Met Office becomes first government website to carry ads

The Met Office is to carry ads for Best Western hotels on its website, becoming the first government site feature commercial advertising.

Met Office website
Met Office website

The newly relaunched site attracts 3m unique users a month and Jason Munslow, acting head of e-commerce and distribution at Best Western, believes it will help the company target potential customers.

“Weather is always important for people looking to book a break in the UK so there is a great synergy between the brands,” he says.

The campaign will feature a series of online skyscraper adverts, which will be updated in real time with special offers.

Charles Ewen, head of web business at the Met Office, thinks this development will benefit advertisers and the department.

“This initiative gives companies the chance to place their brand alongside that of the Met Office. By opening up this new revenue stream, we will also be able to invest more in the service provided on our website,” he says.

Meanwhile,following a comprehensive tender process, the Met Office has selected GOSS Interactive to design and build its website and provide web content management, using GOSS iCM (intelligent Content Management). Prior to the selection of GOSS, the Met Office was using a manual approach to content management. The use of GOSS iCM will allow the Met Office to better manage the life-cycle of content on its website. In addition, it will improve the targeting of content for specialist groups, such as those which have a requirement for weather and climate information.