euromost.info
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Hi There
Thanks for looking in. In my teenage years travel was limited to a fairly predictable western Europe that was enjoyable but in many ways superficial and costly. In the 1990s after the fall of communism the iron curtain melted and a new Europe was born. Many mysteries,and myths could now be explored aided by the timely rise of low cost airlines such as Easyjet and Ryanair. In 2003 my then girlfriend asked me what my main unfilled life ambition was. The answer was simple: for years I had wanted to go to Prague and place flowers on the memorial to Jan Palach who burnt himself to death as a protest against the Russian run Warsaw Pact ire-occupation of the city in 1968 in the twilight of the Prague Spring.
A few months later as a Christmas present she took me there and I fell for Prague as well. That trip to one of the worlds architecturally beautiful cities was repeated several times along with other fascinating cities in and eastern Europe.
Some of these trips were challenging as we were travelling independently which was then and still is often far cheaper package deals but that meant we had no set tours to go on or tour guides to advise us of what was worth seeing or of any tourist traps etc Because of our repeated trips to Prague initially we decided to build a website for that city but added Berlin, Budapest,to the plan and www. euromost.info was born in 2004.
From the it's conception the objective of euromost.info has been to provide visitors to the site with good information about the featured cities. As a former regular traveller it became obvious that information should not only include information on airports attractions and clubs but also background information that offers some basic understanding of it's history - there is after all more to Rome than cappuccino or very expensive bottles of water! Consequently all the guides are heavily weighted with editorial (rather than pretty pictures) over several pages.
The site was structured to feature half a dozen cities built in a small web program. The program kept crashing as it could not handle the size of the website and it was rebuilt in Adobe - Dreamwaverin 2007. Five years later Wordpress includes was integrated with that program but the interface between them is a nightmare to manage. The city carousel in the header is not movable or extendable. Consequently it to is very difficult for visitors to navigate or for me to add additional pages that are easily accessible to visitors.
The current layout means that the google ads are 'random; as they are located in the header set up and do not relate to the individual content of each page - and the yield is therefor minimal. The site needs to be restructured and rebuilt in word press. Currently the site has well over 300 pages but in draft form I have a 140 pager London guide and a 40 page european LGBT guide waiting to integrated and uploaded when the site is revamped. Even when they are added the site urgently needs additional guides for Athens Brussels Dublin Edinburgh and Lisbon
My belief is that euromost is one of the most informative sites about Europe in the world. Personal bias aside it seems that Google agrees as currently if you put the search term 'european city guides' into google euromost is in the top three of the results on page 1. The same result applies if you put he search term 'europe city guides' into google. Over the last three weeks in May both search terms have been No.1 in the world most days. Unfortunately my lack of technical skills in coding and programming mean that until these issues are addressed it will not be financially viable however good the content is or however highly ranked it is in google.
With the benefit of hindsight my enthusiasm for researching and building the site without paying more attention to the technical issues was a serious mistake. The cost of addressing these issues with professional help and employing someone to help deal with drafts and further research is likely over the nest year to be a capital cost of between £35,000 - £40,000. Given the my that since it is impossible for me to raise that capital as it is struggle covering the ongoing monthly cost of managing and running the site the only option available to me is this appeal for funding.
Euromost is unique - to my knowledge there is no other contemporary travel site with so much editorial content covering such an extensive area. If you travel abroad or use to travel please visit the site - your probably at least add it your favourites or share it with friends and family.. You might even share it with someone you don't like in the hope they will go on a long European tour!
So if you think the site site has merit and are able to help me in spite of my past mistakes in it's development any contribution you can make will be really appreciated it - more than you can imagine probably. If your not minded to help thanks anyway for the taking the time to read this.
Take care and good luck
Oliver
Thanks for looking in. In my teenage years travel was limited to a fairly predictable western Europe that was enjoyable but in many ways superficial and costly. In the 1990s after the fall of communism the iron curtain melted and a new Europe was born. Many mysteries,and myths could now be explored aided by the timely rise of low cost airlines such as Easyjet and Ryanair. In 2003 my then girlfriend asked me what my main unfilled life ambition was. The answer was simple: for years I had wanted to go to Prague and place flowers on the memorial to Jan Palach who burnt himself to death as a protest against the Russian run Warsaw Pact ire-occupation of the city in 1968 in the twilight of the Prague Spring.
A few months later as a Christmas present she took me there and I fell for Prague as well. That trip to one of the worlds architecturally beautiful cities was repeated several times along with other fascinating cities in and eastern Europe.
Some of these trips were challenging as we were travelling independently which was then and still is often far cheaper package deals but that meant we had no set tours to go on or tour guides to advise us of what was worth seeing or of any tourist traps etc Because of our repeated trips to Prague initially we decided to build a website for that city but added Berlin, Budapest,to the plan and www. euromost.info was born in 2004.
From the it's conception the objective of euromost.info has been to provide visitors to the site with good information about the featured cities. As a former regular traveller it became obvious that information should not only include information on airports attractions and clubs but also background information that offers some basic understanding of it's history - there is after all more to Rome than cappuccino or very expensive bottles of water! Consequently all the guides are heavily weighted with editorial (rather than pretty pictures) over several pages.
The site was structured to feature half a dozen cities built in a small web program. The program kept crashing as it could not handle the size of the website and it was rebuilt in Adobe - Dreamwaverin 2007. Five years later Wordpress includes was integrated with that program but the interface between them is a nightmare to manage. The city carousel in the header is not movable or extendable. Consequently it to is very difficult for visitors to navigate or for me to add additional pages that are easily accessible to visitors.
The current layout means that the google ads are 'random; as they are located in the header set up and do not relate to the individual content of each page - and the yield is therefor minimal. The site needs to be restructured and rebuilt in word press. Currently the site has well over 300 pages but in draft form I have a 140 pager London guide and a 40 page european LGBT guide waiting to integrated and uploaded when the site is revamped. Even when they are added the site urgently needs additional guides for Athens Brussels Dublin Edinburgh and Lisbon
My belief is that euromost is one of the most informative sites about Europe in the world. Personal bias aside it seems that Google agrees as currently if you put the search term 'european city guides' into google euromost is in the top three of the results on page 1. The same result applies if you put he search term 'europe city guides' into google. Over the last three weeks in May both search terms have been No.1 in the world most days. Unfortunately my lack of technical skills in coding and programming mean that until these issues are addressed it will not be financially viable however good the content is or however highly ranked it is in google.
With the benefit of hindsight my enthusiasm for researching and building the site without paying more attention to the technical issues was a serious mistake. The cost of addressing these issues with professional help and employing someone to help deal with drafts and further research is likely over the nest year to be a capital cost of between £35,000 - £40,000. Given the my that since it is impossible for me to raise that capital as it is struggle covering the ongoing monthly cost of managing and running the site the only option available to me is this appeal for funding.
Euromost is unique - to my knowledge there is no other contemporary travel site with so much editorial content covering such an extensive area. If you travel abroad or use to travel please visit the site - your probably at least add it your favourites or share it with friends and family.. You might even share it with someone you don't like in the hope they will go on a long European tour!
So if you think the site site has merit and are able to help me in spite of my past mistakes in it's development any contribution you can make will be really appreciated it - more than you can imagine probably. If your not minded to help thanks anyway for the taking the time to read this.
Take care and good luck
Oliver
Organiser
Oliver Dines
Organiser
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