Do you love our websites, social media pages, newsletter and YouTube videos? Readers we need you – please help Visit Fylde Coast to continue! There are LOADS of ways that you can help and join in. Here’s how –
Readers we need you – please help Visit Fylde Coast to continue!
Readers, we need you, our community of friends! We need you to contribute and help Visit Fylde Coast to continue bringing you interesting things in the future. Your financial help matters – but so do your comments, photos and contributions.
- Did you know? Visit Fylde Coast is independently published?
- Did you know? We don’t get any grant funding or government support?
So we have to generate income where we can! We do it in various ways, but LOTS of small, regular donations from LOTS of our lovely readers makes SUCH a difference!
Regular reader? You’ll know that Visit Fylde Coast celebrated its tenth anniversary in January 2020. We were all excited, with different plans for how we would celebrate… Then coronavirus happened shortly afterwards… But it made us creative, look at what we do, how we do it and how Visit Fylde Coast is financed. We also know we helped to keep you sane during lockdown!
However, we are one of the many businesses which didn’t qualified for any government assistance. We can’t stop working so we can’t go on Universal Credit. Meanwhile, it’s still costing us money to keep Visit Fylde Coast running – never mind that we need to eat!
Readers we need you – because publishing costs money
We’re not owned by investors or funded by any public organisations. It’s just us – a small family business, supporting ourselves and doing our best for the place we love.
Up to covid, Visit Fylde Coast was financed by advertising revenue from local businesses. With many of them hit hard by coronavirus we realised we need a variety of ways to generate income, or we won’t be able to continue to bring you Visit Fylde Coast. That’s the harsh reality.
It takes hundreds of hours and costs thousands of pounds each month to do all this.
- To publish content,
- send the weekly enews,
- run the social media pages,
- make new videos for YouTube,
- answer all your queries and emails,
- promote places, businesses and people far beyond our own product – locally, regionally and nationally,
- keep the lights on,
- the internet servers working,
- and the articles flowing.
Donate and Help Visit Fylde Coast to Continue!
If you value what we do and want it to continue, please support us by making a contribution. Truly, every little helps.
Your support helps to protect our future. It means we can keep delivering quality articles to showcase this amazing place to everyone around the world. Every contribution, however big or small, is so valuable for our future.
Make a one-off donation…
| Buy us a Coffee! | There are various ways to buy someone a virtual coffee. It’s just another way to show your support. Lots of you buy us an occasional coffee via our Ko-fi page – it’s easy and quick and means such a lot! |  Buy us a coffee here |
| Donate once with PayPal | It’s easy to donate through PayPal. You don’t need a PayPal account, just a credit card or bank details to hand. |  Donate once with PayPal |
| Donate via Visit Fylde Coast | You can make a one-off online donation through the secure shop on Visit Fylde Coast. |  Donate via Visit Fylde Coast |
…or contribute monthly
Lots of readers, each donating a small amount,for example the price of three Mars bars a month, would make SUCH a difference. Make a monthly contribution here
‘A Mars a Day helps you work, rest and play…’ so tinkled the famous advertising slogan. Now, at roughly 65p each, a Mars a day would cost you £19.50 a month… and make you put on a shedload of weight!
But a donation of a couple of pounds – the equivalent value of just three Mars Bars a month – would make a world of difference to Visit Fylde Coast. It would help us to carry on!
| Donate monthly with PayPal | It’s easy to donate through PayPal. You don’t need a PayPal account, just a credit card or bank details to hand. Follow this link for instructions. | Donate monthly with PayPal |
| Prefer another way? | Rather support us in another way? Just drop us an email for our address/bank details for BACS and cheque contributions. | Email jane@therabbitpatch.co.uk |
Monthly contributions are billed each month. You can change how much you give or cancel your contributions at any time.
How we Support the Area and Local Businesses
We go to great lengths to provide you with interesting information, photos, videos, events and much, much more. For 52 weeks of the year, for donkey’s years, we’ve tirelessly shared everything that’s great about this place.
- We work hard to endorse all the good work that the community does,
- to showcase Fylde Coast facilities,
- show-off our amazing seafront,
- support retailers in our town centres,
- showcase local businesses,
- whip up enthusiasm amongst local people,
- create a like-minded community and VFC family,
- and attract visitors from far and wide.
If you value what we do and want it to continue, please support us by making a contribution. Truly, every little helps.
Thank you.
Contribute your Content to Visit Fylde Coast
We also want to hear your stories and share your news. Here’s how to contribute your story and photos to Visit Fylde Coast.
We’re a small family team and quite limited for time. Unfortunately we won’t be able to come along to your meetings and events in person. There’s such a lot going on and so many groups it would be impossible for us to be everywhere all the time. Please don’t take it personally!
However, we REALLY want to know your news! So we’ll give you a bit of a hand in making sure that you give us all the information that we need to share your story. It’s not difficult to collect and handover what we need – but you might just need a bit of guidance!
Here’s how to contribute your story to Visit Fylde Coast.
- We publish news and stories about individuals and community* groups doing great things, completely FREE of charge.
- Got a great photo to share? Send it in. New ones, old ones, landmarks, events and places. Full photo credit will be given.
- Sorry professional photographers – we’re not able to pay a fee to use your shots. But you can watermark your photos with your name/website (just keep the photo legible!)
- If you just want to share a nice picture feel free to post it in the Visit Fylde Coast Facebook Group
Submit your news, stories and photos: simply email everything to jane@theRabbitPatch.co.uk
How to Submit your Photos
When you submit a photo you should:
- Supply your name and the location of the photo
- Make sure that people in the image have given permission to be photographed
- Always get consent when taking photos of children
- Only submit old photos which you have permission to share and are free of copyright restrictions
- Remember that obscene or inappropriate images aren’t acceptable
- We may use your photos across any of the Visit Fylde Coast channels now or in the future, but we will credit you each time we do so
- Visit Fylde Coast cannot be held liable for the content of any photos which are published in good faith.
How to Submit your Story
There’s no need to do any fancy formatting. Just type straight into the body of your email, or send a Word file – either is fine. Don’t do anything weird and wonderful, just tell a logical story in a clear and straightforward way. We can edit it and add things if you’ve underplayed it – or edit it down if you’ve said too much!
- Include WHO, WHAT, WHERE, WHEN and WHY. If you cover all those questions, you’ll have all the details for your story.
- Covering an event? Remember to include the venue, dates and times!
- Don’t worry if you’re not very good at writing. It’s not a problem. At a minimum send a list of the main points and we’ll string it into exciting sentences for you and correct any spelling mistakes. It’s not an English exam. The news is the important thing not your grasp of grammar!
- If you struggle to use a computer, email, send photos and such like, just ask and we’ll give you advice. In the course of publishing these websites we’ve taught loads of people how to do many basic IT things. How to attach files to emails, use Facebook and suchlike. It’s all part of the fun!
How to capture your story in a photo
Got a smartphone or digital camera? You’ll be able to take a photo that’s suitable for a website. Website photos need to be a smaller file size anyway. But beware – if you do decide to print your photo onto paper a small file may look blurred.
Things to watch out for:
- Make sure that everyone in the photo is looking at you.
- Make sure that the frame is filled with the people so that they are big and clear when published.
- But leave a little gap around the edge so that there’s a little room for cropping. (Like the header photo on this page).
- Take a few frames. You’ll have a few to pick from in case they’re blurred. Or someone is pulling a face or looking the other way!
- If it’s a story about something to do with people, then get people in the shot.
- If you’re outside and it’s windy, try to balance your camera/phone on something to steady it.
Just send your photos to us as the file (jpeg) that comes from your phone or camera. You don’t need to do anything to them – if they need cropping or resizing we can do that for you.
Paid Coverage/Advertising with Visit Fylde Coast
The Rabbit Patch Ltd is the publisher/owner of Visit Fylde Coast. We are a private business and this product is independently published. Our earnings come from various earned streams including advertising revenue. We are unable to publish business information free of charge.
But we do have a range of very affordable advertising options which you are welcome to take advantage of. Use it to reach our huge audience of really engaged readers and viewers.
While you’re here…
Go to the homepage of the Visit Fylde Coast website for the latest updates.
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Join us on Facebook at our Visit Fylde Coast Facebook Group Plus hundreds of videos to watch on our YouTube channel – from all over the Fylde Coast!
Booking a stay? Pick a safe, clean and legal place to stay, at the very best price. Book using the Visit Fylde Coast Accommodation guide.
