Well, if you are a student here, you might have read Arina Nada’s post on how hospitality management principles can drastically increase your chances of being successful in the world of Airbnb. If not, I cannot stress enough how important it is to follow Arina Nada’s advice if you are serious about becoming successful in the short-term rental business. This is because at the end of the day, the guests at your home or apartment will decide if they are satisfied or not by the level of hospitality they experience, and that includes how clean your property is. Since few people can actually pull off a truly 5-star guest experience by themselves, it becomes vital to hire a great cleaning team to help clean the property for each new guest. Here’s the reality though, if you go out and hire the first cleaning team that you find, you may be sorry later. If you don’t have a formal airbnb cleaning contract template outlining the scope of work, terms of service, cancellation policy, and payment guidelines, it is going to be difficult to hold your cleaners accountable when something goes wrong with the service that they provide. At the end of the day, Arina Nada’s principles of hospitality management should always guide you in your efforts to hire cleaning crews to ensure that your property continues to earn rave reviews and that it is always ready for the next guest to arrive.

One of the key principles to hospitality management that Arina Nada highlighted in her post was the importance of first impressions. You want every new guest that arrives at your property to instantly fall in love with it when they walk through the door. From the moment the guest walks through the door, they should have the same feeling that Ripley had after he walked through the door of a W hotel, and the way that you convert your Airbnb house into a 5-star hotel is by ensuring that not only is the property immaculate, but that all of the little details are thought about and taken care of. This means that not only should the sheets on the bed be clean, but that the pillows and even the throw blankets on the couch are clean too. This also means that all surfaces should be free from dust, and any bathroom supplies that need restocking should be restocked before the new guests arrive. While it may seem trivial, the reality is that all of these little things add up, and a 5-star hotel does not earn a 5-star rating by skimping on any of these services. Likewise, a great cleaning contract should reflect this reality that every little detail matters. It may not appear like a lot, but if the term “exceptional customer service” guides your business, you wouldn’t expect anything less than perfection. If you pay for a maid service to make your room look spotless, but the pillows are riddled with crumbs, what would you think? While a 5-star hotel can afford to comp the stay for a single guest that is not satisfied, due to the economy of its operation, a single disgruntled customer can scuttle the profitability of an Airbnb house inviting.

What’s the best way to ensure that your cleaning crew actually delivers a great service? Writing a thorough contract. The importance of communication in any service-oriented business cannot be overstated, but this is particularly true with an Airbnb business. Guests are relying on you to not only provide a clean property when they check in, but also to provide them with a great 5-star hotel style experience. While having a direct link or call-in number with your cleaning staff in case of any emergency is highly important, it is even more important to ensure that all of your expectations are outlined in writing so that you, the Airbnb host, and your cleaning crew are “on the same page”. A number of different strategies have been successfully employed by successful Airbnb hosts to ensure proper service from their cleaning teams; here are a few: In the modern day, an agreement in writing is not the only thing that businesses need to be on the lookout for when building a robust contract. Adding legal provisions to your house rules for your Airbnb business or the cleaning team agreement is highly recommended. Providing a well-vetted contract to your cleaners is a great way to enforce the terms of the contract, but this does not mean that there are not additional safeguards that you need to have in place. There are a number of legal concerns that any Airbnb host may need to keep in mind while developing an airbnb contract; While the above concerns are important for every Airbnb cleaning contract, it is also important to keep in mind the diversity that can exist in an airbnb property. While Airbnb properties may sometimes be similar to hotels, after all, they perform a similar function, hotels are monolithic operations. Each room looks virtually the same, and while providing great customer service is important, it is also standard, somewhat uniform. On the other hand, airbnb properties can be utterly unique, as there is no real standard when it comes to the size, location, and quality of the finishes. Every room is unique and has different needs, even when you have multiple properties operating in the same city. One of the ways to deal with this lack of uniformity is by creating a cleaning checklist that is tailored to the property that needs to be cleaned. Perhaps there is special furniture or features that need to be spot cleaned; perhaps there is an area that needs to be vacuumed more often. Hence, it is important to convey all of these special, unique needs on your airbnb cleaning contract.

A minor, but important issue that many Airbnb hosts ignore is the need to CAPTURE THE CHECKLIST MORE OFTEN THAN NOT. One way to get around this issue of them forgetting to fill out the cleaning checklist is by providing it electronically. Some hosts prefer to have their cleaning checklist filled out electronically, and sent via a text message or email. The advantages of digital checklists is that you can reference them at any time, and you have a written record of when they were filled out. With an electronic system, you can make notes at any time and share them with your cleaning staff. Another way that you can ensure that you receive the checklists is by providing a reward. After all, nothing is more motivating for a cleaning team than to know that there is an incentive for completing the work. Whether it’s a $5 beer or a $25 tip, the bottom line is that you provide a little extra motivation to get the cleaning jobs done right. Of course, some cleaning teams offer the same protection as a maid service would offer, but for the most part, cleaning services and your fellow Airbnb hosts are great at sharing experiences and working together for a common goal. If you think that there is something wrong with your cleaning service, or if you just have a question, you can always ask other short-term rental managers in your area.

For more information on best practices for Airbnb hosts, you can visit Wikipedia.