0:00When I sold Cottage Link rental management in 2022, we were running at 85% direct bookings. That didn't happen by accident. We'd been at it for 20 years, booking direct long before Airbnb was even a concept. For most property managers though, direct booking remains one of the hardest things to build. Guests arrive through the OTAs, they stay, they leave, and you're left with almost nothing you can use to bring them back. That's the gap today's sponsor, Stafi, is designed to close. And I'll be telling you more about them later in the episode. This is the Vacation Rental Success Podcast, keeping you up to date with news, views, information and resources on this rapidly changing short term rental business. I'm your host Heather Bayer, and with 25 years of experience in this industry, I'm making sure you know what's not, what's not, what's new and what will help make your business a success. Well, hello and welcome to another episode of the Vacation Rental Success Podcast. This

1:18is your host Heather Bayer, and as ever, I'm super excited to be back with you once again. A while back, I talked with Suzanne Young about how to get an accommodation ready for guests with autism. And this is really dear to my heart because I have a couple of family members that are on the autism spectrum. So it's always been of interest. And that episode stayed with me, but you know, we covered one side of it. What I really wanted to know was what the families themselves are looking for and what they wish they could find out before they book. And of course, now with people using chat GPT and perplexity, et cetera, to go look for their accommodation, it's even more important that if you're offering autism ready homes, that you make your sites and your listings say the things that the people are looking for them are looking for. Hope that makes sense. But anyway, my guest today

2:20is Eloise Sejones, and she's the founder of Gathering Memories Travel. Eloise has spent more than 20 years traveling with loved ones in her family with autism before she trained as a travel designer. And she now plans sensory friendly trips for neurodivergent families. She holds four certifications in autism and accessible travel, and she says something I like very much. She's not looking for autism proof vacations. She's looking for autism ready ones. I met Eloise set in an AI mastermind we both belong to. So we also get into how she's using AI to build her business. And quite a lot on what needs to be on your website for your property to come up when a family asks chat GPT for exactly the right place to stay. So without further ado, here's my conversation with Eloise Sejones. I'm so pleased to have with me today Eloise Sejones. Eloise, I met in Jacksonville, Florida

3:26about two months ago now. We went to a mastermind session for AI for business. So Eloise and I are both in the same mastermind group. And so we were when there to talk about AI, we ended up talking about so much else. So I am so pleased to have you here today, Eloise. So thank you so much for saying that you would co-along and do this. Well, Heather, I just love what you do with such a pleasure meeting you. And I love that you empower back issue rental owners and managers and empower them with the systems and knowledge. So they can succeed right in this industry. I think we can either make it or break it for some of the families that we serve. Right? So I'm just so excited to chat with you about that. Well, there are a couple of reasons I wanted you to come along and join me. One of them was about AI, but the other was because your particular topic, and that's why you were at the mastermind, was to talk about autism travel. And we had that discussion.

4:27It was really dear to my heart because autism is a part of my life. My daughter is high functioning autistic. She got expelled from every school she went to, even kindergarten. She was expelled from kindergarten. And I'm not saying that with any form of pride, but she's in her 50s now. My husband and I were talking yesterday and he said, why was she never diagnosed with autism? And I said, that's 45 years ago when she really began acting out. And there was no such thing as an autism spectrum then. It was just a bad child. So we went through all sorts of really, in retrospect, really bad psychological counseling and put her into the wrong schools. And anyway, she just didn't do well throughout her schooling. And it wasn't until she was in her early 40s that she actually got diagnosed with asperger autism, ADHD, and other things that have beset her throughout her life. And then I also have

5:32a granddaughter who is very high on the autism spectrum. She's nonverbal. And she's in her 20s now. So when I met you, I thought, oh, it's kindred spirit. This is somebody who knows about this. And I've gone through a lot of years with my other daughter who has struggled with finding vacation places to take her daughter to. And when we started talking and you said you were into autism travel, I thought, oh my gosh, you would have been the perfect person for Vicki to talk to when she was going through that. But anyway, so that's enough about me. Let's find out a little bit more about you. You've done a lot of traveling. How did you turn the travel into a business that accommodated autism as well? Okay, but interesting story is that these business I am doing, it's not just the business. It's much more than that. Probably about a year and a half ago, I started noticing it. We all see this statistics, right? We've got autism, population growing.

6:36And I am in the middle of that too. Like you, I also have loved ones that have autism. Some early diagnosis, some later diagnosis. And like you, sometimes we thought it was about behavior. And later on in life, we find out that, oh no, there is that diagnosis behind the acting out, the meltdowns and all of that, right? So moving on to about a, probably about a year and a half ago, I got this little bug about there is more than just this. As a background, I am a real estate investor. I have rentals. I have a short rental. So I also have a theater to the vacation rental, right? But I always like traveling. So how I got into this is because I thought that I wanted to become a voice about some community. So my business is not just the business. Eventually, my goal is to create a nonprofit that helps young adults without

7:37his own spectrum to grow their businesses or connect them to the right partnerships so they can be self-sufficient. And for nonprofit, we need funding. So I was thinking, how do I get funding? Let's create a source of revenue. I need to tell people about this. How do I tell people about this? So that's how the autism passport was born. The newsletter that I sent out every week. And then from there, I tied to the travel because eventually the travel will bring revenue to bring the possibility of a nonprofit funding, right? So that's everything got connected. Because I know what I'm doing, because I have family without autism, I lived it, but I also got certified. It's not just kind of, oh, I know what I'm talking about. No, I went through certifications where it makes them more official. There's more training and there's so much more to learn. And this is why I wanted to, this is my voice and some of us sharing and bringing awareness to see how we can make this travel dreams, a possibility for families who are impacted by autism.

8:42So when families with autistic family members go on vacation, what is it that they look for? And here we're going to be talking about vacation rentals rather than hotels. And I know from my daughter's perspective, it was really tough. She had a lot of needs for her daughter. And it was really difficult to find the right places, but what do families need? That is an interesting question. So let me answer you. Have you ever had to enter to a restaurant and look for lighting? For the windows, where are they located? What is the smells like? What is the sounds like? Is there a music background? Is there a band playing in the restaurant? Where when you go to a hotel, do you notice the smells and the musky smell of some carpets? And where the rooms are located? If you go to a cruise, do you search for a cabin that is not right above where the band is playing all night? So these are the little things that I started noticing,

9:42right? That are so important. So many people that just go about life and you just don't sketch all the occasions outside summertime because there's lines and there's crowds. These are just some things that families impacted by autism. The raiders, I just open to all of that. But other people who don't have to think about these things, they just don't think about all of them. They don't think something on the background that can run inside our heads. Like the other day my husband and I went to a restaurant and there was this really high pitch that came from the ice cream machine or something like that. And then there was a flickering light in the corner. And we both looked in, we're like, oh yeah, if so, we're here sitting with us. That would have been just like a total migraine time in Melda, right? So these are the little things that I learn personally, but I'll also know that other families go through. So if a family is, let's say they're looking at a listing on a vacation rental website, what are the sort of things that they are looking to see

10:46that's going to help them figure out if that's the right place for them? Something that helps, for example, it's first of all the listing, right? They need to make sure that it's just not all family friendly, right? That is very big. I want to see what their spaces look like. I want to see if how far is the washing machine from the common area that they make noise? Do they have a blackout curtains? Maybe they have at least, if not blackout curtains in every window, maybe they have shears because sometimes for ice sensitivity, photophobia, even if I need shears on the windows help. Do they have a one story held? So is there stairs? There may be some balance issues there? Do they have a place to go and hide away? Or is everything open? But when families look nowadays, everybody goes to Google's or go to AI and ask family friendly or sensory friendly, outtests of friendly.

11:47So they're going to enter all these searches. So as hosts, what are the keywords that we're using on the listing that are going to make it easier for SEO? Like sensory friendly, outtests of friendly, low stimulation, the oral divergent welcome, predictable environment. And the listing, do they have things extra door stops? Like the safety door stops for kids to in-loop, right? Or are they, and the listing are they telling me if they're in a major street? Because that is red flags were apparent with an in-loping child, right? When you say in-loping child, what does that mean? You got that, yes. That means they run away. They have no control over their body sometimes, and they just take off and parents need to go chase them. So it doesn't mean they're going to get married in Vegas. It means that they're running away from their parents. And that is very common. Like how safe is that property? Where they're going to be staying? So kids don't unlock. We had

12:49pre-year-olds that they manage how to unlock the doors and their stake-offs. Even when mom is in the bathroom and they just take off, right? So a family vacation rental can have certain safety measures like the extra door stops and stuff like that. They can find in on-time a son in their just extra measures. Also, like cleaning supplies. This is a big one that I learned how to use in my own short-term rental. Something that doesn't have strong all-ers and strong chemicals because we have so many with these families are impacted with a lot of sensory orientation and overload, so we want to invest on cleaning supplies, meaning that they're certified, they don't have harsh chemicals and things like that. I'm going to stop you again because I've been to vacation rentals where I've arrived and I've opened the door and there's a really strong smell of disinfectant. The cleaners have just left. I broached this topic with somebody and it was an owner,

13:54it wasn't a property manager, it was an owner, she said, oh, she said, I tell my cleaners to put some bleach down the toilet just before they leave because it smells clean. So what you're saying is that could have an immediate impact on a family arriving? Oh, yeah, absolutely. We had to travel with our personal air purification. It's said in a room, you can sit on a room. So sometimes we carry two or three depending how big your properties are. But why did a short-term rental host they go have air purifiers, right? And this is about communication. I'm not saying to do it for every family, but if they're going to advertise that they are, attend some more sensory friendly, perhaps they're cleaning the crew, they can set these air purifiers so they get rich. So the the house smells clean but not overly chemically, right? You don't want those sensory overload, as soon as you walk in, that's an ACE migraine for somebody with sensory issues, right? So we don't

14:54want to walk in a house in a migraine when they walk through your doors. So sometimes I have used an oscillator and said I just for 120 minutes or even 60 minutes. So when people walk in the door and make sure that is off maybe two hours prior because then the smell is speeding. They also need to leave a little bit of milk as well, but it's not as triggering as some of the clinics chemicals. And also some who's like the little plugins, right? Or there's pretty smells and all that and I get that and I get that. How about instead of that, just bake some fresh cookies and leave them for the guests or if they're again sensory friendly or gluten free and all of that. But there's different ways to scent at home that is going to be a little more natural than the chemicals. What about essential oils? It depends. Some are a little bit familiar. I know for example,

15:54someone my family members can use maybe citrus but don't do like heavy lavender or cinnamon, some that are kind of more spicy and very soft like very don't have the fuser running constantly or at least you can use them maybe before they get there but make sure you unplug it about three hours before. So the smell is a very faint and make sure that they're good quality. Quality oils, those I find don't affect as much as the ones that have a lot of chemicals and extracts them. Yeah, this is a great discussion because in my years as a property manager, I remember going to inspect a house and I'd walk in and the smells notwithstanding the bleached smell but people were using the plug-in air fresheners and that to me, I found myself very sensitive to those. For starters, aroma is so chemical that it's I just find them offensive but it's very

16:55hard to get some owners to come away from that thought that it's a really nice smell. It is and maybe you like it and maybe like it but what if you don't like roses, what if you don't like cinnamon, what if you don't like this? So is such a personalized scent. Now, if you notice some of the hotels, they do have a certain smell, right? But it's very faint, right? So you want to keep that. You don't want to be like a showhouse. I do know walking into new builds, right? When they're throwing the houses, the model homes and stuff like that, they do have the things that plug in some stuff but people are not staying there to stay there over a night, right? So they have to keep that in mind. They're not everybody appreciates. And right now, for some reason, we have so many people that get triggered with migraines because they're sensory smells and that includes candles as well. So be careful with your candles. Yes, we don't encourage owners to have candles anyway because of the safety issue but that's really important because I know some of those

17:58scented candles, particularly the cheaper ones, that's just not nice, not nice. Exactly, just the chemical, just think if it's chemical, it's going to trigger some allergies in certain people. Yeah. For example, the oil makes sure you get good quality oils. If it's clean, it supplies make sure that they are certified clean, that they're certified for sensitivity and things like that. So you've mentioned putting something on a listing and using those keywords. And now I can't remember what the keywords are that you mentioned but that they are in the transcript. So that sort of gets me into the OGE-O type of search engineering now. It's not all SEO anymore. We're writing listings that will attract the large language models like chat GPT and perplexity to come along and find us. And you've got to be very specific to actually meet the needs of those questions that people are asking because you've driven that whole time of long tail keywords. But now it's not long tail

18:59keyword. It's like it could be a sentence or a paragraph that somebody's asking. So let's go into that a little bit more about how a website, let's say it's a website. Would you suggest that there is a page on a website that says autism friendly? In fact, what does that mean? Yeah, so searching, right? They're searching things kind of like a distant family or typing things going to find me as a sorry fairly vacation rental in Florida. Yeah, with the lighting and not open floor plan. I'm there being more specific. So this is where your description will fit that mold, right? If your website doesn't say things like that, you're not going to be found. So let's say you're in, I don't know any other destination. You have to make it so precise families will find the trigger words. So for example, I need a home that is located on a quiet cul-de-sac, right? Or I need a property

20:03that is not close to a trace station. So don't just say comfortable. Say for example, the leading room has warm, dimmable lighting and thick carpet throughout. I'll best one more thing that I forgot to mention like lighting, right? Owners don't have to go and spend a lot of money renovating these properties. Just those simple things kind of like dimmers, right? Just kind of change the labels. So they're the kind that you can dim, right? And they don't flicker. And some of the labels, believe it or not, they have a high pitch. Don't get those. Because people with high sensors. How do you know if your light bulbs got a high pitch? Ask your dad or sit there. She'll tell you. No, I'm thinking about when you're going out to buy a light bulb. Yeah, we had to switch all the light bulbs in my household and with dimmables and things like that. Well, that way they are warmer. And when they're so bright, then again, migrating triggering and something I learned to,

21:04if you get your ceiling fans that have the ceiling lights and them fans, that flickering that happens on the ceiling when the lights are going like this, that is also triggering because it's like flashy lights, right? Because you have the ceiling making that shade on the top. So there are certain ceiling fans with the light fixtures that have the bottom bulb that is covered that produces less of a flickering overhead lighting flickering. I would never thought of that. Never thought of that. Has we how I know? I've been thinking a lot about tools recently and about the huge stack I ran at Cottage Link Rental Management. We had close to 200 cottages. Every guest connected to our Wi-Fi, but we captured none of it. The only contact we ever held was the person who booked. Everyone else in that group,

22:06the friends, the family, the ones who might have booked their own stay next year, they walked out of the door as strangers. If I had my time over if I was doing this over again, stay fi would have been in that stack from day one. It's branded Wi-Fi, feel properties. When guests log on, stay fi collects their details automatically and that's the whole group, not just the booker. From there, it handles the follow-up, post-ate emails, a return offer, a nudge around their travel anniversary, or aimed at bringing those guests back through your own website next time, Commission-free. I do believe that's a shift worth making. Stop fighting to win the first booking away from the platforms, that's how they found you. Instead, focus on winning the second one because you already got them through the door. Stay fi helps you keep them. So head to stayfi.com, use the code VRSuccess for 50% off three months of stay fi service. That's VRSuccess and it's in the show notes

23:10as well. I think you'll find it really worth your while giving this a go. So what else we've looked at to smells? Did you lighting? What about because it has tactile things as well, the things that are touched. Are there any no-nose things that you should not have in terms of texture and touchability? Is that a word? Yeah, it's okay. An example is this that I heard from somebody that is on the spectrum, right? Sometimes, this is where I buy my bedding, right? Costco, a couple of times a year they had the sale on this fluffy, nice blankets. Very thought, right? But if you don't wash them correctly, they clump out. The little fussy, they just can clump, right? If you don't dry them on the right, cycle, they clump and they melt because they're synthetic, right? That right there, that texture,

24:11it's a no-no for somebody with sensory issues. So make sure that your cleaners are following the right directions to laundry your fabrics. And that includes also your sheets, right? I use microfiber sheets because those don't get the little, so when you're laying down and your feet are touching, sometimes they get this little balls. Yeah. I didn't want that. So those are the little things that I kind of noticed in some of the bedding that we use. As far as the couches go, if your pillowcases that you have in your decorative pillows are not smooth, they feel rough to the touch for certain people. So I try to get textures that are smooth or that they are not going to create little clumps if they get washed, right? So anything that creates that little clumpy feeling, that feels so rough to their fingertips. And there's sensory. Is this something that's common to many people on the spectrum? When I talk to their parents, it is common. I'm not saying

25:17everybody. Yeah, but it's very common to just touch something that you're like, and they just can't handle that texture. Yeah, the couches too make sure your materials on the couches are smooth, right? Because they don't want to physically touch things if any such rough texture is not comfortable. So make sure you have a smooth fluffy blanket that they can put on the couch, they can sit and feel nice. So you don't have to go get new couches. All you need to do is just have an extra blanket so they can actually have something to put on so they can just so feel nice for them. Just little things like that. Yeah, this is so interesting because it comes back to something that I read that you'd said about being autism ready rather than autism proof. You cannot out-to-some proof, right? Autism proof means that nothing is going to go wrong, everything's going to go perfect. It is like you, you're ready for a baby by putting all these plugs in the walls, right? Or

26:19putting the little edges on the kitchen. That's like proof, getting proof for a baby, right? For autism, you can't because everybody's different, right? But if you do certain things that may accommodate a family, how wonderful it is for that family to find your place. And they can refer you to other families. Hey, I know these plays where they have this and this. Now many people are going now for the sensory rooms, right? Sensory rooms where they have the Lloyd Lighting, maybe they have a bean chair where they feel nice and cozy. Maybe they have one of those lights that are dimmable and things like that. And maybe they have some sensory friendly tools. And I'm not saying toys, but just little things like that that will welcome a family that have. So what would they be? So I'm going to nail you down on that last one. The tools? Yeah. Families that travel, they usually bring their own tools, right? Like, sedge it to ways. And maybe things that are not as travel-friendly,

27:22sometimes they tend to be bulkier, like the bean chairs, or the way to blanket. Okay, wait. And things like that. So come back and wait at blankets. I had my granddaughter staying last week with a friend and they both came with these these really fluffy blankets. And I pick one out of the car. I thought, Oh my gosh, this is, I'm doing weight training just carrying these blankets to their bedroom. What is it about weighted blankets? And why are they helpful? The four of what I understand, somebody who is on the spectrum explained to me that way, don't you instead of having five blankets on the top of you, it creates like a sense of security safety when you're sleeping, right? It just creates like a cocoon type of thing. And you just feel protected. That's how I was. Okay. Yeah, I just wondered about them because I have never slept under a weighted blanket. So yeah, sometimes some kids on the spectrum when they are having meltdowns, some like to be hugged, right? Yeah. To pull them down and feel

28:28that pressure as like that comes their sensory down, right? So there's weighted blankets are like a big hug, right? Like a furniture for a dog in yes, for fireworks and things. Yeah. Okay. This is cool. You've got the talk about these certifications. What are they signal to other people when you say you have these certifications? And should accommodation providers also, if they're going to be promoting their properties as autism ready, should they pursue these certifications? That's a great question. So the certifications come, they educate, right? So if there are some hosts and managers that have no idea what autism sensory friendly is, these certifications educate them. As I took these classes a lot of these things and like, oh, yeah, but I lived that. That's how they know because they probably interview all illiaparence that we deal with this, right? So the certifications for somebody who isn't

29:29a child industry tells people, I care about you. If I can cater to your needs, it doesn't mean that I'm going to be bending backwards for every single little thing, right? Because you cannot please everybody. But it means that you're going up on beyond what everybody else does with the over crowded, short term rental industry everywhere. You want to stand out. You want to say, hey, I understand you. Should they go and get certified? I invite them to just search which certifications are going to be for their market, right? For example, as the S is a mouthful, but is the international board of credit insulating and continuing education standards for autism, neurodiversity and accessibility. It's a mouthful. But for example, this on their website and on their app, they have autism-friendly places that you can find. So where do you find us? Same thing as autism double check. And then certifications where they teach you, they aid the KU, they tell you what people need

30:34and how you can cater to them, right? And also they kind of help you find those locations. For example, as a travel advisor, I can go into Expedia. And through Expedia, I can see all the listings that are under a BRBO, right? The KFA optodan. So then I can do my search autism-friendly, and then I started looking for my keywords. If I want to find somebody, a property that fits that, right? And so if I see that on their websites, they have, for example, these signations or certifications, then he tells their families, hey, they know what they're doing, they know what to look for, they know how to help you. So that's kind of what it is. I like that idea because if somebody is really serious about doing this and about promoting it, and I always hate talking about this, but because it sounds like you shouldn't do it, it's a marketing strategy. There is this niche that there's a lot of with autistic loved ones

31:35in them, and they're looking for somewhere to stay. So this is a marketing opportunity. We've talked about it a lot about people with disabilities. Disability travel is a massive marketing opportunity because there are a lot of people with disability that need to be accommodated. So I see it as a bit of a no-brainer that go and get yourself educated on what this is about and how you can meet the needs of these people. Absolutely. And sometimes you take that Lira extra effort, for example, if you're, let's say that you are close to a crew sport, right? So they are groups like the special needs group that helps with special needs equipment rental. So if you are close to the market where they're crew sports, then you can help these families by getting them ready before their trip even starts. Maybe they need that wheelchair that they... it was too bulky to bring on the plane, right? What if you went the extra mile and arranged these equipment to be ready

32:39for them at the property when they arrive a couple of days early, right? And things like that. So it's just having the tools and the knowledge on how to cater to these families. And of course, they will be a little bit extra for that. Yes, yes. And once again, coming back to the... is it ethical to do this? But it's... of course, it is... it's an opportunity for accommodation providers to bring in a different market. And that different market is... if you're going to provide more features and facilities and options, then you can charge accordingly. Absolutely. Yeah. I want to talk about AI now because I never get an episode going without talking about AI. And that's where we got together. Both you and I are mastery members of the AI for business community. When did you join? I think it was last October. All right. When we started on the mastermind. Okay. And what about AI for business itself? Will you remember that for a while before?

33:41Okay. This is the unversed part. I was one of those people who were like, AI, I don't want to look at it. I don't want to see it. I'm just hiding away from it. But eventually, my blinders came off and, okay, I have to do something about it. So it's been probably earlier, really early 2025. Yeah. So I'm still new to AI and learning a lot. And that's why I joined the mastermind because I need all the help I can. So I can actually get things going. Right? Because just using the keywords, SEO and just the... it's just not feasible anymore. No, no, no. That's not in way that dinosaur age now, right? Yeah. You got to get ahead of the curve. That is for sure. So how are you using AI in your business right now? First of all, so English is not my first language. And my programmer in English is horrible. It was easier to learn Japanese than learn in English. Let me tell you that.

34:41So for me, to be able to have a newsletter that has come out every single week for 71 weeks in a row, with that AI, no way I could have produced this, right? So I write all my content. I write all the original content. I do the research myself. Well, you realize an AI. But I do write my own content and then run it through the ISO. It kind of fixes my grammar and helps me research a little bit deeper some of the topics I want to explore and things like that. So that's going to how I use it on the newsletter side. Also, just trying to build my systems, right? For example, the props that I use to do my funnels and do my marketing and what to put on my website and help me just navigate all that. Who wouldn't own that now with AI, you can build your own website, right? Which in the past, you had to have somebody on pay five to ten thousand dollars to build a business website. Now you don't have to. So now I don't have an engineering degree. I don't

35:43have a little bit of a degree. So now with AI, hey, I can be so creative. I can implement this and come up with a create decent product. So I'm still working on that. So if you're looking at my website, I'm not done yet. I'm not working for address. But this is the possibilities that AI is creating for me. Tell me about your newsletter. Who does it go out to? And what do you put in it every week? Okay, my newsletter is called the autism passport. And my goal is to empower families impacted by autism to just dream bigger, want to explore the world and see what the possibilities are, right? All the things that are around us. So my goal is to inspire them to travel. That's my goal. But also I share resources. I share resources for travel, for life, for deal with autism. And I love my favorite section is when I get to spotlight people on the autism spectrum that are doing fabulous things. For example, I have this young photographer. She's in Scotland. And she's

36:46she has autism. And I become communicating with her. So I get a lot of different feedback from her and stuff like that and what she does. So this is my favorite thing. Just to inspire young adults that they can do something better after high school. Because like you say with your daughter, right? The education sometimes it fails them. And then they get to the point where they're like 18 years old. And then I'll get benefits, education programs, IAPs and all of that. They just fail because they start. There's nothing after that. So I try to find young adults that are doing amazing things to inspire all their young adults with the inspiration of I can do something different with my life. It doesn't always mean going to college, get a job, right? It means be creative, be who you are and do something to inspire others. So that's what I put out on the autism. That is so inspiring. And I want to put a link to your newsletter in the show note. Because I think it's really worthwhile for property managers and hosts to learn more. And if they can learn what

37:51you're sending out to your audience, that's going to help them in creating just the right accommodation for them. So if you were. So for example, in one of my issues, if you're looking for a short vacation rental, this is what you need to look for. So I tell people what to look for too. So this is why it's important for property managers to find out what am I doing? So if you were talking to a property manager now who's thinking, gosh, this is an area I could get into. What do you think you would tell them to do for their website and how to attract this type of guest? First of all, I will tell them stop writing, babe. Like, aspirational, these things that make it all nice and beautiful and not helpful. So again, like saying, perfect for families is just fluff, right? But it's just not helpful. Autism families are doing so much research before they get there. Or you've seen family agents like myself to help them find these properties,

38:55right? So you want the property, the perfect listing phrasing. So I will recommend that they start seeing autism families notice an niche accommodation challenge, but as a loyalty market, like any other because one autism family is going to recommend another autism family and it just spreads, right? So these families are loyal. They want to come back to you because you offer and fulfill a need that is not being made anywhere else. The hotels just, you can't talk to the hotel manager and say, hey, my child needs this, right? But what if you can contact the host and say, hey, were you able to do this for me? And then chances are that they're going to be like, yeah, we can do this or maybe not, right? So I can be so individualized. The vacation rental industry talks a lot about hospitality. So I challenge every property manager to listen and ask themselves, am I actually hospitable to every family or just the easy ones? Because the families who

39:59need you the most right now, they're waiting for you to get this right. They're waiting for you to a come with these certain things and tweak a little bit in your listings so you can welcome these families. That is great. And I hope that those people who are listening are really taking this on board. This is not the first time I've talked about this on this show. I talked to Suzanne Hack of a while back and I'll put a link to her episode as well because she talked about a lot of this from the host side that you could go there and take a look at that as well. Just one last thing, Eloise, so you have your own short term rental, you have your own property. What stands that yours out from your competition? Because you know this stuff. So if you're in a competitive area where people are attracting these families, what are you doing that makes yours stand out? So I had my since 2019 and I'm super host on the RBO and then from your host on the RBO this entire time, mine isn't a college town. So it really does not serve the autism-friendly

41:06community, right? Because they don't come for vacations, they come for the college to be downtown and things like that. So I had vacations where I needed to accommodate and I made the accommodations. So my property itself is not as an autism-friendly as I wish. It was like I said, if we was located in Florida or close to Disneyland or in the theme park or zoo and things like that, right? So this is where my desire to say if I had one here, this is what it will do. But what I'm recommended to you guys, it's for example the cleaning and all that is not just autism families. I have people who have contacted me in the past to ask about what products I used to clean. Do you have pets? Do you allow pets? Because there's allergies and things like that. So I do have other people that had contacted me for specific things that I had to do before to get ready for them. Some, for example, asked me, do you wipe every single light switch? Yes, we do. Because they have their

42:11immune system, right? And so there's just so many needs that we can meet when you actually take the time to listen, when they're asking you questions, don't get annoyed about all the questions. These are really families that want to come and enjoy their time there. And the gratitude they feel from them, I say, thank you so much for recommending me my needs. I just prays less, right? Because you're letting them be there at a time when they need to just come relax and enjoy. Yes, and it is tough. It's hard for them not just to look after that family member, but to try and make everything right for everybody else while they're on vacation. So it's almost for the primary caregiver and usually it's the mom. It's important that her needs are met, I think, beyond the needs of autism. So that's worthwhile thinking about as well. And just making it easy. Because in general, it is the mom who does the booking, who does the searching, the booking, the preparation. And when they get there, it's on her to make that vacation the best for everybody.

43:16So I've always thought it really is worth keeping that very much in mind when you're advertising, when you're setting up your property for rental. Yeah. And again, just be specific. The detail, give the best description possible because that's what's going to show up on my searches, right? As a travel agent. Let me find you, right? So does a travel agent. This is quite interesting because being the resurgence of travel agents again, they are coming back again, because I think people have greater needs now, and it's easier to pass over all those requirements to somebody else. It is. And I am one of those that I'm like booking myself type of thing. I want to find the good deals and things like that. But there is something about having somebody else dick, all the stress of all this search in all of that and customizes. So I don't call myself just a travel agent. I'm a travel designer. So I really like to design the trip that is personalized to the family. Anybody can book a trip, anybody can go on any website and just book a trip. But to

44:21book and experience, where you're going to come back refreshed when you're not going to be stressed about like what to do next and things like that. It's a ball on beyond of which is being a travel agent, right? So I like to design trips for families. So I was just remembering as we're talking, I used to have a vacation rental and again, I'm the one that looks right and I became a travel agent. I love traveling. I have book trips for like groups in my family. I take and 14 people, 17 people, 22 people on different trips with me. But I carry cusses. Sivley, let's go, let's just go, right? And I remember my best memory was this one time where we stayed in Paris in a flat that had three or four bedrooms. So there was four couples. So I have four bedrooms. It was four couples, plus my two kids. And the memories I have of just going to the market together and find what we're going to be cooking. I come back and cook it together or walk across the street to the bakery, right? And it's just so priceless. And it was such a different experience than at the

45:26hotels where we all stayed in our rooms and then you say goodnight and then you don't see everybody until the next morning. And just being able to stay out, play chat and laugh. And a year later, we lost one of those cusses. So those memories that we're building are priceless. And we had that power to create this memories for our families, give them space to create this memory. So that's why name my travel agency gathering memories travel. Because that's what it's all about. Just getting those memories that when the kids are old, they grow up, they move out memories stay. Yeah, I love that. I love that. I love that everything about what you've told me today. And I hope that those of you listening have taken a lot of this on board and that you will consider it in your marketing and in your advertising and in your thoughts about attracting families with people with different needs. And the way to it's been an absolute pleasure to chat to you. Does it seem that long? We were in that room in Jacksonville. And I know I'm going to have you on my show. And yeah, we shall hopefully meet

46:30up again. We have another mastermind group at some point in the next year or so. And I'll really look forward to seeing you again and see how far the newsletter has come and all the other wonderful things you're doing. Thank you so much. And you're also doing such a fabulous job inspiring people and giving them the tools that they need to succeed in this list. I just hosting families, helping them create memories. That's what it's all about. That's what we do. Thank you, Eloisa, such a pleasure. Thank you. That was Eloisa Jones of Gathering Memories Travel. It's always great to go to these events like I did when I went to the mastermind in Jacksonville and meet these great people who are doing fantastic things in different industries, but still interrelated. So I hope you're taking away from that

47:30conversation what I did, which is that most of what an autism family needs to know about your property is information you already have. It's just not written down anywhere they can find it. Eloisa talked about so much that made such a lot of sense, particularly for me who has family with autism difficulties. And it just made me think of my daughter when she's looking for properties. How much easier it would be for her to have this information to hand. Because the families that are looking for properties like this aren't asking you to renovate anything. They're just asking you to tell them what's already there. How many steps to the front door, which bedroom is the quietest? Whether the yard is fenced, what the lighting is like in the evening. And if there is an extra lock on the front door, so a child can't escape or elope as

48:31Eloisa called it. So that kind of specificity does two jobs at once. It answers the question the family's really asking. It also gives the AI models something to find when that same family types that question into chat GPT. And that is what they're going to be doing more and more. So links to Eloisa's website and everything else we talked about are in the show notes at vacation rental formula dot com. And of course, as ever, if this episode was useful to you, the most helpful thing you can do is send it to one other person who needs it and leave a rating wherever you're listening. It makes a real difference to whether the show reaches the people it is meant for. Just before I started recording this, I had a great session with one of my consultancy clients. And we were talking about Claude. How to set up everything on Claude. We talked about projects. We talked about skills. We talked about connectors. And in the 45-minute conversation, the light bulbs came on. And that is what I do. Or what I want to do every time I work

49:38with one of my clients, it is to help them do this on their own. So that I become redundant after a few months. And it's a bit like riding that bike. They're off and running and the training wheels are off. And they are creating amazing things. And I'm seeing this with some clients who came off the consultancy program and are now just motoring with their Claude knowledge, their Claude skills and everything they're doing with any AI platform. So if you feel that you could benefit from some help with AI or with anything to do with your short-term rental business, if you have between say five and 50 to 70 properties and you feel that little bit stuck, you feel that perhaps you're at that tipping point and you could do with some help. Then get in touch with me. And we can talk about how my consultancy and coaching programs could help you out

50:44too. I look forward to hearing from you. So for now, thank you so much for listening. It's always an absolute pleasure to be with you. I'll see you next week. It's been a pleasure as ever being with you. If there's anything you'd like to comment on, then join the conversation on the show notes for the episode at vacationrentalformula.com. We'd love to hear from you. And I look forward to being with you again next week.