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As I write this, we are all in the height of the busy summer season. All our hard work last winter in updating our rooms and properties, tightening up our operations and procedures, and improving our websites and marketing is hopefully paying off with happy guests that fill our rooms and our bank accounts. I am also happy to report that all of the board’s hard work this winter and spring is starting to pay off too. I’m proud of what we have accomplished so far this year and am excited for our future.
- Our new WBBG gift certificate sales program is now live for members who want to have the option of selling WBBG gift certificates.
- WBBG Facebook and social media are more active than ever with more frequent postings and a growing fan base. Have you seen your inn mentioned yet?
- The WBBG website is currently undergoing some major improvements by our web host Innkeeper’s Advantage in terms of appearance and function.
- WBBG is reaching out and working with the Washington Lodging Association, Seattle City Council, and Seattle Bed & Breakfast Association to push for a level playing field for bed and breakfasts in the short term rental market in Seattle. These legislative updates are happening all across the country and will make their way across the state. It’s nice to see decision makers here asking our association for input. See details of proposed Seattle short term rental changes at http://www.seattle.gov/council/issues/regulating-short-term-rentals
- Details are being finalized for speakers and events at the Annual Meeting & Trade Show November 7 and 8 in Port Townsend.
- Even in the busy summer, WBBG is receiving a steady stream of membership inquiries from innkeepers and vendors who want to take advantage of the networking, marketing, and education benefits.
 As always, please stay in touch with your news or questions via my email at president@wbbg.com or on the WBBG Member Forum on Facebook.
Best,
Julie
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Background: WBBG currently sells Gift Certificates. The gift certificates are a member benefit because they promote the  WBBG brand and can only be redeemed by current members. Unlike most gift certificate programs, WBBG gift certificates are redeemed at 100%.
What’s new: Now you can have the option of selling WBBG GC’s through your website via a special secure WBBG gift certificate widget. I do it because keeping the funds which accrue from my own GC sales in a separate account and accounting for them for taxes is more pain than I want to deal with in my retirement. By selling WBBG GC’s you let WBBG handle all of that complexity. WBBG gift certificates may be used at your own inn, of course!
What’s in it for you: If you choose to participate, direct anyone wanting to buy a WBBG gift certificate to that page on your website. When they buy, you get credit (through the miracle of the internet)!
- As a thank you for adding the widget the first year, WBBG will give you a $25 discount on your next dues renewal.
- The inn with the most GC sales credit each year gets one year’s free membership!
- The inn with the second most GC sales each year gets one year’s free registration for the annual meeting!
- The inn with the third most GC sales each year gets a personal hand shake from the president (just kidding the first two places are real prizes… the hand shake is invaluable.)
The contest year begins on September 1.
How to get started: First, you need to put the GC widget on your website. This piece of code can be downloaded by logging into your listing at WBBG and clicking the Download Widgets tab and choosing the Association Gift Certificate Widget. When you have added the code to your website, notify the treasurer at treasurer@wbbg.com, and you will automatically receive a discount of $25 on your next dues renewal. Note: you may still sell your own gift certificates in addition to WBBG gift certificates.
How to redeem a WBBG gift certificate: The Certificates are sold in any denomination with a $9.95 surcharge. Any member inn can be fully reimbursed for WBBG GC’s they accept. You should use the GC validation engine on wbbg.com to check the remaining value on the GC when a Guest tells you that they will use a GC. Then, when the Guest stays, you use the redemption engine on wbbg.com to claim your reimbursement by logging into your listing at WBBG.com and clicking the gift certificate tab. The treasurer will issue full payment within a short time. In the immortal words of Yogi Berra, “They'll pay you cash, it's as good as money.” For more details on redemption, see the gift certificate information document by logging into the Members Only section of WBBG.com.
For an example of how this can work, see http://www.meritagemeadows.com/gift-certificates.html. Do this right and you could get the next free membership.
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The website committee over the past several months has been working hard to assess and identify some needed changes and enhancements to our WBBG.COM website. Feedback
from our quarterly meeting and additional work assessment was the basis for a proposal to the board that we needed a site refresh with some key upgrades. After several
teleconferences between Cindy Bachmann of Innkeepers Advantage and the web committee a plan was developed to accomplish our goals. We are excited to move forward and start this project and expect a roll out the refreshed WBBG.COM site in early September.
Some of the features we can look forward to will be the use of larger images for main pages and a revamp of the navigation bars for the site. The development of key city focused pages is an upgrade that will help in delivering more traffic overall to the site . Since WBBG will be responsible for writing the content for the city pages we will be reaching out to many of our members to help write some of those descriptions as you are the best source for your local city information. The content is a Key SEO component to increasing traffic and the visibility of our Inns as they now will be associated with city focused pages. Innkeepers Advantage will also be producing for us some training guides for SEO for page and blog posting; a check list so to speak to SEO to make sure that our blog posts and pages produce maximum traffic. A wonderful tool for WBBG and can be shared in our future presentations with Innkeepers.
We will also be looking at presenting ranked search information under some of our feature search’s in driving time as opposed to distance. We are hoping this will help our guests in planning for their travel.
Lastly, we will be streamlining the look and amount of information available on our phone sized mobile application so that using WBBG.COM on today’s smart phones will be easier.
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The move to regulate short-term rentals across the country continues. As the popularity of sites like Airbnb and Homeaway continues to rise, more and more major cities are taking action to regulate or eliminate short-term rentals all together.
The good news, cities like San Francisco are adding laws to regulate and register short-term rentals. The bad news, Anaheim, CA recently voted to ban ALL short term rentals, giving 363 licensed operators 18 months to close their doors.
 Several WBBG members have been active in Seattle, as the city grapples with the explosion of unlicensed or regulated short-term rentals. As an organization, we are still working toward a level playing field for all short-term rentals, and Seattle is proposing positive legislation for our industry.
For more information, check out the Seattle Times article here.
Read the summary of proposed legislation here.
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Save The Date - WBBG Annual Meeting
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"Running a Tight Ship" is the theme for this year's WBBG Annual Meeting, which will be happening at the beautiful Northwest Maritime Center, located on Port Townsend's historic waterfront. Along with getting more heads in your beds, the educational workshops will be focused on operations this year, with tips to make your B&B run more efficiently and profitably.
The keynote speaker is Nancy Huisenga, a former innkeeper  and author of "Behind the Door Marked Private: Confessions of a Small Town Bed and Breakfast Owner". Learn more about Nancy from her website here.
The meals will be provided by In-Season Catering, a Port Townsend favorite, and will feature local, fresh, seasonal ingredients and attendees will have the option of staying at local B&B's rather than a traditional conference center.
The conference will begin Monday November 7 at 1PM, followed by a trade show, networking reception, and dinner on Monday. Tuesday will begin with the business meeting and workshops will finish around 2:30PM Tuesday afternoon. Early Bird Registration, more details, including final pricing, will be available August 1 on wbbg.com
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Notice the beautiful images that open our InnStep newsletter. Each one of these was taken by an innkeeper. In most cases, these images have been used at least once by WBBG in our social media marketing and the inn has received a mention.
WBBG has over 1700 followers on Facebook and that number is steadily rising. Pins and Repins on Pinterest are up and most of all, we are committed to using consistent weekly blogging as a way to enhance the SEO of the WBBG site.
What does this mean for you? Certainly, it means more exposure for ALL of our inns, but any events, images or ideas you share directly with us means that your inn benefits directly.
How can you get a direct mention via WBBG's social media marketing?
- Send us a great image. We can use those
 on Pinterest, Facebook or in one of our blogs. If you don't have time to send an image, then be sure to have your very BEST images displayed on our website. We often go directly to your listing for an image to represent your inn. We link directly to your listing and credit your BnB.
- Send info on local events. All we need is the name and a link to the event...we will do the rest...including a thank you and a link to your inn in our blog.
- Follow us on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram and Twitter. We will work to Share, Comment, Repin, and Retweet your BnB across our social media platform.
Thanks to those who have shared events, images and ideas with the guild. It is always appreciated. We are looking forward to featuring YOUR inn soon!
(Thanks to Otters Pond, Anchorage Inn, 9 Cranes Inn, Inn at Mallard Cove and Three Tree Point for those opening images)
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Private Facebook Group Just for Members
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Visit the WBBG Member Forum, our private group on Facebook. The Member Forum is a great place to ask questions and get support from other members. If you want to be a participate and did not receive your invitation, please contact Jill Britt at qa@wbbg.com, or Julie McAferty at president@wbbg.com.
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Welcome Terry Esch and 45th Street Hospitality. This 43 year old family owned company is located in Seattle. They offer high quality "flippable" mattress, a great alternative for keeping your mattresses like new. They have also developed a proprietary washable top of bed line using wool and cotton along with latex.
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Support Our Associate Members
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Bed Voyage
Eco-luxury bamboo bedding
Sharon Stuart and Val Thorkildsen
sharon@bedvoyage.com
425-949-8216
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Heart N Soul Innsitting
Interim Innkeeping
gizlar3@w-link.net
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