A MASSIVE tourism campaign is being launched today in the hope of drawing record numbers of new visitors to the city this year.

VisitWiltshire is launching its biggest ‘Visit Salisbury’ campaign to date, promoting the city as the perfect short-break destination.

The £40,000 publicity drive – which will see 150,000 glossy eight-page leaflets inside this Saturday’s Times and Daily Telegraph – highlights the city’s rich heritage.

The tourist board hopes its campaigns will boost the county’s economy by more than £15 million over the next 12 months.

VisitWiltshire marketing manager Fiona Errington said: “We’ve had fantastic support from Salisbury tourism businesses and we’re confident that, alongside our other national marketing campaigns, it will result in another record year for Wiltshire and Salisbury tourism in 2015.”

The campaign will focus on the Magna Carta 800 celebrations as well as the city’s attractions, events, festivals, arts, culture and evening entertainment.

It also showcases Salisbury’s accommodation, independent shops, food and drink.

Salisbury Business Improvement District (BID) project manager Robin McGowan said: “This plans to be a very busy and exciting year for the city and its many different businesses and we hope that everyone will in some way be able to take advantage of the increased exposure for Salisbury and the additional footfall that we will see this year in our fantastic city.”

The campaign also involves online publicity and adverts on South West Trains.

It follows the success of the ‘Fall in Love with Salisbury’ campaign in 2014, which helped attract record numbers of tourists to the city.

Salisbury Cathedral is the campaign’s major sponsor.

VistWiltshire, its partners, Salisbury BID and VisitEngland are funding the campaign.