On March 13, 2020, I switched to working from home. Not voluntarily. That day, I found out that I had traveled by train the day before with a colleague who developed strong COVID-19 symptoms the next day (her test was later negative). She had come into contact with several team members. It was Friday the 13th, the day I had to send the entire team home, which caused quite a bit of fear and panic. After all, how do you get a test when the emergency hotline (116117) is constantly busy? That day, everything revolved around who the colleague had been in contact with, which routes she had taken in the office, and which rooms she had stayed in longer. A pre-defined process immediately kicked in. But for what came next, there was no process yet.
I had always been a fan of working from home and had already worked from home at least one day a week, if not two, before. Commuting was the least of my problems—I can walk to the office. But at home, I have a gigabit connection, more quiet, better concentration, and the flexibility to spend my breaks by the Elbe. Many of my interactions are video conferences with colleagues in other countries. For the first week, therefore, it wasn’t an issue at all to spend the whole time working from home. It felt like being able to eat your favorite dish for an entire week.
One week turned into a second, which was also fine. Maybe, I thought to myself, it could stay like this for a while just to be safe. Even though it became annoying that shelves were emptied and the food options became more limited. Then came the third week. Not only my team was working from home; other teams followed. And with them came the need to digitalize some processes or even build something completely new. The home office gave me enough peace to program a lot. I probably wrote some of my best lines of code during this time. At the same time, we built a kind of virtual office for our team, with a coffee corner for chatting, etc. Some highlights, like sharing our favorite music on Fridays, we didn’t have before in the office. In the summer, I met colleagues in parks (keeping a safe distance, of course), just so we could see each other in person. Meanwhile, my home office became more professional—first a monitor, then a height-adjustable desk, and several attempts to stabilize the Wi-Fi at the other end of the apartment. Fortunately, I had already pushed for converting a room into a more dedicated office space before the pandemic. Not everyone has that luxury, and I’m definitely privileged, especially when friends around me were losing income and had very different worries.
But, as with favorite dishes, if you eat them every day, you eventually get tired of them. Don’t get me wrong—I’m still a big fan of working from home. But every time I did go to the office and could meet colleagues, I came back home in a good mood. And I’m not necessarily someone who needs people around all the time. Quite the opposite. But it’s the balance that matters. The days spent working from home start to feel monotonous over time. Even though I go outside during the day, usually once at lunch and then after work, just to give the day some structure. Some colleagues struggle with separating work from personal life. And while many people think it’s cute when children burst into a video conference, it’s often embarrassing for the parent, and how are kids supposed to understand that “Dad is home but not available”?
And then there’s something else that Ronnie Grob describes well. Companies have realized that their employees can be productive even when not physically present in the office. Office space and business trips could be permanently reduced. But if remote work works so well, why not go even more remote in the future? Do we really need expensive experts on-site, or can a much more affordable expert from another continent do just as well? This is already the business model for some consulting firms—expensive consultants on-site, cheap experts elsewhere—and not only large companies have experience with offshoring or nearshoring. It’s likely this trend will continue to grow.
When the pandemic is over (hopefully soon), we will try to return to the world we had before. But that won’t be possible, at least not beneath the surface. Restaurants, unless they’ve already closed down, will reopen, and concerts will take place, but that’s just one side of the coin. Because thought processes have been set in motion that can’t be easily reversed. We’ve also learned how vulnerable our system is. This won’t be easily compensated by simply dining out more after the pandemic.
Meanwhile, I hope that the monotony of my home office will soon end and that I can once again spend well-planned workdays in the office. My fundamental hope, however, is that we will use the newfound freedom in a more meaningful way than before.
On one of the first pages of the book Essentialism, McKeown quotes Dieter Rams, “Less but better.” It’s hard to find a better definition of Essentialism. I am reading this book in an armchair next to the 606 shelving system designed by Rams in 1960, and when I look up from the book, I see a poster of the film Rams, which I had co-financed a few years ago through Kickstarter. I can report firsthand that it’s not enough to surround yourself with objects by Dieter Rams if you want to dedicate yourself to Essentialism. 🙂
The Essentialism defined by McKeown is based on the following core principles:
If you don’t set priorities in your life, someone else will do it for you. Therefore, we must learn to say “No” so we can truly make a contribution. While we don’t always have control over our options, we do have control over choosing between them. It’s about not just recognizing that you have a choice, but also celebrating the possibility of choosing. If it’s not a clear “Yes,” then it’s a clear “No.” Instead of asking how to do everything at once, the question should be asked: which problem do you want to have? Some people require more “maintenance” than others, but they steal your time and turn their problems into yours.
The question an Essentialist should constantly ask themselves is: “Am I investing myself in the right activities?” It’s not about getting things done (as in GTD), but about getting the right things done. A lot is less important than it initially appears. The most important and difficult things should be done first.
We are not designed to have so many choices and make so many decisions for ourselves. This ties into Barry Schwartz’s observations in his book The Paradox of Choice.
We should reflect on what we truly want, best by asking three questions:
What deeply inspires me?
What am I particularly talented at?
What fulfills an important need in the world?
McKeown suggests an iterative process: Explore, Eliminate, Execute. For Execution, it’s important to withdraw to focus. “The main thing is to keep the main thing the main thing.” The Latin origin of the word “decision” comes from “cis” or “cid,” meaning to cut or even kill. Stephen King said, writing is human, cutting is divine.
The most important asset we possess is ourselves—our mind, our body. We must invest in them to get the best out of ourselves. What is the obstacle preventing us from achieving what we really want?
The Greeks had two words for time: Chronos, the time we measure, and Kairos, the time we feel when we live in the present. The Essentialist lives time in Kairos. Multitasking is not the problem; the belief that we can multitask is. The most important question: “What is truly important in this moment?” Occasionally, when overwhelmed with many competing tasks, you must pause and see what is really important.
Overall, the points are not new; they are more of a re-compilation of what already exists. What’s nice is that McKeown brings in various historical examples to illustrate his points. At times, the book repeats itself. Still, a recommended read.
The MBA world has intrigued me for a long time. Early in my career, I bought a book with MBA knowledge because I always felt that something was missing for me as someone with a more technical background. Not that I haven’t learned anything over the years, but I always wondered what I might be missing, something I might not even be aware of—”Unknown Knowns.” The book I bought back then was The 10-Day MBA, which I still recommend to everyone because not everything covered in it is taught in the PowerMBA. The Real-Life MBA, which is even available in German, is also worth recommending. And while we’re talking about books, The Visual MBA should not be missed.
In recent years, I’ve been bombarded with more and more ads for MBAs and alternative programs, especially for the altMBA and the PowerMBA. The altMBA seemed too expensive for what it offers, while the PowerMBA, with its introductory price of $750, was a fraction of the cost of other programs. But can something like this really be good? An unaccredited MBA? I had my doubts, as some of the topics covered were not new to me—in fact, they were quite familiar. And for any content related to “Growth Hacking” or similar topics, where long-known approaches are just rebranded under a cool new name, I find my time and money too valuable for that.
So, what about the PowerMBA? First of all: I’m not finished yet; this is an interim report. I’m writing this report because I searched for experiences from others when making my decision, but the few reviews I found online were in Spanish. So, signing up for the PowerMBA was a bit of a gamble 🙂 Perhaps my experiences will help others in making their decision.
Right after registration, you receive a certificate, even though you haven’t done anything yet. There is no application process or regulation about who can join the program. My program didn’t start immediately; a few months passed between my decision and the start. This might be different today, as I’m part of the 1st international cohort. After signing up, you’re bombarded with communities, webinars, etc., all across different apps, websites, and channels. The abundance of content is, of course, great, but having a community on one website, an app, a reading club on yet another portal—well, you get the idea. Additionally, there are Telegram chats and Zoom meetings for local groups, led by “Ambassadors,” which, of course, is a result of Corona, as in-person meetings aren’t possible right now. This means that part of the benefit of an MBA program, the offline networking, is lost.
The PowerMBA is divided into 8 modules, with the 1st module not included in the screenshot here:
The “Go to next class” button usually doesn’t work for me, even if I still have one module left. The application runs on TypeForm, so it’s not a proprietary development.
Every weekday, you get access to a video or a clickable sequence of mini-content lasting about 15 minutes, which constitutes one learning unit. This is the concept of microlearning. The unit is usually unlocked around 7 a.m., which is rather suboptimal for 5AM Club followers like me. I’ve solved this by trying to save 1-2 videos to have a bit of a buffer. In the picture below, you can see the units I’ve completed, units that have been unlocked but not completed, and units that have not yet been unlocked:
Sometimes, instead of the video, there are error messages, so it’s good to have more than one unit “on hold” if, like me, you want to do it in the morning. Honestly, I also find it a bit disappointing that more content isn’t unlocked yet, like an entire topic, because sometimes the topics are really interesting, and you just want to learn more, especially when you’re in the flow. However, this has been blocked, as the support replied to my question about unlocking more:
This I am afraid we cannot do, sorry! Our one class per day system allows all our students to progress at the same time, helping them get fully involved with the program and the other services available to them, such as the forum where they can discuss ideas or questions they may have regarding that class, with their other classmates.
This is, of course, nonsense, because I can already tell that some students are falling behind. And just because I am further along in the material doesn’t mean I can’t exchange ideas with others about previous topics. In my opinion, the quality of the exchange also depends heavily on the Ambassador and what they know about the topics to be discussed. What’s missing are case studies that you have to work on either alone or with a team.
The individual units vary in quality; some are really excellent, many are good, and a few are not so great. You can give feedback for each unit. Overall, I’m very satisfied with what I’m learning; much of it is inspiring, and I’ve already been able to successfully apply some of it at work. So, the PowerMBA has been worthwhile for me. I was already familiar with content like Lean Startup, but it’s of course cool to experience Eric Ries in the videos. Many of the first videos are hosted by PowerMBA co-founder Borja Adanero, and I can almost no longer hear “You must understand…” :), but you do have to admire the passion he brings to the topics, which is something I sometimes wish I had seen more of from professors during my studies.
In addition to the units, you get some written material, which is okay—a rough summary of the topics. Sometimes I wish for a deeper dive, but that’s not really part of the price.
The questions in the tests are sometimes just bad or at least not clear enough. This could be due to translation from Spanish, but questions like “Who wrote The Lean Startup?” are just silly. Some tests seem to have been hastily put together. So far, I’ve passed all the tests without much effort, though you do have to stay focused during the individual units, or it won’t work.
Overall, despite all the criticism, I don’t regret my decision. I’ve been able to take away some important insights. The PowerMBA is also suitable for entrepreneurs and intrapreneurs who want to start a startup inside or outside a company. Will the PowerMBA make me more attractive to employers? I don’t know. I did it because I wanted to learn more. And maybe I’ll even do a proper MBA afterward. But so far, I would definitely recommend the PowerMBA as a basic education. I will update this text when I’m finished with the program.
Update 29.11.2022: One of the thermostats is defective. It no longer closes properly, so heating is done even when the thermostat is actually switched off. 79 euros. At the bottom of saving money, there is also an addition. Perhaps tado will now pay for itself more quickly thanks to the unfortunately sharp rise in gas prices, but the defective devices do not really help.
Update 18.1.2022: After a repair of the thermal bath, the heating could no longer be controlled with tado. Although the tado app said that everything was running smoothly, the requirements did not reach the spa.
The emergency service of our plumber could not find the fault, and so the weekend was mainly characterized by looking at what the problem could be. In the end, it was a wire that had come loose from the Smart Thermostat. Although the colleague said that this could not possibly come from the maintenance, but that the cable simply detaches from the thermostat on the wall, well. But now a question arises: How can tado say that everything is fine if the connection is not properly established?
Update 8.9.2021: After almost 4 years, the Internet Bridge is in the bucket. Simply dead. Contacted support, a day later the answer came that I should please make a video of the problem. No sooner said than done, then we went to 2nd level support. And since it is older than 2 years, well, bad luck, warranty over, it costs 99€ new. As a result, the investment in the tado story will pay for itself even later, if at all. The claim of tado that you save money, I can deny that for myself. Even after 4 years, I won’t have recouped the original investment, and if something breaks again… But I have to praise the very friendly technicians with whom I wrote.
First of all: I wish I could join the storms of enthusiasm for tado, after all, I chose tado because I really believe that the system can solve my heating problem. So far, however, my experiences with tado have been mediocre to ok, and this is due to the system itself and also to the hotline and the suboptimal help texts. I hope that this report can help to prevent one’s own bad experiences with tado or to think carefully about what one is actually doing. I will update this article continuously. The system was purchased at the end of November 2017.
Content
The problem: wood-burning stove versus heating control
A short affair with Max!
The Crowd’s Experiences with tado
First unpleasant experiences with tado: The sales hotline
Experiences with tado: The installation
Can you really save money with tado?
tado batteries empty after only 4 months
tado Smart thermostat is crazy. And the rest, unfortunately, too.
Conclusion: Experiences with tado
The problem: wood-burning stove versus heating control system
Let’s first come to my heating problem. First and foremost, I’m not interested in saving on heating costs, although that would of course be a great side effect, but about the fact that the old heating control system had a fundamental error in thinking. Everything was newly installed during a complete renovation in 2013 in a pre-Wilhelminian old building from 1855: gas boiler, pipes, heaters, thermostat, everything new. The mistake from the beginning was that the plumber didn’t really listen to our questions, especially whether it makes sense to put a thermostat for the overall control of the heating in the living room when there is a stove 3 meters away. My beginner’s logic: When the fireplace is on, the thermostat thinks it’s super warm and turns off the boiler. Living room warm, rest of the apartment cold. Well, you’re usually in the living room anyway, it doesn’t matter. And in the bedroom you should sleep cold anyway. During a renovation, you have 1,000 problems, and you trust every craftsman who even appears on the construction site. That was a mistake.
4 years later. Offspring. Born a little skinny. The midwife says that the old rule of 18 degrees room temperature does not apply here, the children lack the warming bacon. So the heating is on. Phew. There was something. And lo and behold, even if the oven is not on, I can’t get the temperature the way I need it. Because the living room faces south, the children’s room faces north. And even if it is said that it always rains in Hamburch, no, the sun shines here too, and then I don’t need to turn up the heating, it’s also so warm in the living room. The trick now would be that I simply turn down the heating in the living room, turn up the thermostat so that the boiler is on and supplies the children’s room. But it doesn’t really sound like control, more like a waste of energy, especially since the heating doesn’t even have to be switched on here. Update: One commenter found out that the iSense thermostat can also control the heating independently of the thermostat. So my investment in tado would not have been necessary at all. However, the heating control would still be inaccurate.
A brief affair with Max!
Next idea: I’ll try a smart thermostat, in this case from Max!. The nice salesman from conrad recommends this system to me because it is cheap. Preferably a wall thermometer plus the two smart heating thermostats, and the arbor is ready. The wall thermostat is intended to prevent the temperature sensors on the heater from going out from 21 degrees, which no longer exist in the middle of the room. At first, I believed, no, hoped that this was the solution. But it wasn’t. The system was unpredictable and sometimes heated up to 24 degrees, although it was regulated down to 19 degrees. And it didn’t solve my problem. Because if you wanted to turn on the stove in the living room, well. Then the thermal baths were just out. I couldn’t put it so high that it would have heated the children’s room. Quickly sold on eBay, by the way, the buyer reported after a year that a thermostat was defective; luckily I still had the receipt.
The Crowd’s Experiences with tado
In the days that followed, I learned more about heating systems than I ever wanted to. Our boiler is a Remeha Tzerra 28c that can communicate via the OpenTherm protocol. Until I looked closely, I had assumed that our thermostat in the living room communicated with the boiler by radio, but the iSense thermostat was actually connected to the boiler in the kitchen with a cable from the living room. But it’s also a pity, otherwise you could have just hung the thermostat somewhere else where it wouldn’t have been exposed to the heat of the oven. A wireless version would have cost at least 300 euros. But that would still have been inaccurate.
My next step was to call on Facebook to see who had experience with smart heating. The response was impressive. tado was the main recommendation, followed by elgato (falls flat because not everyone in the household owns an Apple device), Max! (there were also nasty contras), Coqon, Loxone (because you can solve several smart home stories at once instead of having an app for everything), innogy, hydraulic balancing and objections that it was complete nonsense to want to stuff your home with something like that at all. Unfortunately, some hadn’t bothered to read the thread completely at all and came up with platitudes. But good. All in all, a great yield. Since some friends had had good experiences with tado, I took a closer look at this system.
First unpleasant experiences with tado: The sales hotline
My research showed that tado could actually be the solution to my problem, because apparently a heating thermostat directly at the boiler can demand more power here. In the MediaMarkt I saw the complete set late Saturday afternoon, and since it was not yet 6 p.m., I thought that I could try out the offer of the great hotline. Can the tado Smart Thermostat handle the Remeha Tzerra 28c? On the net only contradictory information. On the German side, Remeha was not listed at all, but on the Dutch side, it was. What a pity. No one answered. Not even an automatic message. So I left the set in the store.
On Monday, I called tado first thing in the morning. And I won’t forget this call in a hurry. Before I could even finish my first sentence, I was interrupted. “Do you have a thermostat or…” and so on. No chance to describe my problem. Even when I pointed out to the gentleman that I would like to finish talking first, I was put in my place very rudely. At some point I was able to describe my problem, and now the brash telemarketer had to admit that it might have been better to let me talk first. No, he couldn’t guarantee that it would work with my Remeha-Therme. OpenTherm would also work with others, and in 95% of all cases blablabla. Yes. It is also on the website. I could have saved myself the call and bought it right away at MediaMarkt. I don’t like to buy there, because the much-quoted advice focuses on the devices that are currently in the warehouse by the pallet, but I don’t begrudge tado the extra margin and perhaps also the sales bonus in this case.
4 days later, the package was sent, together with an e-mail including an invoice with a payment deadline on the same day. Also nice. Wouldn’t be there yet, but please pay immediately. Calling the hotline is futile. But a big thank you to the social team of tado, who replied on twitter, because they solved the problem at short notice and competently. Of course, I have a 14-day payment deadline. I ignore the fact that the product arrived here only 4 days later. But interacting with the social team was my only good experience with tado until then. Even with later inquiries, the tado social media team always proved to be fast, honest and solution-oriented. Thanks again at this point!
Experiences with tado: The installation
The installation is very simple, and I agree with it to a large extent. Apple-like. So the setup also knew my constellation of iSense and Remeha Tzerra 28c. Why didn’t the arrogant guy from the hotline know that? It’s just a shame that this super simple installation leads you to assume that every step is really that easy. If everything seems to be made for stupid people, then you can’t believe it when it’s not like that. And then sometimes things get stuck.
For example, you should simply pull the blue paper strip out of the battery compartment when you turn the thermostat over. For me, it all looked very different. I didn’t see a blue stripe. Who would have thought that I would have to open the case first? I don’t think it was there anywhere. But at some point even I came up with it. But it doesn’t say anywhere how to open the case. Of course, you don’t want to destroy such an expensive new device right away.
Some points are also formulated so naturally that, for example, you actually get the idea to look in the box where the phase tester is. Because when people talk about “the phase tester”, then I assume that it is included, otherwise it would be called “a phase tester”. But it is not or it was missing from me (apparently it was only included in version 2?). You are also not informed anywhere before installation that you need it. It’s a pity, actually. In the middle of the installation you realize that you can cancel, because apparently the installation is otherwise life-threatening (I then solved this differently, because the iSense can only live without a battery if it gets power from the boiler, and with the fuse disconnected, the boiler could not pass on anything. But this is not a tip, please do not imitate it!). Or you thought, if you mention on the package that a phase tester is needed, then some people don’t buy the product because they don’t even know what a phase tester is. It’s better to only realize during the installation that you need one, because then you have already bought and are so far along with the installation that you will not send the device back. At 10 p.m., when I started the installation, I definitely wouldn’t have been able to get a phase tester. Apart from that, the “lying pen”, as it is also called, is not a sufficient tool. But that’s another topic.
After everything was reasonably attached (at 10:30 p.m. I was unfortunately still missing something in the wall to which I could have attached the Smart Thermostat, but gaffer tape is your friend), the positive surprise at first was that I had apparently actually managed not to have destroyed anything. The thermostat could actually control the boiler. Only the hot water was switched off. And there is another point of criticism: The hot water control is not really explained. And this drags on through all the help text, everything is just superficially treated. The help function is no help, because the content there is so general that you might as well do without it. During the installation, a yellow tab with a phone icon on the right side of the window can be seen all the time, but if you click on it, you won’t find any help texts that match the current state of the installation. Hardly any text has sufficient depth. This also runs through other areas of the tado world, see below.
Likewise, I don’t understand why I can’t say that the thermostat is now in the living room, where there are also two smart radiator thermostats? Wouldn’t it be great if they synchronized with each other? But now it just says “heating” and “living room”, and they show different temperatures (which is no wonder, because from the heaters at the window to the thermostat on the wall it is again three meters, and there is a loss of temperature). A call to tado, this time to a very helpful employee, brings the solution: He can summarize it, but it doesn’t really matter. The fact that the heating is set to 20°, the children’s room to 21° is also no problem, the heating thermostat is still allowed to request a higher temperature from the heating. Very nice. The hot water was not really explained. And while waiting in the hotline queue, I found the cover plate, which cannot be found in the shop (it can be found under this link here; the know-it-all salesman on my first phone call knew everything better, why hadn’t he recommended this plate right away?). By the way, in the video below you can see how it looks good.
Another point of criticism that I have made in my experiences with tado: The snapping of the radiator thermostats during installation only works suboptimally, with some thermostats I needed several attempts.
tado’s location-dependent control
In addition to the solution that tado offers us for our individual heating problem, I also found the location-dependent control system to be very ingenious from the very beginning. Instead of a strict schedule, the heating would now work when someone is really at home. Sounds good at first, doesn’t it?
The mobile phone or the tado app itself had problems locating me correctly from time to time, because even when I parked in a side street I was still outside the rings. Google Maps showed my correct location, in the settings of the tado app, the side street definitely belonged to the home zone. Only shortly before the front door did the background change from green to yellow. If I had taken the S-Bahn (in Hamburg the S-Bahn runs partly underground and the U-Bahn partly above ground), then I would have understood that. But I drove a DriveNow and was very curious to see when the system would switch. But as a rule, this feature works quite well.
Important: Some Android derivatives seem to activate a power saving mode that prohibits apps from querying the location in background mode. And so it can happen that you are not at home, but the tado app has not noticed it and the heating continues to work happily. So it’s worth taking a look at the app from time to time.
Can you really save money with tado?
I strongly doubt that the >30% savings in heating costs promised in the advertising at the time are really possible. However, the energy-saving guarantee did not refer to the 30%, but simply in case you “didn’t save enough”. I don’t see this offer anymore today. After a few weeks, I could say that the purchase would not pay for itself so quickly. We spend less than 750€ a year on gas, even if tado would save a third of that, then it would take more than 2 years to have the Smart Thermostat and the now 10 Smart Heater Thermostats out again. And this does not include the fact that some of the gas is used for hot water, and I won’t mess with that in the settings. I don’t want to be in the shower at 4 in the morning because I have an early plane, and then have to run to my cell phone again to turn on the hot water. Especially not as long as you are kept awake at night by two little new earthlings and then maybe need warm water to wash your hands after changing diapers (who would have thought that little boys would be so far… but let’s leave that). So I spent around 1,000€ on the smarthoming of our heating system, so I would need about 4 years until I am in the black with tado. I definitely haven’t achieved that after 4 years.
It is also interesting that the app already certified a saving of 11% for the first month of installation, November 2017. I had installed the Smart Thermostat and 4 radiator thermostats for two rooms on 27.11., so there were only 4 days and only part of the rooms in which the tado system was installed, and still you want to have saved 11%? I would be extremely surprised.
Let’s take a look at a monthly report for an entire month. In December 2017, I am said to have saved 22.8% of energy. That would be great, of course. Of course, tado does not know what energy I consumed in the previous month or in December 2016. It is simply estimated that I have saved so much energy compared to “consumption with a temperature- and time-controlled standard control with night reduction according to DIN V 18599-10”. It’s not as if there wasn’t a timetable before. The heating was already turned down during the day anyway, as well as at night. Does this comply with the DIN standard? I don’t know. But I suspect that the calculations here are very optimistic. After all, how much further can tado regulate down so that savings are actually made? To be honest, it’s even unlikely that I would have saved money here, but that’s not because of tado. Due to the offspring, we are more at home and have even heated a room more. In fact, because I can control the heating more precisely, I’m even more willing to turn the heating up when I’m cold. After all, I don’t have to get up for it anymore
In the meantime, however, you can also enter data, in our case the values from the gas meter. If you don’t, the estimates of the “Energy IQ” function look like this:
„
If you then enter data, the predictions are not immediately recalculated, apparently this takes place in the cloud. Here it took a day, and there you can see how far tado is from real consumption:
Anscheinend haben wir schon einiges gespart, aber dennoch nicht so viel wie tado vermutet hatte. Dennoch lohnt es sich, den Verbrauch manuell einzutragen.
Was auf jeden Fall nicht zuverlässig funktioniert, ist die automatische Erkennung, dass ein Fenster geöffnet wurde, so dass die Heizung ausgeschaltet wird. Manchmal funzt es, manchmal nicht, manchmal funktioniert es zuerst und dann schaltet sich die Heizung doch wieder ein. Und dann versucht sie natürlich gegen die Kälte anzuheizen, was natürlich komplette Geldverschwendung ist, im wahrsten Sinne Geld zum Fenster herauswerfen. Das ist natürlich schade, dass das nicht funktioniert.
What I also don’t quite understand is how tado and the heating curve of the thermal baths work together. The heating curve is a very special topic that you can talk about for hours with a heating technician. As far as I understand, the heating curve of a boiler is determined by an external sensor, so that the boiler achieves a flow temperature depending on it. So the boiler always runs a little to reach this flow temperature. At tado, it seems that the boiler is only started when heat is requested. But it’s not quite that simple. You can search in vain for the term on the tado page, and although there are interesting discussions about the heating curve, they are not shown in the search.
tado batteries empty after only 4 months
Yes, you read that right. After 4 months, I received a push notification as well as an e-mail from tado that the battery was empty in two thermostats. The remaining batteries ran out shortly afterwards. Quote from the email:
This is significantly earlier than the expected battery life. We are aware of the problem and are working on the solution. Your devices are updated to extend battery life. Please excuse the inconvenience.
Of course, this is extremely unpleasant. The question is, when will this be solved? Do I even notice when the thermostats are updated? By the way, it takes more than just a few minutes for the app to note that the battery has been changed; in one case, it took almost 30 minutes. In between, you get to know whether you have actually replaced the batteries with the right thermostat.
By the way, a dead battery can also be the reason why a room supposedly has no connection. The two rooms in the screenshot on the left both have 2 Smart Thermostats each, and one of them has a connection, the other doesn’t, apparently because the battery is dead. The app is not really helpful here at first, because the whole room is now no longer controllable. Premium is really something else, I’d say.
And after a year, the Smart Thermostat started to spin:
Sometimes something flashed only briefly when I pressed the button. The problem? Again a weak battery! These had just been replaced (and not with cheap batteries), but without warning the device no longer reacted properly. The flashing of the thermostats, which can be triggered via app, does not work at all in some rooms. Again a battery that is too weak!
Now, disposable batteries are not necessarily the best solution, rechargeable batteries are better from an environmental point of view. Not at tado. Because if you put batteries (HR6 instead of the recommended LR6) in it, then the display that the batteries are empty does not go away at all. This is because batteries simply have less spanning and tado apparently does not feel like adapting the software here. tado simply sits out the topic, as this Twitter thread shows.
Is it really that smart with tado control via the cloud?
A big point of criticism on my part: Why does everything have to be in the cloud? All settings are transferred to tado, and if your own Internet access fails, then intelligent heating is over. Yes, you can still adjust manually. Oh no, it doesn’t work, because if you have activated the parental control, then nothing works anymore. Bad luck. That doesn’t happen? Vodafone Kabel has failed here twice for several days in the last two months. In the middle of Hamburg.
And it doesn’t even have to be your own Internet access, because tado itself can also have problems with the server or the data center (yes, there are redudancies, but I know from my own experience that something like this always sounds good and can go wrong in an emergency). On the photo on the left you can see how it looks in the app when no connection is possible. Supposedly, in this case it was due to my internet connection, the cloud LED flashed on the Internet Bridge (the bridge tries to reach the tado servers). In fact, I was able to access the tado support pages via the same Internet connection, so it was probably less due to my Internet connection. According to the status page, the tado servers were running normally. Supposedly, the devices can then still be controlled manually in the event of an Internet failure. But the first week of my experience with tado was definitely rather mixed, because tado doesn’t seem to be honest about the availability of their servers.
Update 1673.2020: tado was offline for several hours on 1563.2020. Of course, there were more than 294 users who had problems, these are just the ones who had reported it. However, tado was transparent and admitted the problems on Twitter.
Will tado still exist in two years? I don’t know, I hope so, because otherwise I just spent a lot of money on unusable electronic waste. Synchronization is dependent on tado servers. My hope would then be that one of the established energy companies recognizes the opportunity and buys the innovation.
The main question for me is how long tado will continue to offer its cloud for free; at some point, it will probably be turned into a subscription service as well. Otherwise, I don’t understand the business model: How can you run a free sync server if you only have one-time income from the sale of the hardware? That makes no sense at all. I’m even afraid that tado is planning to add a subscription at some point, because if you have made the investment in the expensive thermostats for the first time, then €9.90 a month is not so bad anymore. Or?For this reason, I don’t recommend tado! Update February 2019: That’s exactly what happened. It costs only €2.99 a month, but it was foreseeable that a free cloud couldn’t work.
Nepper, Schlepper, Bauernfänger, tado
In my opinion, tado users are lured to paid updates that don’t do them any good. For example, the paid upgrade of the tado app to version V3+ is recommended for just under 20€, but if you look very closely, this update doesn’t really help you in some cases. The support (the social media support, which I’m really excited about) has kindly admitted that. Of course, tado was also able to automatically detect when you leave the house and also when a window is open (well), only that such settings are now supposedly made automatically.
The indoor air comfort skill, on the other hand, sounds quite useful, but it doesn’t really bring you more information. I did the update anyway (just for this blog), but it was 20€, which I could have saved well. With IFTTT you can do more, because you even get warnings here.
Conclusion: Experiences with tado
The App
The app feels good. The knowledge that I can now really control the temperatures in every room is what I expect from today’s networked world, and tado has implemented this well. The V3+ version, on the other hand, I perceive as a bit of a money-making ploy.
Is it worth it?
At a price of 70-80€ per radiator thermostat, you think more carefully about whether you really equip all 12 radiators in the apartment with it. Then I’m at a price of over €1,000 in total, and then tado needs more than 4 years to recoup the money, as written above. By then, there will probably be better systems again. tado itself has already released version V3+. And even though all components look high-quality (my wife definitely thinks they are fancier than Max’s components!), they don’t necessarily feel more valuable. It feels more like cheap plastic.
Features
Mein Heizproblem wurde gelöst. Auch die ortsabhängige Steuerung funktioniert. Dass die Fenster-offen-Erkennung nicht zuverlässig ist, ist natürlich extrem schade.
Der Support
Dear tado management: Please inform your sales colleagues on the phone that you should not run over the mouth of customers if they have not even been able to pronounce half of the first sentence. This was hard to beat in terms of unfriendliness. And as I said: the help pages are really suboptimal. If tado didn’t just write marketing blah blah in the help part of the site, then they could possibly also relieve the support team. But so it’s no wonder that you have to call. The fact that the installation at a Remeha thermal spa works could have been written on the page. It would have saved me a pretty stupid phone call and tado a blog article that criticizes the friendliness of the tado employees. The help and sales texts are inaccurate, not in-depth enough and sometimes misleading.
Final Words
So my experiences with tado are generally rather mixed. My biggest criticisms are the dependence on the cloud, the poor communication (the social media team is an exception), the lack of reliability in recognizing an open window, the short battery run, and the sometimes unfriendly treatment on the phone. However, I don’t see any alternatives when I look at my experiences with Max! . But I wouldn’t buy tado again.
By the way, the phone number of the support hotline is 089 412 09569
Comments (since February 2020 the comment function has been removed from my blog):
I’m staying says
October 2018 at 19:46 A very helpful experience report, thank you very much!
Marco says
November 2018 at 04:44 Unfortunately, I should have read earlier….
Michael says
December 2018 at 15:45 Oh man, thank you so much for your article. I also wanted to press the order button – but now?? Sorry that you rode ahead as a beta tester. In any case, I have the feeling that the great smart home world is only beautiful in the commercials. The real -smart- life seems to me to be more of an obstacle course. X standards (WLAN, Buetooth, Dect). Nope, I’ll let some more time go by….. As long as I still have two healthy hands, I can still operate the heating controller by hand.
Claus says
December 2018 at 13:38 Hello Tom, I have similar problems, with my heating situation and the tado sales, with me by mail. They don’t answer my questions, and always only answer the question of whether you have a room thermostat. In my particular case, this is built into the thermal baths themselves – a special feature of Vaillant thermal baths with an exterior door guide. Apparently an overwhelm. After your great report, I decided against it shortly before buying. Thank you!!!!!!!! Thank you!!!!!!!! Thank you!!!!!!!!! To you and your family, a nice warm Christmas and a happy new year.
Thomas says
January 2019 at 17:46 Thanks for the review. Unfortunately, I also read it too late. For me, the extension kit prevents me from setting a comfort calorific value of >18 degrees at the boiler. It’s a bit cold in winter… Unfortunately, the support is neither accommodating nor helpful…
Herbert says
January 2019 at 00:33 Thanks for the detailed information. I have also been using 5 radiators and a room thermostat for more than a year. My problem is also the battery life!! every 3 weeks I change brand batteries at the room thermostat !! Without this, the heating system is in place!! I’m thinking about whether I won’t convert the power supply!
Julio Caballero says
March 2019 at 12:13 Thanks for this info. Too late for me unfortunately I recognized the problem even with the window open, I think I’ll send the whole thing back again. You can forget about support.
Herbert says
June 2019 at 06:50 Battery life
After several mails, I got a replacement thermostat free of charge – since then the system has been working again without any problems.
When I asked about the error, I didn’t get any information.
Basically, I am satisfied with the way the Tado system works! But the support is in need of improvement!
Michael says
September 2019 at 10:06 Times without any additional devices The iSense has built in a function especially for this case: “4.2.3. Function External heat If the temperature in the room where the controller is positioned reaches the desired value, the central heating switches off. This can happen if there is an open fireplace. or many people are present. In such a situation, the other rooms in the house are also no longer heated. You can turn on the external heat function to ensure that other rooms continue to be heated. This is done via the Program button. The room temperature sensor integrated in the controller is switched off. The water temperature in the central heating system at that time is then maintained. If it gets too cold or too warm in the other rooms, you can raise or lower the room temperature there by pressing the C button on the controller. This causes the water temperature in the heating system to increase or decrease.In order to further regulate the room temperature in the other rooms individually, you can equip the radiators with thermostatic valves.”
Tom Alby says
September 2019 at 20:25 Wow. All I can say is: RTFM, and thoroughly. I had read it, but apparently not thoroughly enough. I would have saved a lot of money and trouble. The only advantage of tado is that the temperature is at least kept exactly. And that when you’re not at home, you don’t have to think about anything. Thanks for the comment!
Dustin says
September 2019 at 13:13 I can only confirm your experiences in a similar way! The support doesn’t deserve the name. In my case, the bridge loses the connection to the cloud every day, which in turn means that the radiators can no longer be controlled via app, do not recognize an open window and do not notice when they should control up and down. The problem has existed since April 2019, I have now exchanged no less than 77 e-mails with Tado support, made several phone calls…. I document everything now because it seems so unbelievable…. Now, in mid-September, I need the system again and inevitably have to replace the thermostats soon, because I can’t heat properly like this. Instead of saving money, it tends to become more expensive. tado just hasn’t answered at all for 3 weeks now…. All my mails are disregarded. Previously, I was confirmed several times in writing that the problem was not related to my network and that similar errors were currently being investigated, so more time was needed…. as I said, since April it has been going like this…..tado…. please keep your hands off this system. It won’t be fun in the long run and the batteries in the thermostats have to be replaced every 6 months, you will be informed by mail (the mail text is the same every year….you apologize and want to extend the battery life by updating the system soon…)….but there doesn’t seem to be a solution for this either. The support pages on the Internet (please test the FAQ ́s before buying, you will notice it quickly yourself) could not be worse formulated…. You can’t get any help there
Guido Sommer says
October 2019 at 07:40 Hello Tom, I would have found your article in advance .-( I bought 18 thermostats – unfortunately our house built in 1930 is probably so well insulated that the bridge can serve a maximum of 2 floors! Do you have a tip which thermostats (which are controlled via WLAN) are good?
Thanks from Stuttgart Guido Sommer
Tom Alby says
October 2019 at 08:49 No, apart from the thermostats mentioned I have not tried anything.
Andreas Schorre says
October 2019 at 08:19 Hello, I have now two weeks the Tado system V3+, but only for central heating (5 thermostats + bridge) in an old apartment. For me, everything runs as it should, the “window open detection” works without problems, starts immediately and interrupts the heating process. Geofencing also detects my location (iPhone) exactly and starts heating, as it should be. I can’t understand the many points of criticism, at least for me, and hope it stays that way in the future! Of course, I can’t give an estimate of the battery life after two weeks, maybe the V3+ version of the software really has an extension of the battery life, it would be desirable. Although I will probably rely on rechargeable batteries, you can get them quite cheaply from brand manufacturers today and you only have the purchase costs once.
The “window open detection” and “geofencing” are only available in the premium version, otherwise you “only” receive a message and have to turn down the temperature alone, which should be enough for many users (who only hold the mobile phone in their hands anyway…). For my part, I got the annual subscription for 25 euros, because I find this automatic recognition very helpful and the price is also completely ok! (I work in IT and therefore probably see it with different eyes and experience) Unfortunately, many people with today’s stinginess-is-cool mentality don’t see it that way, seen in many chat comments…
I don’t want to praise Tado too early, but I also don’t want to declare every little thing to be a Tado problem. I noticed myself how I had to readjust several times in the old building (3.50 meters ceiling height) with the temperature correction in order to reach the really displayed temperature in the whole room….but it works! Once everything is well adjusted and you have exactly the result you wanted.
So if I don’t have any hardware failures or software problems now, then I’m actually very satisfied with Tado.
Tom Alby says
October 2019 at 09:15 Buying as early as I do has advantages and disadvantages. On the one hand, you still have to struggle with the teething troubles, on the other hand, there was no subscription model at that time, so I don’t pay anything per month for the premium feature you mentioned. I only paid for the new app. I thought that was fair. Tado probably did not dare to introduce the subscription to the first customers retrospectively.
Regarding the batteries: This is definitely better from an environmental point of view and will also be noticeable in the wallet in the medium term. However, even with the best batteries, I have not achieved the times that I achieve with a normal battery. But of course, environmental protection takes precedence over comfort.
Achim Sökefeld says
December 2019 at 22:00 I am an architect and after a year and a half of using Tado, I deeply regret it. I saved 50 € in a year for a 100 m² apartment, constantly changed the batteries and constantly had the feeling that my apartment was too cold. A thermostat broke because a little thing fell on it. After an iPhone change, the old iPhone cannot be deleted, the app crashes constantly, data is wrong, for example, I am said to have opened the window 316 times in November. Nonsense, simply unrealistic. I don’t replace the thermostats just for the sake of appearance, but I think I only use them for manual control like my thermostats before.
Simon says
December 2019 at 23:02 Good evening! I have installed 13 Tado thermostats in my physiotherapy practice for a few days now. Of course, I don’t use the away function, because otherwise my employees plus patients would freeze to death while I’m on home visits. Despite all the initial skepticism, I have to say that it works quite well and I am quite satisfied at the moment. 250 m2 are well covered without radio interruptions. Impresses me. That’s how it should be. The support of Tado, however, can indeed be completely forgotten. I wanted to have a few questions answered before investing in the thermostats. Unfortunately, this is only possible via email, FAQ’s or chat (according to the lady from the chat). Email just takes me time to deal with it for days. I don’t sit at the computer all day and type. The same applies to the chat function. At first, a bot responds and after a short time at least a real person. But still, I don’t have the time to chat back and forth like with a friend. I want to get the questions answered quickly for me in order to decide for or against this system and to be able to continue searching. This could be clarified in a much more time-saving phone call. Tado has slackened off in this respect, as there was probably still a telephone service until recently. What a pity. But I found another company that sells these thermostats and could be reached by phone and could help. So much for my experiences so far.
Marco says
December 2019 at 11:01 Lots of negatives. Have you thought about what it would be or is like if you had/have a “traditional” room thermostat? Similar problems? Then all this is not a Tado problem… I am happy with the ability to check and control the room temperature via mobile phone. I don’t need a home/away functionality in my single-family home with several people. (I was not paid or commissioned by Tado. But aren’t some of the negative comments above from the competition? Some “influencers”, perhaps?)
Tom Alby says
December 2019 at 12:22 Sorry, but your comment gives me a stomachache. Have you read my article at all? Then you wouldn’t write some things like that. And I don’t believe in the influencers. At least other users have given real names here and you haven’t.
For two years we have shared our apartment with guests from a variety of countries, and after over 100 guests, we are now retiring from AirBnB rental. We didn’t have 500 guests like Liz, but we were almost continuously “Superhost”, as the AirBnB landlords with the best ratings are called. Our experiences are not only interesting for prospective AirBnB landlords, but also for travelers who want to get on their landlords’ nerves as little as possible.
Most guests don’t read the description — and nothing else either
The most common question was when you can check in. It is very clear in our description on the AirBnB website, and the check-in times are also requested by AirBnB via form and can therefore always be found in the same section of AirBnB. Since we are both working, we were only able to offer check-in from 7 p.m. This was regularly a topic of discussion, as many guests wanted to check in earlier, had not read the text and then asked if they could at least put down their suitcases. No, because we are working and therefore not there, everything is in the description. No matter how explicitly I mentioned this in our description, it was not read.
Equally astonishing were the questions of where the apartment was or where you had to ring the bell. All this information can be found in the booking confirmation. Especially nice when the guests just ring the bell somewhere after midnight and wake up our neighbors with the little baby. In between, I went to sending the guests a description after booking, but this was not read either.
Questions as to whether you have to bring bed linen or towels were already clarified at AirBnB, at least here we were able to make guests happy. It’s just stupid if it says afterwards in the review that a TV was missing in the room… but it is also very clear in AirBnB that there is none. We’re not a damn hotel, but we had to swallow the worse rating for someone else not being able or willing to read.
Of standing peeing and one-night stands
After the first experiences, we had also noticed that we should at least set up a few “rules”. Unforgotten is the young man who wanted to bring a single guest to us and then had difficulties getting out of the apartment the next morning, i.e. somehow ended up in bed with the lady. It’s ok, it can happen, but somehow you would like to know who is staying in your own apartment.
We threw a doctor from Portugal out of his apartment because he refused to pee while sitting. It should be clear to everyone that you don’t put wet towels on upholstered furniture. At some point, the WLAN router reported that attempts had been made to access blocked sites without success (and no one wants pages blocked by the BPjM to be accessed from their own Internet connection, especially not in times of data retention). Over time, the experiences that we had put in writing and put on the chest of drawers in the room in a nice little manual with other tips for the area added up, together with the Wi-Fi password. The success rate was low (only the WIFI password was found). So we explained the rules at check-in every time. And even that has not always helped.
AirBnB landlords: work, a lot of work
After a few weeks we decided that we would no longer accept guests for just one night, 2 nights was now the minimum. It was just too much work and too much effort to coordinate it all. The bed linen had to be washed, the room and the bathrooms completely cleaned, which means washing, hanging, cleaning, etc. every day, and all this in the short time between coming home and guest check-in. For a while we had a domestic help who could take over between the checkout of one and the check-in of the other guests, but not always, and then you were faced with a problem. Although you can also automatically take a day off between two bookings, but especially if someone stays from Monday to Friday, then you don’t want to ruin the weekend “business” by only being able to rent again on Saturday. The weekend usually brings more money.
AirBnB now periodically points out that you could make more money if you allowed bookings for just one night. Unfortunately, you can’t turn off these notifications. Nor the hint that you would get more bookings if you released a certain weekend that we had booked for private guests, or that you should go down 5€ with the price to get even more bookings. AirBnB is an optimization machine, but not always to the advantage of the landlord. The dynamic pricing is nice, but in Hamburg it’s the case that there is a lull in winter and all the more busy in summer. It doesn’t make sense to rent out for less than €40 per night, the hourly wage is too low for that. Quite apart from that, there are also costs, electricity, water, and of course something breaks. And here we come to a big disadvantage: Most guests have a different relationship to the apartment than we do, here there is less consideration for white walls, wooden doors, toilet seats, etc. These damages are not insured, even if AirBnB communicates otherwise.
Instant bookings and declines
In addition to the logistical challenges, they are also busy arranging correspondence. Inquire. Preliminary questions. Sometimes there are several requests per hour. At some point we got away from instant booking, but even without this function you get enough requests. Of course, it’s nicer for the guests if they can simply book. But despite the requirement that a guest had to have a good rating to be able to book immediately, we just didn’t have a good feeling about the instant booking. After the experiences of the first few months, we took a closer look at who came to us, although that usually didn’t help much. But coordination was more difficult if, for example, someone wanted to book, but still needed information, and then in the meantime another booking request came for the same period that would have been less lucrative for us, but you can’t just refuse with AirBnB.
We have only rejected a few requests, no wonder, you always have to justify this in detail. When in doubt, we always assumed the positive. A little tip for all AirBnB travelers: A photo with feet on the table does not invite you to become the favorite of an AirBnB rental company. Writing only “Schlagermove” as a message in the booking request does not invite you to be accepted. A nicely written text is definitely helpful. A little more work for the guest, but with us a better feeling that you don’t get some asshole into the apartment.
Update: In July 2018 we offered another room for a weekend, which was immediately requested. Unfortunately, AirBnB no longer allows you to see travelers’ reviews unless you offer instant bookings. So you don’t know who you’re bringing in. This is blackmail, just so that AirBnB can push through the instant bookings.
_Nett also the new cancellation policy, which you can see in the picture on the left. For us, this new little trip to AirBnB meant that we will look around for alternatives. AirBnB will no longer be. _
Even more work: Life as a “hostel father”
Over time, you experience a lot with guests. As written, we had created a small manual on what you can experience in Hamburg, where there are nice cafes and restaurants, etc. In addition, we had provided city maps as well as everything you can forget on a trip, from earplugs to sunscreen to sleep masks. But much more exciting were the experiences for which you are not prepared: The bed cannot withstand certain movements :-), the visa for the connecting trip is invalid and everything is fully booked, “important” medication was forgotten at home, the power supply for the mobile phone explodes, the boyfriend does not come to visit as expected, you have just separated and have to look for your own place to stay, the stomach is spoiled, the keys were stolen, you were ripped off in the neighborhood, everything was really there… somehow we always found a solution, even if it was that someone slept on our sofa. We have seen ourselves as ambassadors of our city and our country, and we have tried to welcome everyone and be an example of good hospitality.
Unfortunately, this was sometimes exploited in such a way that the joy of doing good to others was endangered. For the very first guests, for example, we had pulled out a leg, we wanted to do everything right. They were AirBnB landlords themselves, but damaged something with us, were very demanding, did not stick to any agreement, and despite everything gave us only 4 points. That was not a good start. There was more than one guest, who made you think about whether you really want to continue.
Then there are guests who just came and went and hardly said a word. There is a training center around the corner from us, so we often had guests during the week who took part in a seminar there. Usually very nice flight attendants, but then also business people for whom there was probably no more hotel room and for whom our standard was too low.
Small tricks, big effect
During our own stay in an AirBnB, we found water and fruit in our room. Great idea, we copied it right away. Especially if you have a longer journey behind you, this is a great welcome. It costs little, but brings a lot, even if some guests don’t touch any of it (why not?). Then we started to put a small piece of organic chocolate on the pillow of the guests. Low investment, but also a gesture that was well received by most guests. For children, we have a Hamburg book for children to borrow. We keep things forgotten by guests such as shampoo etc for guests who have forgotten theirs. But we have also brought a shower gel to the Dockville.
Of course, we also want to earn money with the rental. A hotelier guest advised us to release the particularly attractive times (harbor birthday, New Year’s Eve, etc.) on AirBnB just before the deadline. That worked to some extent. Does it feel strange that we then earn 50% more per night through AirBnB’s dynamic pricing? Yes, something. But, honestly, even with 75€ per night for 2 people, our accommodation is not really expensive, especially with the location and the standard. On the other hand, there is the single mother, to whom we made a special offer so that she could afford to stay with us.
The other side: Incredibly great memories
Almost all bad experiences were torn out by really great guests, we are still in contact with some of them today, and above all we still miss our first long-term guests. It was a great time with them, like a good shared apartment where you got to know each other better. With some guests you went to the neighborhood, if I had time, there was also a guided tour of Altona or St. Pauli. Most of the guests were super grateful for it and had experienced something special. That was a great reward for us, and I wouldn’t want to miss these experiences. That’s exactly why I would do it again. But for now, let’s enjoy having our apartment to ourselves. And if we start renting again, it will no longer be with AirBnB.
Comments (since February 2020 the comment function has been removed from my blog):
Thomas says
April 2018 at 08:01 I can only agree with the summary after two years of Airbnb hosting!!
Linda+Charly says
May 2018 at 10:13 We agree unreservedly! We still have 2 confirmed bookings to survive in June and then we are very happy to have our house to ourselves again. What really annoys us is how obtrusive Airbnb can be – with really stupid hints.
Grote says
June 2018 at 12:54 I can totally agree. in addition, I am still on the platforms Booking.com and Expedia, where it works better and is professional.
I would like to make a negative comment about Air BnB TODAY, I can submit documents as proof.
NO more AirBnB!!
AirBnB does not keep its liability guarantee promise and the supposedly secure verification of guests does not work.
I’m publishing this article because AirBnB has been approved by a guest who has completed a positive verification with their photo and identity documents of another person, although nothing fits here. Due to this verification, which is marked as secure, not only did I suffer great damage, but other landlords were also ripped off.
AirBnB advertises that it covers all damages with a kind of guarantee for landlords. To do this, I first reported the damage to AirBnB with a price estimate. After 3 weeks and a variety of correspondence, calls and attrition tactics by AirBnB, I was then reimbursed a small part of my estimated damage, but the damage actually submitted via receipts was rejected with the comment “we now distance ourselves from the conversation…”, according to the motto: Get along with what you have!
The fatal thing is that the fraudulent account is still active on the AirBnB platform despite repeated warnings to AirBnB, and complaints from aggrieved people who make their apartment or room available to others are now piling up.
I have sent 3 reminders and 2 registered letters to Ireland, with the request for a statement, reimbursement of my damage and a detailed documentation of the facts with a deadline. There has been no response from AirBnB to date. Even the threat to leave the portal as a landlord or the indication that a fraudster is up to mischief on the platform does not lead to any reaction.
Conclusion: AirBnB accepts that accommodation landlords will be harmed, as the verification procedure is knowingly not secure, but is advertised with 100% security. In addition, damage coverage is guaranteed, which is not adhered to and landlords are left alone, worn down and ultimately left with the damage.
Barbara Schäfer says
June 2018 at 07:46 Even though I have also made the sometimes annoying experience that most guests simply do not read the description text, I have fortunately made almost exclusively positive and great experiences and experiences with guests. Especially from the exciting early days, the contacts have been maintained to this day and even long-standing friendships have developed. My problem is that I now feel annoyed by airbnb itself: with the standardized instructions to make the bed fresh and have fresh towels ready… Currently, despite Superhost status, I got the hint that I do not meet the minimum requirements and it is threatened that the ad will be removed if nothing changes. I had taken a four-month break because I just wanted to have the apartment to myself… the reviews of my guests certainly allow conclusions to be drawn about how much I care about the well-being of my guests. And I really find it quite time-consuming to always keep the apartment in a pikobello impeccable condition, even during the rental. But it also gives me a lot of pleasure to receive guests and I am still excited, nervous and excited before every new guest – everything works out, we are both satisfied and so on. For me, the guests are not the problem, so I took a look on the net for current events… Thank you very much for this report – I can only agree with many points.
Gottschalk says
August 2018 at 21:25 Absolutely consistent, your report, even their employees agree with you that the conditions at AirBnB are unbearable for hosts, How can it be that a guest who breaks all the rules is still allowed to give out stars? He may be allowed to give a written review, you can comment on that, but in case of gross non-compliance with the rules formulated by the host by the guest….stars ! Indecent. If the guest does not comply with the rules formulated by the host, you will experience an almost endless correspondence through AirBnB. Requests for overnight stays for additional people and broken items must be made separately for the same guest. Correspondence in combination with numerous calls from AirBnB employees, who speak English with different accents and talent, although as hosts they allow “calls only in German” according to appropriate experience, queries and waiting loops and a constant request for compromises and concessions for the sake of hospitality. Who needs it …… will have to surrender to AirBnB’s attrition tactics as hosts… You can’t keep it up for long.
Fany says
August 2018 at 10:54 I can only agree after a – fortunately very short – experience with airbnb. The ‘penalty’ of 50 dollars deduction on the next payout because of a cancellation (within 24 hours, because we need the apartment ourselves) is just outrageous. We immediately deactivated the ad again and are still fighting for the deletion of the account, which is denied on the grounds that there are still outstanding bookings ( complete nonsense, only one request and we have not confirmed it ). Requests cannot be refused, although it is assured and the deposit is not handed over (does not work at all). I can only advise against it.
Kurt Klawischnigg says
September 2018 at 15:04 Only pee while sitting? Are you sure that you don’t have other problems than AirBnB…?
Tom Alby says
September 2018 at 19:38 If it is a problem for you as a guest to comply with the fact that the host does not want to pee, then you have nothing to do with AirBnB and have to go to a hotel.
Stefanie K. says
September 2018 at 16:52 I found this post and the comments and felt really “killed” after I blocked all free appointments of my room today and decided to NEVER rent out via Airbnb again after the one booking that was still open. So I wasn’t the only one to have had such strange experiences! We have rented out for over 1 1/2 years, in the beginning there were really some nice encounters and we had fun. But over time, the negative experiences have gotten out of hand. People who don’t read the description and then complain about what is clearly described there. People who don’t read the directions, drive up to the house (it’s forbidden, there’s also a sign and I always point it out), let the engine run for minutes in the residential area at night, ring the neighbors’ doorbell at night and ask where we live because they don’t read what we wrote to them. In other words, people who also cause us trouble with our neighbors. People who say they come at a certain time, but then don’t show up until midnight (last check in 21h), when we usually sleep for a long time, then have no understanding that we are just tired… People who leave the house in winter and leave a window wide open on the ground floor… People who can hardly say “hello” and “goodbye”, hide in the room and stream movies or make Skype calls for hours. People who complain that certain sites on the net are blocked with us. And people who have loud sex in the middle of the night and then take a shower around 3 a.m. – you can’t sleep in your own house anymore. Where has the consideration gone? Would any of them behave in the same way with friends? Unfortunately, there were more and more of the kind – and the nice ones became fewer. Why exactly, I don’t know. I have the feeling that people are no longer looking for private accommodation, but only a cheap hotel. They expect the hotel standard and are less and less considerate of the hosts and their living space. And they don’t care about the hosts as human beings… It’s a pity… Yes, and Airbnb is getting more and more annoying – rating only for instant booking, complaining when you reject guests without even checking why. We don’t reject anyone just like that, but always because something doesn’t fit (no profile picture, want to book for third parties, want to arrive in the middle of the night, want to come with children or pets (which we don’t allow because of our dogs), etc.). So we’re fed up with Airbnb. Too bad about the unused living space. But you don’t earn much with it anyway, and if you are constantly in trouble because Airbnb is now increasingly attracting a different guest clientele, it’s just not worth it… And whether another portal is and remains better? I don’t know. Our room now simply becomes a reading room for ourselves and friends and family who visit us…
Ralf Grasberger says
October 2018 at 17:21 I have been offering apartments in Brazil for years, via Airbnb, but what I have experienced in the last 5 months is a pure disaster. Either some guests can’t read, or they expect to rent a castle for 20 euros. In this case, the customers from Germany can still be described as gold. However, what some of the tenants from America and Brazil have in terms of rent claims is boundless. The bottom line is that I can only advise against or even warn against Airbnb, as 80 percent of them are only so-called idiots.
Linda says
November 2018 at 08:42 It is good to read that other landlords are also annoyed by the stupidity of some guests! I’ve been doing it for 2 years now and I’m thinking about whether I should give up the apartment because I’m totally annoyed. as I said, the guests do not read what they book and sometimes write up to 50 times and always pester me with the same questions, often until 01.00 in the night. And yet they stand in the neighbor’s front yard or ring the bell all over the house because they supposedly don’t know where to ring the bell. Although och always write all my names in every answer !!
Andreas says
December 2018 at 17:55 Thank you for the insightful comments. We were determined to sign up for Airbnb because we have so much empty, unused living space. But now we will keep our hands off it.
Oliver says
December 2018 at 15:37 Well, much of what is written here applies. BUT….
…. I compare it to road traffic, in which everyone, but really everyone, may/must participate.
As a rule, I get stinky when others don’t drive the way I expect, have learned, am used to, etc., etc.
Because in that second I forgot, purely emotionally, that my mother could be driving in front of me, a novice driver, someone from abroad, someone who had just been bullied by his boss, etc., etc.
We cannot guarantee that our guests behave according to our ideas.
It means making experiences, getting involved, learning, acting, improving, thinking outside the box, etc., etc.
If I am not able to do this, I do not belong in the Airbnb community or in traffic.
Oliver, Superhost Duisburg. For 12 months with a private room and an apartment.
I have 90% joy and fun with this business and I am ready to learn and accept defeats.
I usually love my guests and experiences.
There are assholes everywhere, even on the ISS and sometimes I’m one myself
Tom says
December 2018 at 15:47 The comparison is already lame. The streets outside are public, my home is not. That’s where I determine the rules. And if you really mean that I have to put up with a guest peeing standing up, then you haven’t understood what it means to be a guest in the AirBnB universe
Oliver Says
December 2018 at 15:53 Exactly, Tom, I’m hosting.
Don’t take life too seriously, no one will get out of here alive.
Tom says
December 2018 at 16:10 Such answers are not really meaningful.
Read again what AirBnB tells guests: That they have to abide by the house rules. If it says that you are not allowed to smoke, then you don’t smoke. And you say now, oh, it doesn’t matter, don’t you take it too seriously? And if someone pees next to it while standing, then someone will clean it up? Sorry, I live there too. And the principle of AirBnB, in case you didn’t understand, is that you live in someone else’s home. I don’t know what your standard looks like, but nothing sticks next to the toilet with us, but we also don’t want to wipe after a guest who doesn’t want to follow the rules. If you don’t like the rules, you just don’t rent from us.
Maybe it’s also a question of standard. If you feel comfortable with a disgusting toilet, then you don’t need any rules and can look at it all quite calmly
Tom says
December 2018 at 18:20 I have removed your last comment, and I will hand it over to my lawyer. It is a big misconception that you only have to grab an insult “in my opinion” in order not to be prosecuted.
Your name and IP address are stored so that you are not anonymous on the net, Oliver Unity Media, your provider, will receive a letter shortly.
Ingo Fischer says
January 2019 at 23:53 Hello everyone,
Thank you very much for this experience report or the other experience reports in the comments! I was an Aibnb host for a year, most of which was a superhost, until Airbnb completely failed in a crisis situation with a recalcitrant guest (were not available and did not respond to numerous contact attempts) and finally, as a highlight, blocked my access from one day to the next – all pending bookings were cancelled by Airbnb and I had no more opportunity to to explain to the guests (some of whom would have been about to arrive) why.
So after Airbnb deleted my account, I don’t even have the opportunity to view the Airbnb payment confirmations as well as the fees charged for the mediation and the bank transfer – the Konzen did not even react to the request made almost a month ago to provide me with them. This is data that I urgently need for my tax return.
So my request: Who can tell me what amount/percentage Airbnb charges its hosts for the commission and what the additional transfer fees are? If I know this, I can reconstruct the invoice amounts based on the incoming payments. I am grateful for your help!
Dieter says
January 2019 at 13:12 We are currently renting via FEWO. This used to work well, you could correspond with the potential guests and make a selection before confirmation. Guests are guests, there are such and others, as everywhere. With pre-selection, one could prevent the swamping. That is no longer possible, I am looking for a replacement. That’s why I’m reading along here. However, the tendency of all portals is to incapacitate the landlords in order to enforce direct booking and thus ensure the commission. They collect from both, tenant and landlord. It’s legitimate, but unpleasant for landlords. I would like to have a portal where I pay a proper price for my advertisements and which stays out of my other affairs. Does anyone know something like this?
Dieter
Inchen says
February 2019 at 15:15 I have been an Airbnb landlord for 3 years and no longer want to stand idly by and watch the constant expropriation. I will now try several other portals in parallel and then write my experience
mavi says
March 2019 at 12:15 Hello, we also like to be hosts and have almost a 95% positive hit rate with our guests. Only AirBnB is now interfering too much in our rental as an actual intermediary portal. We can also learn that despite the high effort we put in, the rules of the game are set by the AirBnb portal. If you don’t play along with them, then you will be counted. The turnover counts and not whether you have been a SUPERHOST since the first booking. AirBnB’s service fees are based on each point of revenue (including extras such as cleaning fees, provision of additional things or offers that are not directly related to the overnight stay in your living space, etc.) that you are supposed to include, otherwise you will be threatened with cancellation of the booking. And increase your occupancy! We have also found that you make a lot of effort with just one overnight stay and the low overnight price does not make up for it. Even with longer bookings, it’s just an extra income and nothing more. The replacement of missing items and items in need of repair is not uncommon, and the effort of cleaning should not be underestimated. New purchases due to wear and tear are necessary more quickly, renovations etc. pp… And always the concern whether everything will go well and the guest will be a pleasant person… It’s nice that there are the satisfied and appreciative guests with whom it is fun. That’s why we’re still at it! But still. It’s a pity that AirBnB is mutating into a promising and profit-greedy portal. That was probably not the point of the first hour. We will also look around for these experiences in other portals. Kind of a shame actually… But their own remarks are only reacted to with the well-known “threats” mentioned by the previous speakers.
Pasadelski says
May 2019 at 01:35 Now it’s already the end of May 2019 and I would like to rent out my apartment in Bavaria via Airbnb. I am very much looking forward to it and hope that the platform has returned to normal and understood the criticism. Just in case I, contrary to my expectations, also have less good experiences: Does anyone know of alternative platforms where the landlord is taken more seriously?
Tom says
May 2019 at 19:12 No, it has gotten worse. See the comments here, but also the communication from AirBnB itself. We have decided to no longer rent through AirBnB. In some comments here you can also see how some people think about other people’s property and house rules.
EG says
June 2019 at 21:51 I came across this blog today (due to current events, had a real anger at a guest, who actually complained to airbnb about “cleaning issues” and wanted money back – I sent me the photos: on one photo a cardboard box (it’s for waste paper!), on another photo the toilet was photographed with toilet brooms, a cleaning agent – apparently they were not lined up). On arrival, I had to talk to him on the phone for about 20 minutes about how to get into the apartment – despite the detailed check-in section.) – I’ve had enough. Which alternative platforms are you considering?
Ralf Schubert says
June 2019 at 11:38 I currently have the problem that a guest who has been booked for a longer period of time has stored food (dyed, hard-boiled Easter eggs) in the wardrobe together with his clothes in a plastic bag. There was a maggot outbreak, which I noticed when I wanted to take an airbed out of the closet for the family visit of the guest. The costs for the exterminator (insecticide use + basic cleaning) to just under 1000.00€ the replacement by the “full-bodied” host guarantee on the part of Airbnb is rejected. Justification:
All cases mentioned under Excluded Losses are excluded, even though the mention under “Excluded Losses” contains an opening clause. ———————————————————————-
“Covered Losses” means and is limited to direct physical loss or physical damage to a Host’s Covered Property caused by the Responsible Guest or an Invitee of the Responsible Guest during an Airbnb stay. Covered Losses do not include any losses or damage described under Excluded Losses below.
III. Limitations and Exclusions . . .
vi. damage caused by insects, animals or vermin (including pets); provided, that any physical damage resulting from any of the conditions listed above will be covered by the Airbnb Host Guarantee if not otherwise excluded under the Airbnb Host Guarantee.
Sincerely, Ralf Schubert
Ulrich says
June 2019 at 13:03 Thank you very much for the descriptions. Actually, I wanted to try AirBnB as well. I’d better keep my hands off it now.
Tom Alby says
June 2019 at 08:49 We no longer rent.
Heike says
June 2019 at 21:10 all online booking portals annoy the landlords, because they have all made the increase in sales their highest goal and see this only by catching customers. Therefore, the customer is placed on a pedestal and the accommodation provider is allowed to fulfill his wishes. I still understand this with aibnb, because he demands the commission from the customer and not from the landlord. In addition, as a landlord, you still have the greatest rights and freedoms at airbnb. If you deal with the commercial giants of the industry (booking.com, fewo, expedia,), as I do, you actually still see yourself as a “partner” at airbnb, because you are allowed to rate guests yourself, which is not possible with the others – if there is a criticism, the review will not be published. Booking .com actually reads every review from the accommodation partner before it is approved. The customer, on the other hand, is allowed to evaluate as he wants without providing the slightest proof of this (“we do not prescribe anything to our customers”, although it is not their customers, but those of the landlords, because the customer does not pay a cent in commission). Twice I had to make the experience of a devastated apartment, to my letters to the booking agency there was not once an answer. In April, I received a booking for the past weekend. But the appointment had just been booked by another agency, so I immediately cancelled the booker. The value of the booking was about €145. The guest turned to booking.com, who wrote to me that they would now look for alternative accommodation for him, which I would have to pay for. I immediately replied that I would not pay anything, because the guest still had more than 2 months to look for a place to stay on his own and that no contract had been concluded here because I had immediately informed him that I would not be able to take him in. The day before yesterday I received the bill from booking.com: I should pay €785 for the complete stranger, because his accommodation had cost so much. The amount was deducted from the payout amount transferred once a month. My objection that I had objected and that the amount of almost €800 would not be in relation to my price was decided with the fact that it was terms and conditions and they had not found a cheaper offer. I could sue. For these portals, you are just the milking cow that stands in the barn and has to deliver milk. She is never asked, she has no say at all. Unfortunately, it is the case that you can no longer avoid the booking portals that have successfully wedged themselves between demander and provider., Without them you can no longer make it and that is bad for landlords.
Sabrina says
August 2019 at 09:37 Hello Tom, it’s nice that you share your experiences here and also the others who have brought in their experiences here.
I myself have also been renting through Airbnb for a number of years and will continue to do so. But I would like to add something to all the reports:
Everyone started renting her out for a reason, be it an apartment, house or room. Namely, to earn a little money on the side!!! And everyone went into it with the dollar signs in their eyes at the beginning and that’s okay.
I am happy about everyone who has the courage to open up their private rooms and thus also a piece of themselves. Because that also shows strength and greatness to offer strangers a place to stay and to show them a piece of your life and share it with them.
Positive of Airbnb: Processing of payment flawless, calendar management simple and simple, contact with guests anytime and anywhere (mobile phone, tablet, PC), listing creation made easy, many photos possible, contact with Airbnb quickly and much more.
I’m sorry for the unpleasant experiences that you, Tom and some others have had, I was also allowed to make my experiences. Be it from reviews or sometimes small property damage. But my encounters with the people I met, whether only for short or longer stays, were so enriching that everything else outweighed it. And I’m still not a Superhost and that doesn’t matter. Yes, I also had guests who didn’t want personal contact, but only a place to sleep and that’s okay.
I would like to encourage every person here to make their own experiences if they want to rent. And every Internet portal of rental has its positive and negative sides. But I can say my experience with most of the guests has been very positive.
Here are some tips as a hint that I can give along the way:
– Look exactly for how many nights (from 1 night or rather from 2 nights) you want to rent, due to the amount of work (cleaning, making beds, etc.) – Clarify the cancellation for yourself – many pictures speak for themselves – Be prepared for the fact that there will always be hints and suggestions from the Internet providers, but you can decide for yourself whether you accept them. – Look at the commission from the internet providers you have to pay – If you make your private rooms available, you have to expect certain noises at night (sex, showers, coming back late at night, etc.). I recommend offering a room that is not near your bedroom, so that you are not disturbed. – calculate that what will break – every person ticks differently and has a different mindfulness of things, no one is perfect!! – you get to know great people from different countries, friendships even develop, you share their joy and experiences in good conversations, you can learn something about yourself and grow beyond yourself.
I hope I was able to give a bit of hope, after all the experience reports of the others, that renting out is still worth it. And also has a lot of good things, because that has fallen by the wayside a bit.
We humans are as we are, each with our expectations and ideas and they can deviate from our principles. That should be clear to everyone.
Tom Alby says
August 2019 at 11:42 Hallo Sabrina,
if you read my article carefully, you will see a lot of positives in the last paragraph. We are still in contact with some guests, and tangible friendships have developed, which we are still very happy about. But maybe it’s also due to our proximity to the Reeperbahn that not all experiences were nice
Klopfert says
August 2019 at 13:17 I have rented out two apartments on Airbnb and will say goodbye now, massive problems with guests, verification was not right at all… I contacted Airbnb and many phone calls with Stephano from Airbnb, nothing came out of it, only empty promises… Apartment was damaged, there was smoking although a non-smoking apartment is a non-smoking apartment, chair, dishes broken and much more….. Locksmith had to come and I remain sitting at my expense, no one from Airbnb answers and does not call back…. Never again Airbnb
Caroline Alumasa says
September 2019 at 18:37 Airbnb allows fraudulent listings of accommodations… I am the owner of properties listed on Airbnb since 2013. Now I found out that someone was using my photos from the internet to post a property on Airbnb. This is a clear attempt at fraud. I brought this to Airbnb’s attention. Unfortunately, Airbnb declines any support. This not only harms me as the owner of the “right” accommodation, but also potential customers. Airbnb thus allows customers to book a “wrong” accommodation and big disappointments, because customers will never see the accommodation they have booked. Airbnb refuses to take this fake property off their website, even though it is clearly a scam. I’m considering deleting my listings from the Airbnb portal.
Kerstin says
October 2019 at 16:17 The expectations of the guests were really too much for me! 35 € for an overnight stay incl. bed linen, towels, soap, just everything, whole house, sparkling clean with garden and top modern. Can’t you just be grateful to live so beautifully and at a ridiculous price? I have already had complaints because there is no artisanal butcher in town, the others miss vegan restaurants and the third complain about missing shot glasses. I could write a book, maybe I’ll do it… I can only say, never again! Respect for everyone who has been doing this for years.
Astrid Bauer-Maschke says
November 2019 at 21:51 Was 3 years as a hostess, also as a superhost. One negative review and you will be put under enormous pressure and bombarded with emails. I have also made the experience that the description is not really read. My house is in Italy and have attached the directions in Italian, German and English depending on nationality and specifically pointed out not to use GPS, so what, no one reads the instructions. Getting a negative rating for this is extremely hard. The pricing policy also really annoyed me, I offer the guest room with breakfast for 13 euros and am asked to lower the price so that I get more bookings. However, the summit was for me a guest, booked for three days, who gave a negative review because I only served an Italian breakfast with cappuccino and homemade cake and there was no orange juice and no variety, what do the guests expect for 13 euros? Service like in the Bayrischer Hof or in the Atlantis? I deleted my account, because I don’t need such experiences and I have private contact with many of my guests and they come to me and I to them. Unfortunately, the basic idea has been lost and commerce has found its way in.
Edith says
December 2019 at 12:18 I also toyed with the idea of renting out my now almost empty house room by room. In a beautiful, elevated location overlooking the Rhine Valley, the Principality of Liechtenstein and Austria on Airbnb. I tried several times to contact Airbnb because I wanted to ask two more questions about the system.No answer.And after reading this page I don’t have any more.
Susanne Glotzbach says
January 2020 at 09:45 I have now read through all your reports and can confirm some things. Also I was a superhost. I also didn’t let myself be pushed into anything by the mail, bombardments and requests. What I actually wanted to find out here was how you dealt with the change in the photo regulation. Until this change, I looked at the photo of the booking request, looked to see if this was a person I wanted to sleep here next door, and then decided whether I wanted the booking or not. (There has to be so much freedom in times when shared flats cast roommates for days.) Then this condition was changed by Airbnb. Now you could see who would come and go in your house AFTER booking. I contacted Airbnb to find out if I had misunderstood, but there was only a disdainful and concise answer that this is the case now. So: Unfortunately, one less nice room in a sought-after city.
PS : If you know of another, friendlier platform, please share it here.
Joachim von Kienitz says
January 2020 at 01:54 Strangely enough, we only ever get reviews from AIRBNB according to the scheme: “Would have expected a luxury hotel for the price.” With the other two portals I always get only very positive reviews. Somehow, AIRBNB seems to attract the complainers. I don’t know why that is. It is normal that the guests do not read the house description. We have experienced this with all portals. However, you have to know that most guests have real difficulties with reading. Everyone can read somehow, but they have to decipher the words letter by letter. It is not without reason that Germany scores so poorly in the PISA test.
Google Analytics had its 10th birthday last year, and in the last more than 10 years I have been able to gain a lot of experience that you have to consider when using web analytics systems. Here are my 10 basic tips, starting with the absolute basics, then the basics for those who really want to do something with their data
Use a tag management system, especially for more complex configurations (e.g. cross-domain tracking) this is indispensable. But even if only the basics described here are to be implemented, a tag management system is important. Most systems offer a preview, so there is no need for open-heart surgery. And if you don’t want to give your web analytics person access to change the analytics code, then a tag management system is mandatory anyway.
While we’re at it, the Google Tag Assistant is a good addition if you use Tag Manager and/or Google Analytics.
Test everything you do with the real-time reports, unless it can be tested via Tag Manager and Tag Assistant.
Use the Adjusted Bounce Rate. There is no getting around this. The bounce rate is usually defined as counting a bounce when a user comes to the page and leaves it “immediately”. “Immediately” is then something between 5 and 10 seconds, depending on the definition and system. With Google Analytics, a bounce is counted as such when a user comes to a page and doesn’t look at another page, no matter how long they’ve been on it. So maybe he didn’t really bounce, but read through the whole page, and after his need for information was satisfied, he left again. For some content sites, this is normal behavior. But it’s not really a bounce. For me, a bounce means that a user considered the landing page irrelevant and therefore left immediately. And that’s a construction site that you don’t realize until you’ve configured the right bounce rate.
Be clear about what the point of your page is. You would have come up with that on your own? I have experienced too often that there are very different views in a company about why a website exists. Sometimes the participants of a workshop could not agree in 2 hours. Why does the site exist? What role does it play in your company’s overall business strategy? Is it a sale? Is it branding? Is it monetization via advertising? Did you just want to have a www on your letterhead? Does your page have multiple goals? Also ok. Write them all down.
So how can you measure whether the business goals are being met? To do this, you define the KPIs. Example: You want to sell something, then your goal is the number of conversions. Or? If you take a closer look, you probably have a sales goal (e.g. €1,000 a day), and the number of conversions won’t help you much if you don’t earn the same amount with every conversion. There are several adjusting screws for the sales target, traffic, conversion rate, shopping cart value, returns. This results in sub-goals, such as 2,000 daily users, a conversion rate of at least 1% (which is a good standard value, by the way), and an average shopping cart of 50€ as well as a return rate of 0% (which is very unrealistic unless you sell a digital product). If you don’t get to the €1,000, you have to analyze why this is the case based on the KPIs mentioned. For branding pages, on the other hand, we have different metrics. You want users who don’t leave immediately (see Adjusted Bounce Rate above). You want users to engage with your page, so Time on Site or Pages per Visit could be good metrics. If you want to reach users who don’t know you yet, the metric Number of new users is interesting. But here, too, set goals. If you don’t have goals, then any number doesn’t matter. Are 300,000 visitors good or little? Is 2% growth good or not so good? It doesn’t matter if you don’t have any goals.
The standard Google Analytics dashboard is relatively pointless. What does the ratio of new to returning users say? What do you do with this information? Honestly, you can’t actually do anything with any of the information listed in the standard dashboard. The KPIs that are actually important belong on a proper dashboard. Use the gallery (in Google Analytics). Many problems have already been solved by other users.
Web analytics (as well as data analysis in general) starts with a question. The answer is only as good as your question. Examples of good questions: Which acquisition channel brings me the most revenue (and, more importantly, is it worth having more of it)? What’s going on with the channels that bring in less revenue? Which demographic audiences “work” best (depending on the goal), and what content doesn’t fit those audiences? Does my target group read the texts of the website to the end? What elements of my website increase the likelihood that a user will bounce? The questions already show that web analytics is not a one-time matter, but must be continuous.
Segmentation is the killer feature in web analytics. Almost every question can be answered by segmentation. Example: Segmentation by mobile versus desktop, demographics, acquisition channels. Without segmentation, analytics is a toothless tiger.
And finally, the killer basic: You don’t want any data. What you want is information that will help you decide what you need to do. Analytics provides you with data, you draw information from it, and actions come from it. Data -> information -> action, that’s the absolute analytics mantra. If there is no action, then you don’t need the data. My former colleague Avinash uses the So what test for this. If you don’t have an action from a date after asking “So what?” three times, then forget about the KPI. I would go one step further: If you don’t have a question (see point 8) whose answer results in an action, then the initial question was wrong.
This list is not necessarily complete, but with these 10 points you can get damn far. Feedback is always welcome.
When I was a little boy, every morning on my way to school, I walked past a strange shop in front of which people stood smoking and drinking beer. Most of the time most people were standing there, sometimes one or two of these people hurried away. It was only much later that I understood that this was not a shop, but an agency for day labourers. We’re talking about the late ’70s and early ’80s.
My memory came back to me when I read the article “The Whole World as Competition” by Anja Reiter in the November 13, 2014 issue of ZEIT. Reiter manages the balancing act between two sides of the coin, namely the self-determined independence of digital nomads and the inability of legislators and trade unions, who usually argue about work, to respond to this new world. At the same time, she also describes the less exciting digital jobs, for example the Mechanical Turks, who perform easy tasks for little money. More and more of these jobs, I suspect, will soon become obsolete as more algorithms have to take over. The question is, when will the jobs that require more qualifications, such as web design, also disappear?
At the height of the New Economy, whose rise and fall I witnessed first-hand, above-average incomes were awarded to those who understood at least some HTML. At that time, Bertelsmann founded its own “school” where career changers could learn web technologies and where Lycos sent masses of applicants who were then to receive a well-paid employment contract. I am no longer sure whether it was decided after the first or after the second cohort that these lateral entrants, some of whom gave up secure jobs, would no longer be needed, so that they were already dismissed from their jobs while they were still at school. Of course, this was also due to the dot-com crash, but at the same time, we had also introduced some technologies during that time that required less manual work. Only those who knew more than just HTML, for example had gotten into JavaScript or even PHP or Java, were able to survive.
Reiter’s statement in the article is that quality is still in demand in this country. Companies that had previously placed orders abroad were not satisfied with the quality delivered and booked freelancers in Germany again. I think so. My experience with Virtual Private Assistants, for example, was disastrous, which of course may also be due to the language barrier. But no one needs HTML or PHP knowledge to build an interactive website today, WordPress & Co now install almost themselves. Overall, technology will free technology from technology.
„
