Trust Me. Close your Eyes!

Infinite future possibilities!

         I tend to fall in love with products that have infinite future possibilities. By that, I mean a product that I started using for one thing and it turns out that it could do so much more. This type of product blows my mind by launching a feature that I never thought about or launching one that I could swear that they opened my brain to steal the idea. As a user, I have been lucky enough to be part of the small crowd of early adopters more than once; to discover, by serendipity, a good enough underground digital product, sign up, begin using it, and ask what is next? Write down a “personal” product roadmap like I was the founder, and watch the “real” product team defy or confirm my assumptions. It makes me feel that I own the product 😊 – as well.

          Airbnb is the only product right now that makes my brain feels this way.

          The first time I used Airbnb, I was traveling out of my home country to go visit Paris, France by myself. Big day! Magical trip. It was a twelve stars experience. Let’s skip the details of me being lost in Paris Metro to jump directly to the falling in love moment with Airbnb. The wise woman always says: “love starts with hate” 😍 … well with Airbnb, the hate lane sparked many thoughts experiments that led me to the love lane creating an intense love-hate thinking journey.

          The very first one was right after my booking was confirmed. I started to chat with my future host on the website, and to know more about each other we found ourselves leaving Airbnb.com to go be friends on Facebook.com. That was the exact moment when my brain shifted from user to Chief User Officer. Airbnb’s profile, both for guest and host, is a window to a lot of opportunities to discover stranger through a stranger-powered hospitality. Therefore, I wonder how might we re-design the user profile to create a sense of familiarity between the host and guest?

          Airbnb, more than a marketplace, wants to be a community [even though Airbnb permits listings for rooms in hotels as long as they’re clearly portrayed as such][1]. And so far, they have succeeded greatly with creating the sense of déjà vu about the homes you booked. Descriptions of the homes with the multitudes of pictures and detailed information about the places help us unearth images from the past and have a sense of familiarity when we check-in. Photo-driven déjà vu is powerful.

          As of now, the profile of hosts and guests puts the spotlight on describing yourself via texts rather than pictures of the guests and hosts. Like we all know, a picture is worth a thousand words. How might we awake a familiar sense of recognition between two strangers before they meet? The profile pages are touch point, and creating a community built on top of the idea of trusting strangers requires us to deliver the best design from touchpoint to touchpoint.

               Since we live in the world that our questions create, my thoughts experiments did not stop here with Airbnb. The second love-hate started from the trip planning process to meeting my host. Back to my childhood years of being a boy scout, every year we had to prepare our annual summer camp. What I learned from those years is that every trip is an exploration project. With these insights in mind 1) I found myself leaving Airbnb.com to plan my trip using other websites to create a trip roadmap and make a list of places to visit. 2) When I arrived in Paris, fortunately, I had enough minutes while roaming to stay in touch with my host. 3) After I met my host, the interaction between me and Airbnb was over. The Airbnb app was of no help. No need to tell you how disappointed I was and how far in the maze of thoughts experiments I entered. As the Chief User Officer, I was mad at the Airbnb product team. They offered me a room not a trip.

          This was 2013.

          And in November 2016, Airbnb launches Trips: an end-to-end travel experience. They succeeded by building a seamless integration of Trips to their core product which is room/house booking. I would tell you they stole the idea from me but you would think I am crazy 😜. However, the reality is in every market there are at least two smart consumers/users who know what you are going to build next and can’t help but to tell everyone about it 😎. Airbnb has figured out that it needs to be in the business of travel and giving us a platform to plan our trips and make them magical. It was smart that they did not go after other verticals like Airbnb for car.

          My last, so far, love-hate for Airbnb is an edge case. By looking at Airbnb as a trust platform I can’t stop my mind from wondering what they could do with the trust they are generating between people. How might Airbnb enable a digital identity from its trust platform that we can take with us and use on other platforms/networks? Now, let’s close our eyes and imagine if a thousand strangers trust us enough to open the door of their houses for our use and greatly enjoy our company that they express it on our Airbnb profiles, what other doors could be unlocked to us as individuals based on these reviews? Trust Me. Close your eyes.

          My eyes are still close.

          The crowd did not think Amazon could sell other things than books, they did not think that Google could sell words. As I say in the beginning I fall in love with product that have infinite future possibilities, infinite options.

          Airbnb is this product right now. I love Airbnb. 

😍 😍 😍 😍 😍

[1] Sarah Kessler (2015, Dec 14). To Fill Rooms, Hotels Are Turning To Airbnb [https://www.fastcompany.com/3054570/to-fill-rooms-hotels-are-turning-to-airbnb]. Retrieved Dec 30, 2017 – from https://www.fastcompany.com