Former England rugby captain Will Carling helped Twickenham Experience launch its new website, as the stadium ploughs investment into its events business ahead of the Olympics.

Former VisitBritain head of business visits, Simon Mills joined Twickenham Experience as head of sales and marketing in June and has since overseen the appointment of two key sales staff, as well as the website overhaul.

He said: “A lot more event space will come online in East London after the Olympics, particularly on the stadium side, so we need to make sure our game is raised ahead of that.”

He added: “When I started I was surprised at how great the non-match day space is here. People don’t know about it, so we’ve got a job to do to raise that profile, but we’ve now got the resources to do that.”

Matthew Blood joins the sales team as key account manager from ExCeL London and Antony Deacon joins as sales executive from Guardian News & Media.

“These are two very experienced sales staff,” said Mills. “Matt’s got the corporate contacts and can win us business. Antony will drive the associate accounts and we’re aiming for 30 per cent growth with RFU partners in the next year.”

Mills added that the stadium would also focus on winning business from overseas markets, capitalising on its location close to Heathrow Airport.

He said: “We’re looking for business from France, Ireland and Italy and we’ll be attending some of the European shows and working with London & Partners on some of their sales missions to those markets.”

Meanwhile, former Harlequins centre, Carling gave the refreshed website www.twickenhamexperience.com the thumbs up.  The site features an instant search facility, downloadable PDFs, case studies and live social media feeds.

Pictured: Simon Mills and Will Carling