Motoring.co.uk is launching a new website in August which it claims will be "the only website of its kind" in the automotive market.

Little details of the results of a £300,000 investment are available yet, but the move has come as Motoring.co.uk reports the landmark of one million unique visitors in a calendar month*.

Terry Hogan, co-founder of Motoring.co.uk, said: "Our growth in traffic is part of our testing prior to a major new product launch mid-year, which will see a step-change in our product offering, so that it is more aligned to e-commerce and social sites than classified sites. 

"Over the last few years, we have seen very little ‘new’ from the major classified portals and we include ourselves in that mix. The sector is stale and lacks real innovation, and our aim is to shake things up a little bit.

“We firmly believe that there is an opportunity for a data-centric business like ours, to use technology to make it easier for car manufacturers, their dealer networks and consumers to transact with each other. The industry can’t keep passing users from website to website, with each dealing with a little piece of the user’s needs.  This just isn’t what people are looking for. Consumers are looking for real advances in product and something that makes their whole vehicle ownership experience easier.

“Big data and social media are threads that run right through the new website, and our increase in visitors has proven that our community model can help us grow profitably. It’s fair to say that if you exclude Auto Trader, there aren’t a lot of motoring portals making money in the UK, even ones that have been backed by huge plcs or publishers.

"Businesses that copy the Auto Trader model will struggle to make ends meet, as the gap between paying for visitors and branding and establishing an audience of anything like that size is simply too big, especially with a one-dimensional product offering."

Motoring.co.uk is an independently owned automotive website and has an active community of over 1.7 million registered motorists, which is growing at a rate of over 50,000 fresh car owners subscribing every month. More than eight million unique in-market consumers visit the Motoring.co.uk website annually, delivering over 120,000 new and used car leads.

(*Source: Unique visitors between 14 February – 16 March, Google Analytics)