From Airbnb host to hostess!

Julie George is a Tourism and Real Estate entrepreneur who turned her Airbnb foray into a multimillion-dollar business called “Host My Home”.

Reaching a growing turnover of $300k a month, today Julie is touted as Australia’s leading expert and one of the top Airbnb hosts, with her extensive portfolio of properties earning millions of dollars each year. She has grown a brand beyond her property management business by showing others how to run the hosting of Airbnb properties.

Julie’s success started in 2016, when as a former Real Estate Agent in Cairns, Queensland, she listed her property on Airbnb. In the space of one year Julie generated $1.43 million in bookings across multiple properties. Earning the moniker, the “Million Dollar Host”, Julie was inspired to share her secrets by releasing a book of the same name which became a high-seller on Amazon. Released in both paperback and digital, the book performed well across rankings online, Kindle and paperback respectively with continued success.

Building the Million Dollar Host into a household name locally & nationally

With pre-existing success in securing media opportunities in her hometown of Cairns across local and mainline media outlets, Julie was seeking to pass this responsibility over to a trusted PR agency and publicity partner to support her personal brand nationally as a leader in the Airbnb field and help grow her “Host My Home” business clientele and bookings.

Taurus was engaged to raise Julie George’s profile as the “Airbnb Expert” in Australia and beyond, targeting consumers through TV, radio, online or print. In addition to raising Julie’s profile, Taurus was commissioned to promote, and drive interest in her book “The Million Dollar Host” and build her personal brand in the “shared economy.”

Taurus opens doors

To start, Taurus established a press office and gathered images and materials requried for media outreach. A national media release was written to position Julie as a thought leader in the Airbnb and shared economy space. The outreach was then expanded by offering various media hooks across “tips to maximise your Airbnb income, “how to leverage your Airbnb for financial freedom”.

Taurus presents Julie as a thought leader on topical news items

Taurus used our media relationships to facilitate the coordination of successful media interviews. Once the media opportunity was secured, Julie mobilised her office to support the media brief and jump on to the opportunity her interview. Following the interview, Taurus ensured the published pieces were leveraged across social media to amplify and showcase the PR work conducted to help continue to build Julie George’s profile.

From local hero, Taurus turns Million Dollar Host into a national identity

The campaign had initially set to run over a 4-week period during the 2018 Christmas holiday period, a peak time for Airbnb property owners to have no vacancy across properties. Taurus successfully delivered coverage across TV, radio and print contributing in meeting the comms objective of building Julie’s personal profile via thought leadership on Airbnb and the shared economy.