The way people discover experiences is quietly but fundamentally changing.
Increasingly, discovery happens in place—on a phone, in the moment, guided by proximity and curiosity rather than pre-planning. Mobile has become the connective tissue between people and place.
For destinations, museums, cities, and tour operators, this shift introduces a practical challenge: How do you ensure your stories are discoverable when and where visitors are ready to engage—while choosing the publishing model that best fits your goals, timeline, and audience?
That question is exactly what STQRY Guide was designed to address.
What Is STQRY Guide?
STQRY Guide is a portal-style app that allows organizations to publish their tours and experiences into a shared discovery platform—alongside other trusted organizations and locations.
Rather than requiring each customer to launch and independently promote their own app, STQRY Guide acts as a centralized directory, listing experiences from many organizations in one centralized portal.
Content is discovered in two core ways:
- Location-based discovery: The home screen is sorted by the user’s physical location, meaning nearby experiences naturally appear first.
- Category listings: Experiences are grouped by genre, allowing users to explore themes such as history, art, or outdoor exploration.
For STQRY customers, this model reduces friction for audiences while increasing the likelihood that content is found organically—especially by visitors who weren’t actively searching for a specific organization.
Many organizations choose both: STQRY Guide for portal-based discovery, and a fully branded standalone app or web app powered by STQRY Apps for a dedicated, organization-owned experience distributed via the Apple App Store, Google Play, or the web.
What Makes STQRY Guide Different
Organizations publishing within STQRY Guide have access to STQRY’s full feature set, including:
- Quizzes
- Before/After image sliders
- Mapping options
- Badges
- Support for AR
- Geofencing with location alerts and automatic audio play
- Customizable layouts that adapt to different use cases
Equally important is the level of support behind the technology.
STQRY provides round-the-clock support and dedicated Customer Success Managers who assist with training and content recommendations. With 19 years in business, STQRY brings long-standing experience supporting museums, cities, parks, tour operators, hotels and properties, universities, and cultural organizations worldwide.
Unlike some publishing platforms, STQRY takes no ownership of your content. Legal rights remain entirely with the organization that created it. Each listing maintains the organization’s branding, voice, and structure—STQRY Guide simply provides the discovery layer.
Flexible Monetization and Clear Control
STQRY Guide is designed to accommodate a wide range of budgets and business models.
Pricing starts at $495 per year, offering a low barrier to entry for organizations that want to launch or expand mobile storytelling.
Customers can choose how their content is accessed—offering experiences for free, or monetizing them easily through built-in options such as:
- Code sales and redemption
- Apple & Google in-app purchasing
STQRY can also provide translation and audio recording services, ensuring accessibility and consistency without requiring additional vendors or workflows.
Who STQRY Guide Is For
STQRY Guide is particularly well-suited for organizations that want to balance visibility with practicality, including:
- Museums and cultural institutions
- Cities, towns, and local governments
- Historic sites and heritage organizations
- Public art programs
- Walking tour operators
- Parks, trails, and outdoor destinations
It works especially well for teams looking to pilot an experience, reduce app management overhead, or complement an existing on-site or guided offering.
How Discovery Works in Practice
From the visitor’s perspective,someone spending the day in Washington, DC, might open the app and immediately see nearby experiences—such as a public art tour in the Golden Triangle, an experience at Arlington National Cemetery, or stories exploring the history of the Anacostia River.
The discovery occurs because the content was relevant to where they were and what they were interested in.
For STQRY customers, that context-driven discovery is the value.
Built—and Used—by the STQRY Team
STQRY Guide is not just a product the team supports—it’s one they actively use.
During a recent team bonding trip in Southeast Asia, the team created a walking tour and published it directly into STQRY Guide. The experience moved from idea to live listing in less than one week, without custom development or additional infrastructure.
To explore it firsthand: Access the STQRY Guide App → Search for “George Town History Tour” → Enter the code: STQRYGOESLOCAL
A Practical Publishing Model for Modern Discovery
STQRY Guide is not positioned as a replacement for branded apps. It’s a flexible publishing option within the broader STQRY ecosystem—one that prioritizes discoverability, control, and sustainability.
For organizations navigating changing visitor behavior, crowded app marketplaces, and limited internal resources, STQRY Guide offers a measured, realistic way to meet audiences where they already are—while keeping ownership, flexibility, and long-term support firmly in place.