Using OwnerRez's templates and triggers provides a powerful way to communicate automatically and streamline your vacation rental business processes by reducing errors and improving efficiency. You can respond to guests with personalized messages without lifting a finger! To read more about triggers, check out our Trigger overview support article. We've created a number of Template and Trigger Examples to help get you started.
In this example, we're dealing with a booking for the following scenario:
Scenario: Send Departure Information to Channel Guest With Contact Information
Good guest communication is essential for a positive guest experience. Clear and timely communication can greatly influence guests' perceptions and impact their reviews.
This scenario assumes that the guest has already provided contact information and signed a renter agreement.
By setting up an email, channel, or SMS template and trigger, you can send a Guest Departure Information message template to guests. OwnerRez can do that for you with message triggers.
Here are the steps for how to set up a template and trigger for this scenario:
Create a Booking Message Template to Send Departure Information to Channel Guest With Contact Information
Go to Settings > Templates to configure the "booking" template type message you want to send to your guest.
There are three choices for the type of template you can create - email, channel, and SMS. These are the delivery methods that will be used for your response. To send these types of templates, the booking must have contact information you can reply to. For instance, if you want to send an SMS message as your reply, the guest must have provided a phone number with their booking. Likewise, if you want to send a message on Vrbo, the booking must have come through Vrbo, to begin with, so that our system knows how to deliver your response back to the correct Vrbo thread.
Note: Why can't you use a platform email or proxy email address like "joe.blow.12345@messages.airbnb.com" or "joe.blow.12345@messages.booking.com?" These platform/proxy email addresses aren't real. If you send messages to them, your message will be collected by the channel, stripped, re-formatted and displayed on the channel's message platform in various ways that typically don't work well for email.
Email Template & Trigger
First, we'll create an email template, so go to Settings > Templates > Email tab > click the Create Email Template button > select the "Booking" option. This will open an email editor with some sample field codes filled in. For detailed information about how email templates work, check out the email templates overview article and field codes article.
Copy and paste the following values into your new email template.
Name:
Channel Guest Departure Information Email Template
From Name:
{MYCOFULL}
From Address:
{MYEMAIL}
To Name:
{CFULL}
To Address:
{CEMAIL}
Subject:
Preparing for tomorrow's {BDEP}, {PDISPNAME} departure
Body:
Hi {CFIRST},
We hope you have had a relaxing stay with us at {PDISPNAME}.
As you prepare for tomorrow's {BCHECKOUTTIME} departure, be sure to check all drawers and the washer/dryer for your belongings and grab our business card to book directly with us next time.
While your experience is fresh in your mind, please leave a review for us at the following link.
{BUREVIEW}
Even if it's just a few words, please let other potential guests know what to expect and about the quality of your stay at {PDISPNAME}.
Safe travels, and thank you for choosing {PDISPNAME}!
{MYFIRST}
If you're wondering what those field codes do, check out the field codes support article or use the "Preview" button on the booking to take a live look.
Here's a quick preview of what the above email message looks like:
Notice how clean and personalized the content is. The subject line is dynamic to the booking by including the departure date {BDEP} and property name {PDISPNAME} field codes. In the email body, we included the check-out time {BCHECKOUTTIME} field code as well as requested a review by including the review link {BUREVIEW} field code. The body addresses the guest by name, so it looks like the body was written by hand. In other words, it looks like a hand-written manual response, even though it wasn't.
After copying and pasting the above subject and body into your template, feel free to play with the words and styles to make it your own. However, remember that we are creating a message that is specific to "bookings." This message assumes that all bookings as it responds to are bookings with guest contact information, so make sure to customize accordingly.
Next, we need to add a Trigger to send our email template. Navigate to Settings > Messaging > Triggers > and click + Create Trigger to create a new trigger.
Event:
1 day before booking departs at 4:00 PM
Conditions:
Listing Site is one of Vrbo, Airbnb or Booking.com Email Address On File Status is one of has real email address
Action:
Channel Guest Departure Information Email Template via Email
We are now armed with a Guest Departure Information email template to send to the guest. But what about channel bookings?
Channel Template & Trigger
Even though we assume that the guest has already provided their contact information and signed a renter agreement in this scenario, some users and guests still prefer to keep all communications on the channel. OwnerRez directly integrates with the native messaging platforms at Vrbo, Airbnb, and Booking.com, so this is easy to set up!
Note: Why can't you use a platform email or proxy email address like "joe.blow.12345@messages.airbnb.com" or "joe.blow.12345@messages.booking.com?" These platform/proxy email addresses aren't real. If you send messages to them, your message will be collected by the channel, stripped, re-formatted and displayed on the channel's message platform in various ways that typically don't work well for email.
For detailed information about how channel templates work, check out the Channel Templates and field codes support articles.
To create a channel template, go to Settings > Templates > Channel tab > click the Create Channel Template button > select the "Booking" option. This will open a message editor with some sample field codes filled in.
Copy and paste the following values into your new channel template.
Name:
Channel Guest Departure Information Channel Template
Body:
Hi {CFIRST},
We hope you have had a relaxing stay with us at {PDISPNAME}.
As you prepare for tomorrow's {BCHECKOUTTIME} departure, be sure to check all drawers and the washer/dryer for your belongings.
While your experience is fresh in your mind, don't forget to let other potential guests know what to expect and about the quality of your stay at {PDISPNAME} by leaving a review of your stay on {BSOURCE}.
Safe travels, and thank you for choosing {PDISPNAME}!
{MYFIRST}
Channel templates have a Preview button, so as you type, take a quick look at the preview window to get a sense of how the channel message will look.
Here is a quick look at how the above channel template looks in preview mode:
As you can see, this message is plain (no colors, images, or rich text), but that's good because it will be sent to the guest via the channel messaging platform, and the messaging platforms don't allow anything other than plain text.
Notice how we omitted the {BUREVIEW} guest review field code link in this channel template? Even though we did include the {BUREVIEW} field code in the email and SMS templates, requesting Airbnb channel guests to provide a review off-platform is against Airbnb's terms of service (TOS), so in this example we ask the guest to provide a review on the listing channel platform by using the {BSOURCE} booking source field code.
Again, the channel message is dynamic to the booking by including the departure date {BDEP} field codes as well as the property name {PDISPNAME} field code. We also included the check-out time {BCHECKOUTTIME} field code. You want a concise message for the guest to read, and this does the trick!
Next, we need to add a Trigger to send our email template. Use the same Event and Conditions settings as the email trigger above (Settings > Messaging > Triggers > and click + Create Trigger), but instead select your new channel template in the Action dropdown list to configure your trigger.
Now we have your channel message template created! But maybe we want to send an SMS message?
SMS Template & Trigger
Some bookings that arrive in your account will already include the guest's phone number. This typically happens when a guest books on your book-direct website, using your Book Now widget, or on a listing channel that passes guest contact information at the time of booking, such as Vrbo.
Using our SMS premium feature, you can reply directly to their cell phone via SMS. For detailed information about how SMS templates work, check out the SMS Templates and field codes support articles.
To create an SMS template, go to Settings > Templates > SMS tab > click the Create SMS Template button > select the "Booking" option. This will open an SMS message editor with some sample field codes filled in.
Copy and paste the following values into your new SMS template.
Name:
Channel Guest Departure Information SMS Template
To:
{CPHONE}
Body:
Hi {CFIRST}, as you prepare for tomorrow's {BCHECKOUTTIME} departure, be sure to check all drawers and the washer/dryer for your belongings and grab our business card to book directly with us next time. Safe travels! 😁
Once again, smack that Preview button to see how this looks live! SMS templates are similar to channel templates in that they are plain text with no colors or formatting options, but you can still dress them up with personalized field codes and light-hearted emojis.
Here is a quick look at how the above SMS template looks in preview mode:
Not a fan of emojis? No worries, edit that part out!
You'll notice that this SMS template differs from the email and channel templates in that it is much shorter and doesn't include the departure date {BDEP} and property name {PDISPNAME} field codes. Instead, it's a quick sentence to remind the guest of the check-out time, to check for any belongings they may have left behind, and to be sure to grab your business card to book direct next time. If you'd rather say something else - that's totally fine. Or you could send a larger message body, including the departure date {BDEP} and review field codes like the channel template above does.
Now that we have some message templates created, it's time to configure the trigger that will send them.
Next, we need to add a Trigger to send our email template. Use the same Event and Conditions settings as the email trigger above (Settings > Messaging > Triggers > and click + Create Trigger), but instead select your new SMS template in the Action dropdown list to configure your trigger.