You asked AI to write an Instagram caption for your accommodation. It came back with something about a “tranquil haven nestled amidst breathtaking natural beauty where luxury meets comfort.” You deleted it immediately. Sound familiar?

In this solo episode, Sarah gets practical about one of the most common frustrations she hears from hosts: AI that produces bland, generic content that sounds nothing like their actual business. The problem, she argues, isn’t the tool — it’s the prompts. Most people are using AI like a magic content machine, typing “write me an Instagram caption for my Airbnb” and pressing enter, then wondering why the result could have been written for any property, anywhere.

Sarah introduces the principle of ‘garbage in, garbage out’: a computing concept that’s never been more relevant. AI is not unlike a new marketing assistant: hand them a vague brief and walk away, and you’ll get average work. Spend time giving them real context about your guests, your brand, your story and what makes your accommodation different, and the work transforms. AI amplifies the insights you give it. It doesn’t invent them.

She walks through three practical approaches that change the game: first, training AI on your business before asking it to produce anything and the concept of building your own ‘AI business bible’ that you can reuse again and again. Second, using AI as a creative thinking partner rather than just a writer: feeding in guest reviews, asking it to analyse emotional themes, or getting it to help you understand what questions your ideal guests are asking before they book. And third, the PROMPT formula: a memorable six-part structure (Purpose, Role, Offer, Market, Personality, Technical details) that gives AI everything it needs to produce content that actually sounds like you.

Sarah also shares a full worked example: a detailed prompt for a luxury treehouse in the Forest of Dean, so you can see exactly what a strong prompt looks like in practice and adapt it directly for your own business.

If you’ve been getting mediocre results from AI and assumed the tool was the problem, this episode will reframe how you use it entirely. The goal isn’t more content. It’s better content — content that sounds like you, connects with your ideal guests, and helps the right people find and book your accommodation.

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Key Takeaways

• Garbage in, garbage out. The quality of your AI content depends almost entirely on the quality of the brief you give it — vague prompts produce vague content, every single time.
• Before asking AI to create anything, train it on your business: your ideal guests, your brand voice, what makes your accommodation different, words you love, words you never want to see, and guest reviews. Build an ‘AI business bible’ you can paste in again and again.
• Use AI as a thinking partner, not just a writer. Ask it to analyse your reviews for recurring themes, identify the emotional reasons guests book your type of property, or audit your website copy for generic language — before you ask it to write a single word.
• The PROMPT formula gives every AI request the right ingredients: Purpose (what’s the goal?), Role (who is AI acting as?), Offer (what are you promoting?), Market (who is it for?), Personality (your tone and brand voice), and Technical details (length, format, CTAs).
• Your guest reviews are a goldmine. They contain the exact words your guests use to describe the experience — feed them into AI and it will immediately start producing content that resonates with the people most likely to book.
• AI is a first draft tool, not a final draft tool. Never publish without editing — add the human layer, the local knowledge, the details only you know, and always fact-check any specific claims or local recommendations it generates.

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Free Resource: AI Marketing Cheatsheet

Want the prompts and frameworks from this episode in one handy reference? Download Sarah’s free AI Marketing Cheatsheet — everything you need to start getting better content from AI today. Download your free AI Marketing Cheatsheet here.

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Do you have a marketing roadmap for your business?

No more winging it and feeling like you are in constant marketing chaos! Create your easy-to-follow marketing roadmap for the year ahead. My Direct Bookings Bootcamp is now available ON DEMAND! Let’s make this the best year yet for direct bookings! Head to my website for more info.

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Are you currently rely on Airbnb or another online agent (OTA)?

Take Sarah's FREE quiz here - it's time to give them the boot!

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You're listening to Get Fully Booked with Sarah Orchard.

Are you ready to master your marketing so you can ditch your reliance on the online agents and grow your direct bookings?

I'll be sharing with you exactly what it takes to grow your direct bookings and the simple marketing steps to get more profit in your pocket.

Hello and welcome back to the Get Foot Booked podcast.

I'm your host, Sarah Orchard.

I've got a really practical and juicy episode for you today, so let's get stuck in.

Have you ever asked AI to write an Instagram caption, a website piece of copy or an email for your short term rental and you got something back that sounded like it had been written by a robot?

Probably in a bit of a straight jacket.

You know the kind of thing I mean.

Escape to a tranquil haven nestled amidst breathtaking natural beauty where luxury meets comfort and unforgettable memories await.

And you read it and think, absolutely not.

Nobody who has actually stayed here with us would ever say that.

The problem isn't that AI isn't useful.

I think the problem is that most people are using AI like some sort of.

I suppose it's a magic content machine.

They're being a bit lazy if I'm could be brutally honest.

Perhaps you type in write me an Instagram caption for my Airbnb or my holiday cottage and you press Enter.

And then you patiently wait with bated breath to see what it comes up with.

And then you wonder why the results that come back feel generic, bland, a bit icky and completely disconnected from your actual business.

And it's using a language that you don't feel comfortable with.

So I suppose the truth is that AI is incredibly powerful for us short term rental owners, but only when we know how to give it the right information.

Because AI doesn't know your business.

It doesn't know that the best part of your woodland cabin is actually the guests sitting in a hot tub at dusk listening to the owls in the trees nearby.

It doesn't know that your guests are couples in their 40s, escaping their busy jobs and their very demanding young children and wanting a proper reset.

It doesn't know that your converted barn is perfect for dog owners because there's a 20 mile walking route straight from the secure garden gate.

You have all that insider detail and the quality of the content that you get from AI depends massively on how well you communicate that to it.

So today I'm going to be talking about how to prompt AI properly to create content that actually sounds like your short term rental, not all the other short term rentals that are out there.

I'm going to share with you three approaches that make AI genuinely useful for your marketing.

And I'm also going to look at some of the biggest do's and don'ts that I see when people are using AI.

And I'm going to give you some resources that are going to help you get this right for your business.

But before we start, I wanted to talk about an interesting concept and actually I'm sort of showing my age a little bit here.

It's a phrase that's used called garbage in and garbage out.

Now it has been around for years.

It was used particularly in the context of computing and I think it's incredibly relevant to using any of the answer engines.

So the AI tools like ChatGPT, because basically the output that we get is only as good as the information and the instructions that we put in in the first place.

So I like to think of it as like when you're hiring a new member of staff, maybe thinking about maybe outsourcing your social media, maybe even like I'm doing at the moment, moment training a new cleaner.

Imagine that you, you know, you hired them tomorrow and you just said to them can you write me some social media posts or can you just get on with the clean?

And you walked away and you didn't actually provide them with anything in terms of background.

So what you're going to get is probably something pretty average.

They're going to have to second guess stuff.

They don't know who your customers are, they don't know the tone of voice that they need to use, like your backstory, what makes your accommodation special.

But imagine if you spent some time with them explaining these are our ideal guests and these are the pain points that they have.

This is why they want to get away and stay in our short term rental.

This is why they choose us.

This is what they love the most about staying with us.

This is what we feel our brand personality is and the tone of voice that we want to use in our communications.

What about if you shared all of your guest reviews so that they had the sort of overall sentiment of what people think about staying with you?

And what about if you shared with them what makes you different from your competitors and even sharing who your competitors are, suddenly that marketing assistance or social media manager's work is going to be dramatically better And AI is exactly the same.

It isn't a replacement for your expertise, it's a tool that amplifies the information that you give it and the insights that you give it.

So let's get into my sort of three approaches that will help to transform how you use AI in your business.

Because let's face it, AI isn't going anywhere soon.

So, you know, we need to get to grips with this.

So I think the biggest mistake I see is short term rental owners sort of making the jump straight into content creation.

So they see AI as a means of quickly churning out lots of content.

So they'll ask it, write me a Facebook post or an Instagram real caption, write me a blog, write me an email.

But before AI can create good content, it needs context, it needs a framework, it needs a bit of training, just like that cleaner or any new member of staff.

And that is really your first step.

Now you don't need to upload every little bit of knowledge that's in your head about your business, maybe your entire business plan.

And you definitely don't need to go about creating like really complicated AI project setups, but you do need to give it information about what makes your business unique.

So I'm going to give an example about, let's say a luxury woodland cabin that just happens to be in the Lake District in the uk.

And you say to it, our ideal guests are active families.

The children are under 11 years old and parents want them to spend less time on their screens and more time outdoors.

Our guests love that they can walk from the door onto some lovely nature trails, that they can toast marshmallows around a real fire pit, and that they can explore nature together.

And we give them some little guided bug hunting, insect tours or like a basically a treasure hunt round our site.

Our brand voice is warm, adventurous and family focus.

We don't want to use words like luxury escape or tranquil retreat because that's too generic and not relevant to our ideal guest.

We want our content to feel like a recommendation from a close friend.

Now, that context, that's quite limited.

You can obviously give it a lot more information than that, but for the purposes of our podcast episode and not being on here for hours, we'll keep it at that for today.

So if we gave it just that initial outline, it would definitely make a huge difference because AI now has something to work with and by means, I don't think that's a good enough brief.

That's just an example compared to just having a, you know, write me a, you know, write me a Facebook post.

But it is a starting point and I think a great exercise is to create what I would call like your AI business bible.

And you should include in that who you are, good description of the business.

Maybe you've done something like maybe you've entered some awards or you've applied for something like green tourism.

Maybe you've had to fill in like a profile for some other business application.

Maybe take that information and dump that into a, into a, you know, document.

You also need to outline what you offer, who your ideal guests are and what their pain points are.

Really try and get as descriptive as possible.

If you know how people generally find your business, describe that why they choose you, what makes you different.

Give it some sample messaging.

So if you've got some pages on your website, copy, maybe you had a professional copywriter write it or you wrote it and you think it's really spot on.

Give it some sample text.

If you've had a listing written for maybe a directory listing site and you really think that, that they've nailed, you know, your business and what it stands for, you know, give it that as points of reference.

Either copy and paste the copy in or give it some web links to look to as reference points.

Add in your content pillars.

So three to five themes that you know will appeal to your ideal guests.

Give it instructions on your brand and your tone of V words that you love, the words that you never want it to use.

Give it your Google reviews to look at.

Give it frequently asked question information.

Then it can reuse this information again and again.

And most AI tools give you the option to sort of customize it and it will be in different places on different platforms.

But I know with Chat GPT you can go to the settings and you can personalize it and you can upload this information into almost like the brain and of the AI tool so that you don't have to keep repeating this sort of information.

And the more you give it, obviously over time it, it learns and you are basically giving AI your brand handbook.

Now the second point I wanted to look at was, and I think this is where AI becomes really powerful, is actually not just using it as a quick writing tool, but using it to actually think for your business.

So we're not just using it for ideation and being like creative because I think a lot of people do treat AI like a junior copywriter and it's just like, or rather than having to pay a copywriter, it's like just churn me out this content that I need.

So instead of asking it, for example, you know, write me an Instagram caption about my hot tub because I've got this like really cool clip of a hot tub and you want to put that out on socials and you just think, right, I'll quickly go to chat and get chat to write me a little, you know, caption and try asking it something a bit more detailed.

So my guests booked my accommodation because they want relaxation and quality time together.

Help me identify five emotional reasons that someone would want to stay somewhere like ours with a private hot tub.

Now AI starts helping you understand your customers better.

It helps you to nail your marketing messaging better.

Or maybe give it 10 guest reviews and say analyze these guest reviews and tell me the common themes that guests most value.

Sometimes obviously you can ask it to come up with like what's the overall sentiment that's in those guest reviews?

Or you could ask it based on my ideal guest, what questions might they be asking before booking?

And I did suggest this to one of my club members the other day.

You had could actually go on to AI tools and say based on my ideal guest, what questions might they be asking an AI tool or asking you ChatGPT before booking because that's going to help you to create content that will get you cited more likely in the AI tools.

Or you could ask it act as a holiday accommodation marketing expert.

Review this website copy and tell me where it feels generic or where it could better connect emotionally.

For my ideal guest, a who is looking for Y or X, Y and Z.

You know, you can fill in the blanks.

So that's when I think AI really comes into its own in terms of being quite powerful.

Yes, it's very good at ideation.

Yes, it's very good at being creative.

You've got great platforms like Nanobanana that can do imagery and things like that, all very, very clever.

But I think when you get involved in the thinking process and using it as a sort of strategic sounding board, now it's not replacing you, but it's acting as a sounding board that you can actually bounce strategic thinking around with.

Then I think it becomes really powerful because often the hardest part of marketing isn't just writing the words.

Although I know many people find writing content hard, it's actually knowing what should I say?

What matters most to my guests?

What angles should I take?

What problems am I solving?

You know, what are they?

You know, how do I address their pain points?

It's all the things I teach in my boot camp is helping you with that process because that is fundamental to getting your marketing right.

Now, AI isn't always going to know all of the answers and it can still be a little bit generic, but it's definitely better than not asking those questions in the first place, and it will help you create much more powerful marketing content.

The third thing I wanted to share with you is I have put together a prompt structure because prompting AI, once you've obviously trained the brain, you need to be able to prompt it.

And I definitely think that if you don't prompt well, you don't get good results.

Now, the formula I've come up with, it spells the word prompt.

It's clever, hey, makes it nice and easy to remember.

So let me break that down.

So the P of prompt is for purpose.

What is your goal?

So you do need to sort of tell it what it's creating and why and maybe why that's important to your business.

The R of prompt is role.

So you need to say what is it sort of acting as?

So maybe it's a copywriter, maybe it's a social media manager, maybe it's your FD finance advisor, maybe it is your strategic marketing consultant.

You need to give it a role and tell it what it's being asked to do in terms of what its role is in the project.

The O of prompt is for offering what am I trying to sell or promote.

So that's where your.

Maybe your.

It doesn't have to be a special promotion, it could just be overall, what are you trying to promote in terms of what you offer as a whole?

In terms of your guest experience?

M is for market.

So who is it for?

Who are your ideal guests?

And obviously being as specific as you possibly can be.

P of prompt is for personality.

So what's your tone?

What's your brand voice?

Sometimes you might want to flex your especially if you've got multiple audiences.

So if you're talking to a family audience, you might want to inject a bit more fun and more playfulness.

Obviously if you're talking to a romantic couple's audience, you might want a slightly different message for your whatever the task that you've given the AI tool and T the last bit of prompt is for technical details, so be really specific about the format, the length, the number of words, how you're going to be using it.

So if it is a caption for or a hook, what the calls to action are that you want it to include.

I'm always very specific about not including emojis because they do my head in and you can spot it a mile away.

Obviously it still seems to be chat still seems to be using hashtags and actually hashtags are not being used on platforms like Instagram and TikTok anymore.

So you know, you might want to be specific about things that you don't want it to include.

And that could also include when you talk about your tone of voice.

And it could be in the technical details as well, like words that you definitely don't want it to use.

I'd be quite specific about that as well.

And having that sort of prompt structure in mind does make a big difference.

So if I gave an example, maybe for my own business, so I could say to ChatGPT, you're an expert marketing copywriter specializing in a boutique short term rental.

I own a luxury treehouse accommodation in the Y Valley.

Our ideal guests are couples aged 30 to 65 who are typically coming to celebrate a life milestone, a big birthday, a proposal, a honeymoon, an anniversary.

They want seclusion and privacy and a luxurious bucket list type stay with the chance to switch off from busy lives.

Guests love the feeling of waking up surrounded by the birds on the feeder outside the bedroom window, feeling cocooned by the trees, enjoying slow morning coffees at the lookout bar, using our woodland sauna, and feeling completely disconnected from the outside world and their stresses at home.

Our brand voice is warm, sensory, and it feels exclusive.

We write like a friend recommending a secret place to stay.

Avoid generic phrases like luxury, escape, hidden gem, or a perfect getaway.

Create me five Instagram captions promoting our autumn stays.

Each caption should start with a strong hook, focus on an emotion or guest desire, include sensory details, encourage people to imagine themselves staying here, and end with a gentle call to action.

Now compare that with Write me five Instagram captions for my Airbnb.

The difference is huge.

You know, we're giving AI a lot of context and that that was, I wrote that that wasn't like generic content that came from somewhere else.

That's what's in my head in terms of me knowing my business and knowing our guests.

But you will get a completely different output.

So I want to wrap up this episode just with some do's and don'ts.

I want to always try and give you some practical takeaways.

So let's look at some do's.

So as I said, give AI examples.

If you have a caption that you love, a blog post that you know you think is spot on, or website copy that you feel is literally bang on.

And you know, share that with AI, it learns from your examples.

So the more points of reference that you can give it, the better.

Do add your personality.

The businesses that are winning with AI are not the ones creating the most Content they're not just churning out this AI slop that is so prevalent these days.

The ones that are winning are creating content that feels human.

It feels, feels like it hasn't been created by AI.

It feels unique.

Do use your guest reviews.

I think they are an absolute gold mine and I think, you know, they contain the language and the exact words that your customers use to describe the experience.

And if you can, you know, we've got an old fashioned guest book which I'd say about 75% of guests write in the guest book.

And because they, they're relaxed, they tend to write really long like a whole page of a five with what they were experiencing at the hideout.

Ideally get those into AI, not just the Google reviews because the Google reviews can be a bit shorter because people are doing it and they feel like they want to leave a review but they're in a bit of a hurry and they're not going to probably write as much.

So I, I definitely think, you know, if you can get those longer descriptions and formats into your AI tool because that will really, really help because it's in the language of your ideal guest.

Okay, some don'ts.

So please do not copy and paste what you get from any answer engine, any AI tool without editing it first.

It is literally a first draft tool.

You can, by interrogating it and asking more questions.

They call it like layering.

You can get refinement but your job is to be the filter, to be the editor role.

You'll add in your own funny story, that local knowledge, the details that you know and you'll also hopefully pick up when it gets things wrong.

Which leads me on to the second don't really, which is that AI does invent facts.

So never assume that what it generates is 100% correct.

Check everything.

AI hallucinations and that's what they call it.

AI hallucinations are real, particularly if you're asking it to do blog posts and content that you're doing for GEO and you think that you know you're going to include like local recommendations and amenities or any sorts of like claims.

It can be really bad at making that sort of stuff up.

So you do need to check it all and don't use AI to replace your voice.

You know your guests are not booking because your accommodation sounds like everyone else.

You want to stand out, you want to be different and you won't do that if you don't go through this process of training AI, training that brain so that it knows a bit more about your business.

So I Hope you found that useful.

And if you take one thing away from today's episode, I hope that it's really.

That AI is not.

It's not that magic tool.

It's not a shortcut.

It is something that can increase our productivity.

It can help us to get done what we need to get done quicker.

But it's, it's definitely not.

It's not a cheat, you know, to sort of.

You've got to put a bit of effort in to get the best results.

And the better it understands your business and your guest experience, the better the results will be.

So never ask AI Just can you write me some content?

You know, slash Instagram captions.

Ask it how it can help you communicate why your guests love staying with you to find more people like them.

Because that's what your marketing is trying to do.

And that is where it becomes really powerful.

Because the goal really isn't to create more content, it's to create better content.

Content that sounds like you and helps you with your productivity so that you can get more done and that it obviously connects with your ideal guests.

And content that helps more of the right people discover and book your wonderful accommodation is ultimately our goal.

If you are a little bit new to AI or you've had a little dabble and it hasn't gone that well and you need a bit of help, I have something to help you.

I have a free AI marketing cheat sheet and the link will be in the show notes, so do check that out.

And that gives you my prompt framework with a bit more detail and also some prompts that you can lift straight away and use in your business.

So head on over to that.

It's on my website in my freebie section.

But the link will be in the show notes and download that free guide and that will get you off to a flying start with prompting so that your AI tools are literally like a mini me of you and help you rather than hinder your marketing efforts.

Thanks for listening today.

If you did find this episode useful, I would love it if you could share it with another owner, accommodation, host.

Maybe they're trying to figure out AI.

Or maybe you just know that they could do with some more marketing tips and advice to help them be more successful and get more bookings and more profit in their pocket.

So do feel free to always share the podcast far and wide.

I would love it if you could do that and thank you for, you know, for tuning in and if you enjoyed this episode, you know what to do.

I'd love it if you could leave me a review because you know how much us hosts love those five star reviews.

Now, next week, I'm back with the last episode.

I know the last episode of season six.

It has gone so quickly and I cannot believe we're up to by next week, 60 episodes.

But I've got a really cracking interview.

To round off season six, I will be interviewing one of my club members and a fellow host, Jo Marshall from Prospect House Farm.

And we're going to be talking about marketing insights and how that helps you to make better marketing decisions and get better results.

So you're not going to want to miss that one.

I'll see you next week.

Thank you for listening to Get Fully Booked with Sarah Orchard.

If you want to see if you are ready to ditch the likes of Airbnb and grow your direct bookings, put your business to the test with my free direct booking Roadmap quiz.

Head to my website get fully booked.com quiz and let's get you more direct bookings and more profit in your pocket.