We provide holiday homeowners and agents with a means to increase their holiday rental income through effective advertising online at a very reasonable price. All booking enquiries received from our site are either directly to the holiday homeowner or to their representative/agent who is managing their property. There are no commissions to worry about just the small annual advertising fee.
What services do we provide to advertisers?
Each advertiser gets a full colour page advertisement for their property with the option to add up to 10 colour photos. The advert will also include a contact form so that booking enquiries can be forwarded directly by email to whichever email address is selected. Advertisers can also display other contact information such as telephone/mobile/fax and a link to their own website. All properties are added to our website search facilities so that holidaymakers can browse at their leisure and find homes to rent. Advertisers are also provided with a user account and password so that they can make changes to their advert page whenever they want and as often as they like.
How do I join?
Joining is simple. Just follow the steps below:
1. Simply click on the ?register here' on the Home page
2. Fill in your contact details and then press 'continue', making a note of the owner id and password so that you can logon to your account at a later stage
3. Select 'add a new property' to begin entering your property location details. Press the 'save changes' button at the bottom of the page when you have completed this.
4. Fill in each of the remaining sections to complete: Property details, Area and Tariff information by pressing each of these buttons on the Home Management Page. (Don't forget to press the 'save changes' button once you have completed each of these).
5. You can then add photos online by pressing the 'photos' stage on the Home Management Page.
6. Finally, you need to select 'Make a payment' to pay online using credit card prior to your advertisement being activated.
7. Alternatively you can use the 'Make a Payment' page to calculate what is due, then send a cheque payable to 'UseMyApartment - NEED ADDRESS'
We then aim to review and activate completed adverts within 24 hours - usually adverts are activated within two working hours. If you need any assistance during the process we are more than happy to help. You can ask us for assistance at any time using the Contact Us page on the website.
How much do you charge and how can I pay?
We have two packages available which you can find on the register page. We accept all credit and debit card payments through Paypal and we also accept cheque payments via post.
How should my photos be configured for the best results?
Our site has been constructed using the latest technology in online programming. Photos should, ideally, be landscape in format, otherwise they not fit correctly within the space provided. Your images will automatically be renamed, resized and optimized during upload to our server, but they must be less than 2Mb (2000Kb) each before uploading.
Your photgraphs can be in JPEG or GIF format (.jpg - .gif) JPEGs are preferrable.
Can I change the photos on my page at a later stage and/or add more?
You can logon to your account at any point to add more photos or replace previous photos for your page. To replace a picture, just add a new picture to where the old picture was previously and this will over-write the previous image.
Can I make changes to my advert once it has been uploaded?
When you register with Usemyapartment.com you are given an owner id number and can select your own password. You can then use these at any point to logon to your account to add properties, change details, add/replace photos, pay or request activation of a new property.
Can you make changes for me if I have problems or do not have easy access to a computer?
We unfortunately cannot offer an advert maintenance service to advertisers due to the nature of our site. We have invested a lot in building a site where advertisers can manage their own adverts and are keen to maintain our site's position as one of the best value and effective holiday home advertising sites on the web. It is therefore important for us to keep our overheads as low as possible. If you have any difficulties with the site however, we are more than happy to help explain how it works or sort out any problems - simply contact us using the form provided.
Do you have any tips on what photos to display and how to present them?
The first of the photos (top left) is also displayed on the search results page as a small thumbnail image representing your property so we recommend picking the best photo for this position. External shots work especially well here. Also take a look at the photos that you are using. Are they selling your property to its best ability? Do you have a good mix of internal and external photographs are they attractive and well-lit? Holidaymakers like to see what the interior looks like before even thinking of committing to a booking. They will also be keen to see any attractive scenic shots from the property or nearby if you are able to as this will help sell the area to the holidaymaker too.
Are payments I make secure and do you store my payment card details?
WorldPay, a subsidiary of the Royal Bank of Scotland, provides our payment system. This means we are able to accept payment online by debit/credit card for most of the world's best-known cards. We do not store your payment details on our website
Do you offer any premium advertising on your site to increase my property's exposure?
We do offer FEATURED PROPERITES slots on our web pages. If you are interested in adding one of your properties to these contact us for more details.
There are many things you may be able to do to increase the effectiveness:
How can I improve the performance of my adverts?
There are many things you may be able to do to increase the effectiveness:
How much information have you provided on your page?
We recommend including as much information about your property and the area as possible. If you mention windsurfing or golf, people looking for these activities are more likely to be given a link to your page from the search engines it is registered with. The more words on your page the more content that gets registered with the search engines for your page. Be sure to include all the words and phrases that you think potential visitors to your property may search for on the web.
How well are you selling the best features of your property?
Remember the objective of your page is to sell your property - don't miss out any important attractions or features of your home.
Make good use of the 'Short description' field when completing your property details page.
This field is shown to holidaymakers on the search results pages when they are deciding which properties to look at in more detail.
Is your property appropriately priced?
Take a look at other similar properties on this and other sites to see that your are not overcharging as this will put you at a disadvantage.
Do you provide sufficient information to your visitors?
Specifically pricing, availability notes, facilities, directions of how to get there. If there is an easy way to get to your area such as a cheap airline provider then tell people who they are and any useful information. Often if you don't answer visitors' questions they don't bother writing to ask, they just move on to another property that does.
It is important that you have listed the correct town and region spellings on your property page, as these will affect what traffic your advert attracts from the search engines we register your pages with. Take a look at the 'Search by destination' page to see how other advertisers in a similar location have listed their property. If most holidaymakers don't know the name of your town but you are on the outskirts of a far more renowned town perhaps it would be best to list it under this location.
Why can't I login?
It may just be that you need to press the 'back' button and try again. If you have experienced consistent problems logging onto your account it could be that you have set your browser not to accept cookies. On your browser click on Tools, Internet Options, then click on the Privacy tab. Now click on the "Edit" button and where it says "Address of website" type in www.usemyapartment.com and click the "Allow" button. This will let your browser accept cookies from our site only. Please note that you need to then close your browser completely and open a new one for these changes to come into effect.
When I try to upload photos to the site it always seems to time-out. What can I do?
If this happens you are probably trying to add photos that are too big for the speed of your internet connection. You ideally need to use an image editor to resize you images to just 640 pixels across and 480 pixels high. Failing this you may need to try to email it to us at: support@usemyapartment.com
Who can I speak to for help?
If you ever have any problems with our site, please use the contact us form or send an email to info@usemyapartment.com, we will respond to you within 24 hours and help you with your query.
