“… the excellent VentnorBlog.”
The Guardian

VentnorBlog is an award-winning Isle of Wight news publication that’s been reporting for over six years (since September 2005), having published over 14,000 articles and gathered over 60,000 readers comments.

During that time, the team has grown considerably (we’ve published articles from nearly 500 people!), but we’re still united in an enthusiasm to bring readers important news stories from across the whole of the Isle of Wight.

What we hear from VB readers is that they trust us – and that’s important to us.

Editorial
If you’ve got a news story that you think other Islanders would be interested in, whether you’ve got something to say, or a story lead, get in touch. We’d love to hear from you.

Over the time VB been running, close to 500 people (as at June 2011) have had articles published on VentnorBlog, giving many of them a voice they wouldn’t otherwise have had.

Success for our advertisers
We’re happy to share our large readership with businesses. We’ve brought success to many Island businesses, like the Garlic Festival, whose Chairman, David Holmes, said, “I would thoroughly recommend VentnorBlog to any Island business looking for cost effective advertising and outstanding value for money.”

If you’re interested in boosting your business, get in touch and we can outline the promotional packages we can help you with.

Growing traffic
January 2010 was our busiest month on record with over 160,000 visits to the site, boosted no doubt by our continuous coverage of how services were affected during the heavy snow.

We love our readers
It’s our readers that make us feel special and we’re very proud to have a very active, engaged community around VB.

The level of comments has really pleased us with the current total standing at over 29,000 (as at 1.Sep.10) 45,000 (as at June.11) 60,000 (as at June.11) – and growing at 76 a day.

Innovation
We use technical advances to get our readers closer to the news and events.

We’ve been reporting live from significant Isle of Wight council meetings as far back as February 2007. Here are a few examples …

• Live coverage of Full council vote on proposed budget cuts
• Live coverage of Cabinet Committee discussing the future of Island’s theatres
• Live coverage of Overview and Scrutiny Committee meeting
• Live coverage of a particularly contentious planning application

As well as tweeting from Bestival as far back as 2006, we also delivered live video broadcasts from Bestival in 2008 to give those unable to attend, a flavour of what they were missing.

Interactive timelines have felt like the best way to express complex information.

Our coverage of the Vestas sit-in, that started as a small, local story, expanded to a long-running international story.

Accolades
We’ve been delighted with the praise that VentnorBlog has received from many circles.

On a local level, most recently we were delighted to hear at a public meeting that many people on the Island say, “I don’t believe it until I’ve read it on VentnorBlog!” We couldn’t be more flattered.

On the National-side, as well as winning the inaugural Best UK Hyperlocal site award, our reporting has also been acknowledged.

Guardian journalist Sarah Harte nominated VB for the Best Forensic Reporting Award.

Judith Townend, senior reporter, Journalism.co.uk, picked VB‘s coverage of the Vestas sit-in in her Best New Media of 2009, sitting alongside The Observer.

Testimonials
Many people have said great things about VentnorBlog. Below is a small selection.

• I read VentnorBlog every evening – David Pugh, Leader of the IW Council
• VentnorBlog … showing us how high-quality hyperlocal reporting is done – Judith Townend, Journalism.co.uk
• This is a really influential blog – Rob Da Bank, Founder of Bestival
• VentnorBlog rules … If that isn’t the future of local news, I’m a monkey’s uncle – William Perrin, Talk About Local
• We read VentnorBlog to find out what’s really happening on the Island – District Auditor
• Thank you for putting our story up. We’ve already had a great response from people who have seen it on VB and got in touch, so it was a great help – Ben Rust, Earl Mountbatten Hospice
• As always, VentnorBlog first on the scene! – Tony Tutton, Property Manager, Isle of Wight