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The regional press has always seemed like a benevolent grandfather to the rest of the media industry, consistent and dependable, looking on with a shake of the head at the ups and downs of other sectors such as TV and the internet. But it's not very glamorous, is it? It's really just a mass recruitment device, ideal for local businesses to pick up apprentices and clerks, but it's useless for anything more adventurous such as branding campaigns - right?

Wrong. A study undertaken on behalf of PG Tips' parent company Van de Bergh foods, and funded by the regional press as part of the medium's £250,000 drive to demonstrate its effectiveness to national advertisers, showed heightened awareness of the PG Tips brand in the test areas of Tyne Tees and East Anglia could be directly linked to regional press activity.

With all other advertising activity suspended in the two regions during the four-week campaign, full-colour, full-page ads appeared twice a week in the local evening papers. The spend per capita on PG Tips
subsequently increased by 17.6% among consumers most exposed to the advertising - frequent readers of the evening titles - according to researcher Taylor Nelson Sofres.

The research, released two weeks ago (September 21) by the Newspaper Society, is one of the increasing instances of the regional press proving its worth as a vehicle for branding and driving sales to national brands.

Indeed, using regional press has meant some brands have got to the parts others have failed to reach, which, for some clients, is invaluable. For example: a few of the sector's sales houses and media owners worked together to attract the Central Office of Information's "I couldn't do that, could you?" police recruitment campaign, which has also run nationally in other media such as TV.

"This continues the branding campaign, recruits people and has the social message of showing a little old lady living in a backstreet somewhere that they're recruiting police officers - and the regional press is the best medium for doing that," says Amra chief executive Mike McCormack.

"We're now being included in strategic thinking as well as the tactical thinking surrounding store openings and so on."

But, in addition to showing that the regional press is fighting fit, developing new revenue streams and feeling optimistic in a recession that has undermined the national media, the interesting aspect of the COI campaign is that Amra consulted with Northcliffe, Regional Independent Media and the Manchester Evening News in order to put together a convincing pitch.

"Instead of the COI having to go to each single group, we came back and said we can make this work," says McCormack. "This wouldn't have happened five years ago and we would've been struck off the schedule." 

Amra, in particular, has often been one part of this kind of unified front, having sold on behalf of other groups to advertisers including Scottish Quality Beef & Lamb and the Meat & Livestock Commission. And this united spirit is the driving force behind the Newspaper Society, which, with its Creating New Perspectives campaign, has started to approach major advertisers in the same way as the Radio Advertising Bureau has done on behalf of its own growing medium.

But the Newspaper Society's marketing strategies and press releases, and Amra trimming the volume of invoices and admin sent to buyers, are not the only manifestations of this sense of cooperation. In
Manchester, there have been a number of deals involving ownership and programming, which have made life easier for media owners and have improved the end product.

Since its launch in September 1998, the Manchester Evening News has worked particularly closely with Century Radio. The installation of an ISDN line means the Evening News' sports editor and reporters can comment on the radio station each morning about what's in the newspaper that day, providing breaking news for the radio station and publicity for the paper.

"We decided to do it because their listener profile was closely aligned to our readership," says MEN advertisement director Mark Rix. "With these obvious synergies, we were either going to fight each other or work together and since the launch we've had the view that there's more to be gained by working together."

The two groups are now looking at ways of extending the bonhomie enjoyed by their editorial departments into their respective sales operations.

"We're analyzing the advertisers that don't use either of us and there seems to be mileage in it for us to examine bespoke packages. We're investigating those avenues and identifying who those advertisers are," says Rix.

And, as in other northern cities, Associated News-papers has awarded the MEN its franchise for the Metro in the North-west, with Associated producing the editorial in London and the MEN's owner, the Guardian Media Group, handling distribution. Rix's team deals with the local and classified ads and Associated's team in the capital sells to national advertisers.

Some of the incentives introduced to Manchester by the Evening News and its partners are soon being rolled out in the Middlesbrough area by the Gazette Media Group. And, if the Newspaper Society's
Advertising Conference, held in Blackpool last month, is anything to go by, this cross-company, cross-media cooperation is key to the regional press' future.

This theme dominated the conference speeches given by figures such as Edwin Boorman, president of the Newspaper Society and chairman of the Kent Messenger Group, and event chairman Bob Cuffe, advertising director at the Gazette Media Company.

"This is an industry where people have very big egos and any advantage is only transitory, so why not share with the rest of the industry ideas that work?" said Boorman. "If everybody does this, the industry benefits - indeed, for every one new idea we've had at the KMG, we've stolen 99."

Cuffe said: "We want regional press to take money from other media by spreading good news and helping others to achieve what we have and, in the same vein, we will task key managers with stealing ideas from them.

"Obviously, we're not as likely to share ideas with somebody down the road, but if someone's 250 miles away what's the harm?"

Also speaking at the conference, Trinity Mirror Regional managing director Stephen Parker revealed his group's plans to pool resources and standardize advertising practices.

This will involve the introduction of a series of group-wide performance indicators, agreed on by managing directors and ad directors at both group and local level, and the establishment of an "ideas box".

Containing more than 100 new ideas, the box aims to drive new product development, which will also be supported by a central fund, to which the new regional businesses can apply for financial help.

Despite Trinity Mirror Regional's plans to cut 800 jobs over the next three years and Boorman and Cuffe's talk of stealing ideas, this sense of cooperation is enough to warm the cockles of the most cynical media heart - especially as it's geared toward attracting more
revenue.

But is this really a long-term strategic solution for the regional press - it's hard to imagine feuding Scottish titles, the Herald and The Scotsman and their Sunday editions joining hands - or is it just this sector's way of weathering the recession?

The latter view seems unlikely, mostly because the recession isn't biting the regional press as harshly as other media. Although a downturn is starting to be seen in recruitment revenues, the UK automobile industry is picking up and most regional titles seem to have some solid local display advertising business to fall back on.

The Manchester Evening News, for example, has two healthy revenue streams in the entertainment and property sectors - the city has reinvented itself as a centre of café and bar culture over the last three years, says Rix, and its property market's also booming thanks to urban regeneration.

Similarly, the Sunday Herald has tapped into the youth market - it now claims to have the youngest readership of any quality newspaper in the UK, following its brand campaign this year featuring a Dido soundtrack. Of its 170,000 readers, 41% are younger than 35.

Casting aside current concerns about the recession, then, it seems the rhetoric about cooperation and unity emerging from the Newspaper Society and other regional press bodies could well be part of a long-term view. But is it helping with the important job of impressing the people that spend the money - the agencies?

"The regional press has been united by a desire to grow its share of national business, which has clearly motivated its members to work more closely together in terms of a common approach and research to attract these advertisers," says Universal McCann
Manchester managing director Mark Hodkinson. "At Universal McCann we welcome moves such as the Regional Press Club when it adds value to our clients' business."

Starcom Motive buying manager Katie Prentice, who specializes in regional press and magazines, agrees with this view, but feels there is still much ground to be covered.

"Incentives like the Focus package, where you can make one booking and get 73 evening newspaper bookings in one go, are great, but there should be more initiatives to attract national advertisers," she says. "I'd also like to see the Newspaper Society doing even more to attract more national advertisers."