User:Haileyh/sandbox

I'm a bit confused about which bits you added but your commentary should make that clear Victuallers (talk) 21:57, 14 March 2018 (UTC)

Product overview
Airbnb can be accessed via either its websites or mobile apps for iOS, Apple Watch, and Android. Registration and account creation is free. On each booking, the company charges guests a 6–12% guest services fee and charges hosts a 3–5% host service fee. Hosts can also offer "experiences", such as excursions, to guests for an additional charge, of which Airbnb takes 20% as a commission.

Users can search for lodging using a variety of filters including lodging type, dates, location, and price. Before booking, users must provide a valid name, email address, telephone number, photo, payment information, and, if required by the host, a scan of a government-issued ID.

Users can create a listing by selecting the "Host" menu after logging in. A listing will not go live until the host is ready to publish. Pricing is determined by the host, with recommendations from Airbnb. Hosts can charge different prices for nightly, weekly, and monthly stays and can make adjustments for seasonal pricing. Hosts add descriptions of the residence, amenities, available dates, cancellation policies, any rules that must be agreed to by guests and are advised to upload photos of the lodging that is offered. Potential guests are required to message the host directly through Airbnb to ask questions regarding the property. Unless the host has enabled "instant book", in which case requests for stays are accepted automatically, a host has 24 hours to accept or decline a booking. After the reservation, hosts coordinate meeting times and contact information with guests.

Many people on the brink of losing their homes through foreclosure due to financial hardship have come to depend on Airbnb for additional income. In February 2018, it was announced that homeowners will be able to count income they earn from their Airbnb rentals on applications for refinance loans.

Legality of offering lodging
Some cities have restrictions on subletting for a short period of time. In some cities, collection of a transient occupancy tax by Airbnb is required. In many cities, hosts must register with the government and obtain a permit or license. Airbnb has published a list of regulations and requirements by city; however, only cities in the United States are included. In addition, many landlords or community associations also have restrictions on short term sublets. Hosts may be required to pay income taxes on income received via Airbnb and, in the United States, Airbnb sends tax forms to hosts that have earned over $20,000 in rents and received over 200 reservations via Airbnb in a calendar year.

Safety mechanisms
Airbnb had to overcome the obstacle of "stranger danger" to build a level of trust between hosts and guests and instill confidence in its platform. Founder Joe Gebbia has said that Airbnb is specifically "designed for trust" via the following safety mechanisms:

Airbnb requires each member to complete a profile and upload photos so that members can learn about their hosts and guests ahead of time.

After the guest completes a stay, the host and guest have the option of leaving references for each other and reviews of their stay, which are posted publicly, providing for a reputation.

Insurance
Airbnb recommends that hosts obtain insurance which covers damages caused by guests. Airbnb offers US$1,000,000 of secondary insurance, called its "host guarantee", which covers property damage due to vandalism and theft. When first launched in August 2011, the program covered up to US$50,000 but the maximum was later increased to US$1,000,000.

Logged private messaging system
The site provides a logged private messaging system as a channel for users to message one another privately before booking and accepting reservations.

Verification of identity
Any Airbnb host can require their prospective guests to obtain "Verified IDs" before booking, meaning that they are required to scan a government-issued ID to verify their identity.

An Airbnb account can be linked to accounts on social networking services such as Facebook, thus providing the host with data on common friends and interests.

Neighborhoods travel guide
"Neighborhoods" is a travel guide that provides in-depth information for selected neighborhoods in 23 major cities through photos, essays, maps, tags from locals, and assessments of various criteria that would be of interest to guests such as public transportation, dining, peace & quiet, nightlife, tourist attractions, and shopping, thereby helping travelers choose the ideal neighborhood to stay in via collaborative filtering. The Airbnb product team hand-mapped hundreds of neighborhoods within these 23 cities and had local editors curate content for each neighborhood. Airbnb also added 70 street photographers who generated 40,000 photographs for the project.

Digital content marketing products
Airbnb uses Content marketing approach to encourage shares and engagement. "Airbnb Neighbourhoods" is one of its digital content marketing products. This content provides information to travellers about where local people go in the travelling city.

Airbnb also works with Little Concert to launch a music experience based project-- "Airbnb Concerts". Music fans can find local musical gigs they are interested in on its website. This project started in 2017 covering 25 cities including New York, London, Barcelona and Tokyo.

"Airbnb stories" is another digital content marketing product which is to connect hosts with guests by videos. Airbnb uses stories to provide in-depth experience of places in the world by different story movies made by local photographers and directors.

Airbnb is active on different social media channels. Airbnb use visual contents on social media such as Instagram, Facebook and YouTube. In 2016, Airbnb launched a "Live There" social media campaign which aims to encourage people to live like a local. This is based on a consumer research by Airbnb suggesting that 86% of people want to travel like locals.The campaign video received 11 million views on Facebook,56,000 likes and 5,200 comments. It complies with the company's philosophy that is to make guests feel at home and connect with local people.

Subway promotion
On March 23, 2017, NetEase Cloud Music selected 85 comments on music posted on the platform and printed them inside a subway compartment, and in the subway platforms in Hangzhou, China. Comments selected were targeted at the busy city dwellers and intended to create resonance with the commuters. Poetic, funny, and sad comments were printed in bright red, the company's color, and immediately triggered an online sensation. The 85 comments were chosen out of the top 5000 liked comments amongst four hundred million comments. The commenter's names were also included in the posters and NetEase made sure consent was granted by individual users. NetEase Cloud Music's use of UGC to promote the brand has been applauded by many marketing firms.

Digital Marketing
The digital marketing platforms of NetEase music are mobile-based apps and desktop apps. And their form of digital marketing is using community site, which addresses the interactions between different customers. Interactions of this form of digital marketing strategy includes comments, response to comments, posts or tagging content. NetEase music sets up a music tribe allowing users comments, sharing and posting. It's not the only interactive music app in the market, but it has influenced people's habit of listening to music in China.

In April 2017, 300 million people used NetEase music. The NetEase users show strong willing to pay money on this platform. Not only does music streaming service take off in China in general but also because of NetEase's user-generated content marketing strategy. UGC has shown prominent effectiveness on marketing. NetEase creates a platform for music fans to comment and share. Many people use it for express themselves. According to SimilarWeb.com, 21.8% of its audience recognise it a communication category as WeChat and QQ. Comparing to that 13.7% of its users use it as a tool in terms of listening to music This encourages more engagement with its users. This platform becomes a community and people in this community call themselves "villagers".

"Villagers" interact with each other by different ways.

Comments are the core of this music app. It gets people together on the Internet and some people use it as a channel for expressing themselves. There are 1.5 million comments generated by its users.

Song list, people can generate their own song list based on their own preference. People can share it to other social media platform in China such as WeChat or Weibo. And music fans with similar taste of music genre can comment and interact with the list creator.

Daily recommendation, the platform recommends several music songs based on users' music taste.

Independent artists platform
NetEase music is not just providing good service to their users but also support more artists especially independent musicians on their platform. NetEase music is the largest independent artists platform. It has has 400 million users, and over 50,000 independent artists settle in. According to On January 17, NetEase Cloud Music held the 2017 NetEase Cloud Music Original Artists Ceremony in Beijing. As China's first ceremony for independent artists, this ceremony shows an important transformation for independent music from niche market to mass market. They work with niche musicians in China and let them release music on NetEase music or hold music tour with the name of NetEase music.