A Cracked Code: The Visibility of Rentals. How Can You Profit? with Bart-Jan Leyts: An EOFire Classic from 2023 - Entrepreneurs on Fire Recap

Podcast: Entrepreneurs on Fire

Published: 2025-12-28

Duration: 22 minutes

Guests: Bart-Jan Leyts

Summary

Bart-Jan Leyts discusses optimizing rental visibility through strategic algorithms to boost profitability. He emphasizes the importance of treating rentals as businesses and leveraging data for better market positioning.

What Happened

Bart-Jan Leyts, founder of Loreca, delves into his journey of creating an algorithm that enhances the visibility of rentals on platforms like Booking.com and Airbnb. Initially developed to help his father's bed and breakfast in Bruges, this algorithm increases a property's ranking, resulting in more bookings and higher daily rates, demonstrating a significant 24% increase in key performance indicators.

Leyts highlights the importance of becoming the CEO rather than just the manager of a rental. He believes that many rental owners focus too much on operations without developing a strategic vision for growth. By maximizing visibility on platforms like Booking.com, owners can increase their bookings and revenue.

The algorithm's effectiveness relies on understanding the market dynamics of online travel agencies (OTAs). For instance, maximizing presence on Booking.com can lead to a higher ranking, which in turn directs more traffic and bookings to a property, effectively utilizing the 'billboard effect' to drive traffic to direct booking sites.

Leyts addresses the challenges young entrepreneurs face, emphasizing the value of learning from mistakes and the importance of a supportive network. He shares his experience of scaling a business at the age of 23, focusing on building the right team and automating processes to ensure consistency and efficiency.

He also stresses the importance of identifying underserved niches in the market. By being the first mover, Leyts was able to establish a leadership position in optimizing rental visibility, despite facing initial challenges in development and execution.

The episode concludes with Leyts encouraging entrepreneurs to be brave and take risks, highlighting that opportunities might be seized by others if not acted upon. His journey exemplifies the potential of leveraging technological solutions to solve real-world problems in the hospitality industry.

Key Insights