Internet staff at the Rutland & Stamford Mercury have created a new website to cover the 2001 Air Tattoo at RAF Cottesmore.

The event is the largest military air show in the world and should attract more than 250,000 visitors this year, as well as more than 400 aircraft.

The Rutland & Stamford Mercury will promote the event through both its newspapers and online at airtattoo-2001.com.

The Mercury's promotion and coverage of last year's event was such a success that this year the company is working even more closely with the Royal International Air Tattoo marketing department and has been officially named a "Newspaper of RIAT".

The website, despite being an "unofficial" venture, is offering improvements on last year's coverage, and has reached its goals of establishing a more secure environment for online ticket purchasing and producing a site that is easier to navigate, has a greater variety and depth of content and is quick to load.

The site was launched on March 25 this year and in its first month received over 5,000 page impressions, growing to around 11,000 page impressions for May. The figure is expected to rise as the Tattoo, which runs from July 25 to 28, draws closer.

The site was registered with search engines and the internet staff initially promoted the site by joining several aviation newsgroups and mentioning the site on the website discussion boards.

Back to the online index

Do you have an online story for us?
E-mail us now