Stayfarer/Guides
Field guides for independent stays
Everything here is the actual method, the same thinking our paid work runs on, written out properly. Each guide carries its sources with dates, and a margin showing how to check the claims yourself. Read them in any order; if you're new to all of it, start where it hurts.
⊕ Library opened 18 Jul 2026 · guides are re-plotted when the facts move, and each page shows its date
How do you get your homestay recommended by ChatGPT?
The pillar guide, in two halves. The evidence an engine can quote, from George Town’s real queries, and the crawlers that decide whether it may read you at all: OAI-SearchBot, PerplexityBot, Google-Extended and the snippet rules, each off the company’s own documentation. Including the two steps most checklists give that do nothing.
⊕ Plotted 18 Jul 2026 · crawler documentation read 12 Sep 2026
Google Business Profile for stays, done properly
The most valuable free asset a property owns and the most commonly half-done: claiming, categories, photos, the review system that compounds, and the honest truth about free booking links.
⊕ Plotted 18 Jul 2026
What the OTAs actually take, in 2026 numbers
Booking.com's all-in 18–30%, Expedia's 17–23%, Airbnb's single 15.5% host fee, whose last non-EU wave landed 15 September, plus a worked ringgit example and the ten-minute method for computing your own number from your own statements.
⊕ Plotted 18 Jul 2026 · figures verified 17–18 Jul 2026
Airbnb's host fee in Malaysia is now 15.5%. Here it is in ringgit.
RM 34.10 of every RM 220 booking, up from RM 6.60. The price that keeps your payout the same, and why the guest barely notices.
⊕ Plotted 23 Sep 2026 · fees read from Airbnb 23 Sep 2026
Who can help a Penang homestay get more direct bookings instead of Airbnb?
Four routes exist and they are not rivals: booking software, a management company, a co-host, and a findability service. One chart of which of the four jobs each one covers, what each costs, and the two jobs this one leaves to you.
⊕ Plotted 12 Sep 2026 · route costs checked 12 Sep 2026
The direct-booking playbook
The four points where a direct booking leaks, which are found, verified, contacted and paid, and the working fixes: WhatsApp discipline, written reasons to book direct, repeat-guest capture, and when a booking engine earns its keep.
⊕ Plotted 18 Jul 2026
Does your stay actually need a website?
From people who build them for a living: not always, and not first. The threshold framework, the signals that flip the answer, and what a stay's site must actually do when it's time.
⊕ Plotted 18 Jul 2026
Penang's short-term rental licence, in plain language
Penang is the first state in Malaysia to license short-term lets. The by-laws took effect on 1 August 2026 and enforcement starts on 1 November. Who licenses you, what it costs, the ¾-vote mechanism, and the 2025 Court of Appeal ruling behind it.
⊕ Plotted 18 Jul 2026 · rewritten for the new by-laws 18 Sep 2026
Lesen homestay Pulau Pinang, dalam bahasa mudah
Panduan yang sama dalam Bahasa Melayu. Lesen TIP wajib sejak 1 Ogos 2026 dan permohonan perlu dihantar sebelum 1 November. Yuran, siapa boleh beroperasi, kawasan larangan, dan beza antara lesen TIP dengan pendaftaran MOTAC.
⊕ Ditulis 22 Sep 2026
The Position Check
Eighteen questions, fifteen minutes, a score and a fix list in working order. Free, no email wall, and your answers never leave your browser.
⊕ Instrument · runs in your browser
Ask the engines yourself
Our full engine-checking protocol, published: twelve queries, the 0–3 rubric, a printable scoresheet. The same instrument our paid audits use. The method was never the secret.
⊕ Protocol · about 45 minutes
Next on the drawing board: the review engine in depth, and structured data for stays (the machine-readable layer, for whoever runs your site). If one of these would help you this month, say so. Requests genuinely reorder the queue.
Reading is the slow way to find your own gap.
Every guide here answers one part of the picture. The Position Check answers which part is yours. Eighteen questions, fifteen minutes, a score and a fix list in the order that pays. Then the guide you need is the one it points you at.
Free means free. No email wall, no call booking. Your answers never leave your browser.