenge of global strategy
isn’t how big you can get,
but how small you can get.

38. It has a built-in network of users
who can help tailor marketing to
their own countries.
Airbnb is community-driven.

39. NEIGHBORHOODS
C AS E ST U D Y

40. N E I G H B O R
H O O DS
C AS E
ST U D Y
580+ 20+ 30+PAGES CITIES LOCALIZED SITES
The
section on Airbnb’s site
has a lot of content.
”NeighborhoodsNeighborhoods“
How does Airbnb
pull this off?

41. N E I G H B O R
H O O DS
C AS E
ST U D Y
SolutionSolution
They mobilized their community
and used local partners.
Airbnb builds
each individual
“Neighborhoods”
site, then hires a
to provide the
content.
This is why each
“Neighborhoods”
page has an
.
authentically
local feellocal freelance
editorial team

42. Dennis Goedegebuure, former Head of Global SEO, Airbnb
Delivering a best in class user experience,
both from a content standpoint,
as well as making it easy to navigate,
has proven to be successful for Airbnb.

43. This made the site more discoverable,
right after they expanded globally.
Neighborhoods actually had a
BIG IMPACT on building Airbnb’s SEO
ResultsResults
N E I G H B O R
H O O DS
C AS E
ST U D Y
successful?Just how

44. Leverage
Word-Of-Mouth
in Global
Communities

45. Gustaf Alstromer, Growth PM, Airbnb
Our users tell the story
better than we do.

46. For Airbnb, WORD-OF-MOUTH is
critical to international expansion.

47. that awards both referrer and referee with Airbnb credits.
So Airbnb built a referral program
Referee Referrer
Airbnb
Credit

48. And they made sure this was
focused locally as well.

49. LOCAL PLATFORMS
& INFLUENCERS
C AS E ST U D Y

50. LO C A L
P L AT F O R M S &
I N F L U E N C E R S
C AS E
ST U D Y
Consumers in Asia
tend to be ”mobile-firstmobile-first“

51. LO C A L
P L AT F O R M S &
I N F L U E N C E R S
C AS E
ST U D Y
SolutionSolution
Airbnb’s East Asia
referral program
focused on mobile users.
They targeted
in the region. Weibo
Whatsapp
WeChat
popular messaging apps

52. LO C A L
P L AT F O R M S &
I N F L U E N C E R S
C AS E
ST U D Y
One Weibo celebrity
single-handedly brought in
thousands of signups from his
2M+ followers.
Airbnb reached out to
a few key digital influencers.
ResultsResults

53. Prioritize
High-Quality
Translations

54. Jason Katz-Brown, International Growth Engineer, Airbnb
We’ve taken many steps
toward localization,
one of which is translation.

55. Today
Airbnb is available in
26L A N G U A G E S

56. they carry out.
They’ve invested in
to handle the
massive volume of localization

57. MANAGE TRANSLATION
CHALLENGES BASED
ON DATA
1H I G H - Q UA L I T Y T R A N S L AT I O N

58. DATA- D R I V E N
S O L U T I O N S
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
Airbnb decided to
localize its Japanese site
a weekbefore CEO
Brian Chesky visited the
Tokyo office.
That’s words
of content to translate.
400,000

59. DATA- D R I V E N
S O L U T I O N S
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
There was no way
they could translate and
ship that quickly… Right?!
WRONG!

60. DATA- D R I V E N
S O L U T I O N S
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
based on accumulated views
in a 4-day period.
Airbnb engineers built a system that
SolutionSolution
prioritized website text

61. DATA- D R I V E N
S O L U T I O N S
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
starting from
content
most viewed
to
content
Based on that data,
they translated
least viewed

62. DATA- D R I V E N
S O L U T I O N S
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
turnaround in .jp site traffic
1 WEEK 180% GROWTH
for translation within 1 year of
localization
ResultsResults
Read more about Airbnb’s epic launch from their own engineering team.

63. USE A TRANSLATION
MANAGEMENT SYSTEM
( TMS ) TOOL
2H I G H - Q UA L I T Y T R A N S L AT I O N

64. T M S
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
they can
flawlessly and automatically
manage translations
With Airbnb’s custom-built TMS,
for every new update to existing content.

65. T M S
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
save time & increase efficiency
in producing local texts for
global marketing campaigns.
This TMS helped Airbnb to
ResultsResults
Read Airbnb’s engineers’s overview of their internal workflow automation system.

66. GO THE EXTRA MILE IN
CONNECTING TO YOUR USER
3H I G H - Q UA L I T Y T R A N S L AT I O N

67. C O N N E C T
TO U S E R
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
Some companies ignore
between regions
small language differences
British English
Colour
Centre
Organise
American English
Color
Center
Organize vs

68. C O N N E C T
TO U S E R
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
Their engineers have even
for
individually.
Airbnb has paid close attention to
these variants in their marketing.
built an app switching spellings

69. C O N N E C T
TO U S E R
H I G H - Q UA L I T Y
T R A N S L AT I O N
~ in every city ~
VERY HAPPY!
This makes their users
ResultsResults

70. Prioritize
High-Quality
Translations
Leverage
Word-Of-Mouth
in Global
Communities
Commit to
Locally-Inspired
Content
Marketing
To sum up, here are Airbnb’s
3 key takeaways for global marketers:

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