RealAdventures has just added an availability calendar to your listing page. Now you can show guests when you are booked and when you have availability. Check out the screen shot below.

The calendar will help reduce the number of inquiries that you get for dates that are already booked. But it will also get you more inquiries as guests see that you are popular and they need to book earlier.

The calendar is designed to be really easy to use and update on a regular basis. Simply login to your listing and select ‘Availability Calendar’ in the left menu. There you can click a date to show it is booked (red). Click the same date again and it will change to reserved (yellow). Click again and it will change to unavailable (gray). Click one more time and you are back to available (white).

You can also click the star (*) to change the entire week’s availability status.

There is no cost for the calendar and it is completely optional.

I’ve talked to a number of our advertisers to see how this feature might be helpful to them. Most advertisers think it will help get them more qualified inquiries that they can convert into bookings instead of having to turn down.

But there are some advertisers that are concerned about displaying their availability for competitive reasons and others are concerned about security (property owners). For these reasons the calendar is completely optional — depending on your needs and situation.

If you keep it up to date, we will display the dates that are available. If you choose not to use the calendar, we will display the dates are available.

Personally, I do encourage you to use the calendar if you can and to update it on a regular basis. It will give customers the sense that your place is popular as demonstrated by how booked you are. This instills a sense of confidence which will increase your booking rates.

Let me know how the calendar works out for you. Please be sure to share your thoughts, suggestions and feedback.