Professionalisation and performance of Airbnb hosts in rural regions.

This paper explores the professionalisation and performance aspects of Airbnb hosts in rural regions in Denmark, Iceland, and Norway. More specifically, based upon the professionalisation of hosts, which represents a proxy for the scale of their entrepreneurial engagement, the host landscape in the rural regions is investigated, resulting in different host profiles, including individual single- and multiple-listing hosts, and small and large tourism companies. The paper subsequently estimates the service quality performance of Airbnb hosts in relation to their professionalisation in rural regions through a u-shaped relationship, with the professionalisation influencing the performance evaluation of the hosts by the users. This twofold empirical analysis amends the extant literature, as it provides both a more nuanced and more comprehensive description of the nature and scale of Airbnb host engagement in rural regions, and points to the vast entrepreneurial opportunities for private households and companies on the platform. • Airbnb hosts in rural regions attract new travellers and amend a "thin" accommodation infrastructure. • This paper explores Airbnb host profiles in rural regions through a professionalisation-performance relationship. • The study finds multiple host profiles: individual (single- and multiple-listing) and commercial hosts (small and large tourist companies). • Individual hosts are important for a high service quality for Airbnb guests in rural regions, commercial hosts receive lower performance values by guests. • The different profiles point to various opportunities for private households and local businesses on Airbnb in rural regions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]