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Moneyfacts.co.uk benefits from the Virgin effect

The Moneyfacts.co.uk consumer website has gone from strength to strength since Stephen Rumbelow joined the Norwich based leading independent financial comparison site earlier this year from Virgin Mobile.

Since taking the reins as head of Moneyfacts.co.uk, Stephen has used his Virgin marketing expertise to double site traffic and advertising revenue within his first six months.

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The strong cash flows that are now being generated will enable Moneyfacts.co.uk to start to invest more heavily in the site and in increased marketing activity.

The impetus created during 2007 will be taken to a whole new level, now that Paul Pester has taken up the reins as CEO of the Moneyfacts Group. Paul has an impressive track record and considerable marketing expertise, which has been the driver behind his success at Virgin Money and more recently at Lloyds TSB in his role as Managing Director of Consumer Finance.

So whilst some of the other players in the price comparison market are coming to terms with their plc status and considering their overseas expansion plans, Moneyfacts.co.uk will continue to build upon its customer driven strategy and unbiased, independent stance to give the consumer a credible and trusted alternative to other comparison sites.

Stephen Rumbelow, Head of Moneyfacts.co.uk, the leading independent financial comparison site commented:

"In September alone, we witnessed over 55% more web traffic as consumers flocked to the Moneyfacts.co.uk website last month for information on what the Northern Rock crisis meant, whether their savings were safe and which savings company was owned by whom.

"This indicates that consumers will turn to a trusted, independent and unbiased source in times of market turmoil and uncertainty.

"In today's very crowded price comparison market, it's not easy for consumers to know who to trust; whether best buy tables are driven by what's best for the consumer or what's best for the comparison sites sales revenues, and whether to trust those comparison sites that are backed by financial institutions which may have other vested interests.

"The Northern Rock crisis gave us a strong indication that Moneyfacts.co.uk is extremely well positioned to deal with customer anxiety and to start to tackle the high level of mistrust consumers have with financial services in general. Given the ex-Virgin presence now within the business we will be making strong inroads into understanding customers' needs, identifying areas where they are being badly served and developing a comparison service that's better, fresher and more innovative than those of our competitors."