David beats Goliath... again! Press Release

Former_MSE_Andrea

This is a press release that we've sent out. We thought MoneySavers would like to see!

David beats Goliath.... again!!!
Consumer Revenge website founded for £100 becomes UK’s biggest money/consumer website in less than three years

MoneySavingExpert.com, the consumer revenge website, has just become the UK’s biggest money site, overtaking iii.co.uk on internet tracker Alexa.com’s worldwide rankings.

Founded in February 2003 by ultra-specialised journalist, Money Saving Expert Martin Lewis, the site has the radical motto “we spend our lives being screwed by companies for profit, this site is about how to screw them back”.

It began rather innocuously, during the course of Martin’s broadcast and writing research for his MoneySaving work, he began emailing tips of ways to save money that needed to be done quickly to his friends, jokingly calling them ‘Martin’s Money Tips’. Very soon he went to parties where people he’d never met came up and thanked him for his tips, which friends had been forwarding on.

So he decided to set up MoneySavingExpert.com as a help and collect the email list himself. That was less than three years ago and the e-mail now goes to nearly 400,000 people every week and the site has 1.5 million visits a month all in the UK.

The progress of a little site has taken it past such mammoth beasts as moneysupermarket.com and Associated Newspapers’ Thisismoney website. It’s now the UK’s busiest finance site, offering advice on how to save money on anything and everything, find the best deals and beat the system.

People have flocked due to its unique content, prescriptive aggressive stance, and non profit driven ethical stance.

The Top UK Consumer Money Websites by worldwide ranking (source: Alexa.com)

3,333 MoneySavingExpert.com: Consumer and Personal Finance

3,619 iii.co.uk: Stockmarket & Personal Finance
4,832 The Motley Fool (UK): Stockmarket & Personal Finance
7,530 MoneySupermarket: Personal Finance Comparisons
12,723 Uswitch: Consumer and Personal Finance Comparisons
14,078 Moneyexpert.com: Personal Finance Comparisons
15,122 Thisismoney: Personal Finance
15,763 Moneyextra: Personal Finance Comparisons
26,539 Moneyfacts: Consumer and Personal Finance
42,296 Moneynet: Personal Finance Comparisons


The website, which is totally free to use and has no advertising, is still 100% owned, run, and written by Money Saving Expert Martin Lewis, who is currently presenting ITV1’s Make Me Rich and is author of the bestselling Money Diet book.

The site has hugely popular chat forums where tens of thousands of people every day discuss top bargains and how to take companies on. Last month it was awarded Bradford & Bingley personal finance website of the year.

Martin Lewis, creator of the site says:

"The growth has been gobsmacking. I can't believe that in such a short time the site has become mammoth. This is a lesson to all the commercial sites out there who believe that a high marketing spend to build traffic – which flogs ads and makes money – is the only way. By simply providing the best information and building a community of people all with the same aims, the web allows anyone to take on the big beasts, and for the moment at least, in the money world, it seems we've won!"


Notes to Editors

1. Alexa.com is owned by Amazon, using a toolbar to sample web usage it provides a ranking of websites across the world, listing the biggest traffic. All the data for every site can be viewed at alexa.com

2. MoneySavingExpert.com is a free to use, free of advertising consumer finance help website. The aim of the site is simple; showing people how to save money on anything and everything and fight back against big companies’ profiteering.

3. Martin Lewis is an award-winning TV & radio presenter, and the regular Money Saving Expert on Radio 2, Radio Five Live and ITV1’s Tonight with Trevor MacDonald as well as author of bestselling Money Diet. He is the UK’s only professional Money Saving Expert and spends his journalistic life focusing on how to cut bills without cutting back. Both Martin and MoneySavingExpert.com have been commended in an Early Day Motion in Parliament for their work in ensuring consumers get value for money. The site recently won the Personal Finance New Media of the year award. Martin’s new TV show Make Me Rich is currently showing on ITV.

carol_a_3

Wow...that's brilliant and I'm proud to be a small part (as a site user) of it. Well done Martin and everyone else.

Debras_Angel

:j I'm delighted for everyone on the site and it makes it worthwhile when friends are now signing up and saving money too.

:xmassign:

Cheers to all the team who keep it ticking over for us site users.

Erin

Congratulations Martin! The plaudits are well deserved. You have saved me money more than once. Thanks to Andrea and everyone who contributes to the site

robnye

well done........ up there at the top... where it should be.....

photome

This is good news. well done! Wish everbody i tell, would look and use the site, most people just think i am a sad git going on about how good it is

jaffa30

Well done .

Its a great site.

Keep up the good work

Jaffa

robowen

photome wrote:

This is good news. well done! Wish everbody i tell, would look and use the site, most people just think i am a sad git going on about how good it is

Don't worry ....I get the same treatment from my friends :think:

..lost count of the times they have asked me to look for something cheap from the boards !!! or where to get the cheapest gas / leccy ! :snow_laug

Well done Martin ! and more importantly....Well done MSE'ers for spreading the word !

rob :xmassign: