Enso Connect Alternatives for your Vacation Rentals in 2023
Imagine a guest knowing exactly how to get to their vacation rental, checking in easily with a keycode, messaging their host at any time via friendly communication, receiving tailored local recommendations, and resting easy knowing that their rental is safe and secure—and doing it all via their own smartphone.
That’s the magic of guest experience apps.
They can transform guests’ impression of our short-term rental, and make their stay warm, reassuring, seamless, easy, and enjoyable.
So it makes sense that you’re considering whether Enso Connect could be the best choice for your vacation rental business.
But it’s not the only option. And with so many different choices and features, we understand that you’d want to see what else is out there before investing in a brand new tool.
That’s why in this post, we’ve:
- Given an overview of Enso Connect, its features, and pricing—plus looked at what existing customers say about it
- Explained why, despite Enso Connect’s advantages, a different tool might work better for you
- Listed five alternatives to Enso Connect, so you can make the best choice for your short-term rental business
Want an operations tool that’s smooth and flexible?
Enso Connect overview
Enso Connect is a high-quality, digital guest experience platform designed especially for short-term rentals and hotels. It enables guest messaging, ID verification and smart lock check-in, guidebooks, and upsells all within its digital Boarding Pass web app. The entire “guest journey” takes place within the same app.
It helps hosts run a more efficient operation and generate more revenue while offering guests a personalized, satisfying experience.
Enso Connect features
Enso Connect has a vast array of features designed to help streamline, simplify, and elevate operations.
These include:
- Guest ID verification and registration – Making booking easy and guaranteeing security
- Data collection – Enabling personalized recommendations and guest contact later
- Upsells such as early check-in – Offering a satisfying stay, and making you more revenue
- Contactless check-in – Making their arrival smooth, and ensuring your property is secure
- AI-driven communication – Reassuring guests with quick responses, saving you hours
- Unified inbox – Streamlining fast communication via WhatsApp, emails, SMS, and Airbnb
- Discounts and incentives within the app – Boosting good reviews and repeat bookings
- Personalizable with your brand – Building trust with guests and showcasing your expertise
- Integration with industry platforms – Connecting with major PMSs (property management software) such as Guesty, Hostaway, and Mews
- Security checks – Enabling guest background screening via Superhog and Autohost
- Keyless access – Integrating with smart locks such as August and Yale for safe access
- Integration with local experience apps like Uber – Offering guests fun and convenience
Enso Connect Pricing
Enso Connect doesn’t publicly list pricing but it offers a free 30-minute demo, which can be booked directly via a calendar on its website.
What they say about Enso Connect
Enso Connect was nominated in the third annual “Shortyz” Short Term Rental Awards for the Best App or Website Solution category and lost out only to Superhog (which it integrates with!).
Its founder & CEO Francois Gouelo was recently interviewed by industry-leading podcast Slick Talk, and the company recently raised CAD$2 million in seed investment to expand.
Top alternatives to Enso Connect
Enso Connect combines many useful features in a digital platform for both hosts and guests, but it’s not the only service in the industry providing similar functionality.
Increasing numbers of digital companies are revolutionizing the guest experience in the short-term rental space with mobile-first web apps that connect everything guests need in a single space, and simplifying hosts’ lives in the process.
Great guest apps will:
- Ensure security via background checks and ID verification
- Integrate with PMSs for automated confirmation and calendar syncing
- Offer guest messaging via different methods and a unified inbox for staff
- Ensure digital check-in and secure access via smart locks
- Enable in-stay upsells for added revenue and a more enjoyable guest experience
- Provide digital guides, both to the rental and to the local area
1. Operto Guest: Optimize the guest experience and reduce your workload
Operto Guest is a white-label mobile guest app, meaning it’s branded to your business, and fully customizable for the content you need.
Its intuitive, user-friendly web app includes everything guests need for a stress-free personalized stay, no downloads required. It also offers increased efficiency and added revenue opportunities for hosts.
Operto Guest can also be used as a standalone tool, or together with Operto’s other suite of solutions for operations and guest management (you can see your entire tech stack, operations, and comms on the same dashboard for complete task management and staff coordination).
It also offers a wide range of integrations to smart devices, smart locks, and PMSs.
Operto Guest key features
Operto Guest’s powerful features facilitate a frictionless guest journey and streamlined operations and communications that cut down on guest questions and help you monetize the guest.
These include:
- Digital check-in and check-out – Making check-in easy, fast, and secure
- Guest verification and screening – Easy and reliable security through enhanced digital check-in
- Auto translation – Speaking their language for a better guest stay and easy communication
- Guidebooks – Personalized, location-specific recommendations for a better stay
- House manual with videos and images – Helpful tips all in one place
- Two-way messaging – Fast, user-friendly guest communication
- In-app promotions – For a more satisfying guest stay and revenue-generating opportunities
- Unit-level customization – Giving the guest even more specific details on their stay
- Custom colors and logos – To establish consistent branding, building trust and authority
- PMS integrations – Seamless connections to Mews, Cloudbeds, Guesty, Hostaway, and more
- Digital smart key access – Integrations with smart locks including Salto, Yale, and August
Operto Guest pricing
Operto Guest starts at US$8 per door per month, with packages designed for each business via a free demo.
What they say about Operto Guest
Operto won the VrTech startup competition in Italy in 2019, and in early 2022, it closed a $ 12 million Series A financing round to fund even wider growth.
Operto Teams (part of the Operto family) is rated 4.9 on review website Capterra, including 4.7 for ease of use and 5.0 for customer service.
One reviewer said: “It has changed the way we communicate as a team and things don’t get forgotten about as they used to in the past”, while another said it “is software designed with the user in mind”.
2. YourWelcome
YourWelcome is a guest experience platform based on self-service smart tablets. Its main focus is on digital guidebooks, but it also offers a range of other important features such as guest check-in, chat, and in-platform services for sales.
The main differentiator with YourWelcome is its 8-inch tablets, which come free with each package, and are installed directly into your rental, rather than working via your guests’ own smartphones.
YourWelcome key features
YourWelcome’s features are primarily designed to work best within its tablet, and create more revenue opportunities for your bookings.
They include:
- Guest check-in – In-room ‘check-in’ offers guest access to all the other features
- Property guides – Video and image descriptions of key functions within your space
- Local guides – Recommendations to the local area
- Upsells – Enabling hosts to sell early or late check-outs, equipment hire, or extra cleaning
- Partnerships with on-demand services – Offering guests convenience such as food delivery
- Advertising space – In-app promos to showcase local attractions
- In-app direct booking functionality – Enable guests to book their next trip on the spot
- Guest surveys – Ask guests for their feedback and ratings throughout the stay
- Integration with local services like Uber, StubHub, JustEat – Giving guests convenience
- Integrations – Connections with major PMSs (Escapia, Guesty, Mews, Hostaway)
YourWelcome Pricing
YourWelcome costs $199.99 per property per year for a one-year contract billed annually, including software, tablet, table stand, cable, and free replacement in case of breakage or theft. Custom packages for hosts with more than 10 properties are available via the website.
What they say about YourWelcome
YourWelcome has a 3.3 out of 5 rating on TripAdvisor. One user said: “I genuinely have never received customer service as good as Your Welcome…my guest experience and value proposition have shot up.” Another said they “offer good value for money…and an extra professional finish”.
However, some reviewers say they struggled with the user experience, software set-up, and quality of the tablets.
3. Duve
Duve is a digital platform designed for vacation rentals, which aims to connect all parts of your operation easily, from online check-in to house manual to upsells. It offers a guest app for key in-room services, and useful host features such as a unified inbox, and a marketplace for added revenue opportunities.
Duve key features
Duve includes some of the must-have customer web application features, from easier guest access to faster host communication.
They include:
- Online check-in – Enabling easy access for guests and at-a-glance management for hosts
- Guest app – Property branding, guidebook, local tips, easy customer chat for convenience
- Mobile keys – Digital, secure remote access within the guest app
- House manuals – Easily-accessible guides to each property or unit
- Upsells – Added revenue opportunities
- Unified inbox – Communication via email, chat, WhatsApp and SMS for fast responses
- Digital check-out – Enabling easy departure and streamlined turnaround coordination
- Integrations with PMSs (Guesty, Hostaway, Mews)
Pricing
Duve starts at $5 per room per month for online check-in and the guest app, rising to $6.50 with its “communication suite” added. This rises to $9 for added upsells and payment processing.
Duve also offers an Enterprise package available on request on its website.
What they say about Duve
Duve has a 4.3 out of 5 rating on Capterra, scoring 4.5 for its features, and 4.7 for value for money. One host said: “It is user friendly, and evolves according to user needs”, while another said it “keeps me organized and helps me generate the kind of revenue I had envisaged”.
4. DACK
DACK is a digital portal designed to help operators manage the guest experience and vacation rental operations remotely. With guest verification, messaging, guides, smart locks, and a huge variety of integrations, it’s a powerful platform that seeks to enable operators to maximize revenue after booking, while dovetailing neatly with your existing tech stack. Guests do need to download its app.
DACK key features
DACK’s has many of the features we’d expect in a guest communication app, with extra consideration for host workflow, too.
These include:
- In-room upsells – Opportunities for added revenue and guest satisfaction
- Guest verification – Added professionalism for your business and extra security for properties
- Digital guide – Mobile-first local recommendations to reduce questions and enhance stays
- Local recommendations – Reduce frequent guest requests and make them feel at home
- Digital access – Integration with major smart lock brands for seamless access and security
- Guest messaging – Quick responses for good guest relationships and fast communication
- Smart home and IoT integrations – In-room smart device connections for personalized stays
- Digital check-out – Enabling easy departure, turnaround coordination and review requests
- Connections with major PMSs – Including Kigo, Lodgify, Mews, IGMS, and Hostfully
DACK pricing
DACK doesn’t list pricing publicly, but it calculates packages based on the number of active units. A free demo is bookable on its website.
What they say about DACK
The Dack app has a 4.3 out of 5 rating on the Apple App Store. One user said: “I loved using DACK to find out about activities and dining spots nearby…The interface is professional and user-friendly, much better than scrolling through a website or emails, or waiting to leaf through a book after arrival.”
5. Touch Stay
Touch Stay is a simple platform that specializes in digital welcome books. It’s entirely customizable, and offers a straightforward, beautiful platform (including photos and interactive map) that provides guests with added information and local insights for that extra “cherry on top” to their stay.
Touch Stay key features
As a platform that offers guests easy-to-use welcome books, Touch Stay does not offer many of the features listed above, and is not a guest communication app in the usual sense. However, its simple, to-the-point, guidebook-focused interface could be just what you need.
Features include:
- Practical info – Giving guests check-in and check-out information before and during their stay
- Integration with Google Places – Offering real-time tailored suggestions for local tips
- Messaging scheduling – Unlimited, customized emails and SMS via guests’ welcome book
- Language translation – Multilingual options to improve guest communication and satisfaction
- Offline function – Enabling access even without reception via Progressive Web App tech
- Personalized branding, logo and colors – Show authority, expertise, and build guest loyalty
Touch Stay pricing
Touch Stay costs from $99 per unit per year, or $12.50 per unit monthly.
What they say about Touch Stay
Touch Stay gets good reviews from hosts and guest users. Host Sibllye Kim said: “Since using Touch Stay, I have had zero calls for operational reasons or questions—because it’s all on the app. I can only say I wish I had done it years earlier”.
Similarly, a guest staying at a property with a Touch Stay digital app said that it was “one of the best things about the house.”
Enso Connect alternatives for your vacation rentals: Choosing the best platform for your business
Enso Connect could be a great choice for your short-term rental business, offering a wide range of features designed to elevate the guest stay and make life a whole lot easier for hosts.
But there are compelling alternatives that could work better for you. And with its focus on enhancing the guest experience, Operto Guest could be just what you’re looking for.
Users especially love:
- Its ease of use and intuitive feel (without guests needing to download an app)
- The incredible support team
- How it enables guests to be independent throughout their stay without having to ask questions
As a simple-yet-powerful, web-based app—with added features such as translation, embedded media, and white-label global settings—Operto Guest puts the guest first and gives you hours of your time back.
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