Don't forget about Regional!

Hertfordshire's Local Paper

After my 3 week stint in press, I have a week in regional - which is not just regional press but regional everything! Until I got here and did not realise how important regional is to most of our clients. Most advertisers think big and think national - how can I communicate our message to the masses? However, this is not a rule of thumb, sometimes you need to start small and local to get the greatest impact for your message.

Regional works across all mediums; TV, Radio, Outdoor, Press, Internet, Door Drops etc, but on a localised basis. In press alone they deal with over 1400 titles, compared to the 20 something titles in national press. They also deal with over hundreds of radio stations all over the UK, making them the most knowledgeable people in local UK advertising.

Taking retail brands as an example, local and regional advertising is essential to them when launching new stores. It's vital for stores to know their local area, who lives there? What are their habits? If for example, the area had a very low social grade and household income, higher-priced retailers would have to either adapt their pricing and advertising message or choose another site entirely in order to prevent failure.

In order to determine the local audience Regional use this very funky tool which creates a map of the local area you are wanting to know about where you can then put layers on such as schools, ethnicity, social grades etc - this provides a mind blowing map as it produces a visual of the audience the client is trying to look for. It has in some cases, provided 'Eureka' moments, as regional mapping can show trends in certain audiences which you might have not known about before. Knowing your local audience is vital because if you get them on board, then your job is already half done for you!

I have included an example of a regional map; this map alone shows us the area of Birmingham and the Penetration of the Asian community within the city. The coloured area represents the percentage of Asian penetration - the red areas show that the Asian penetration is 18 times more than the national average - this can give wonderful insight to companies wishing to target Asian communities. The turquoise squares show the primary and secondary schools within Birmingham, with the small blue spots showing where 6 sheets (outdoor media) are in relation to both the schools and Asian Communities.

There is no end to what the tool can do and can serve as a visual for audience segmentation and demographics.

City of Birmingham

Also regional press has stigma to it that 'no-one reads it', but this is not true. I learnt whilst in the department that national press acts as a window- giving you a snapshot of the world, where as local papers act as a mirror whereby it reflects what is going on around you in your local community. In fact, 70.7% of all British adults, 32.9 million people, regularly read a regional newspaper compared with 56.8% who read a national newspaper, furthermore, 27% of people who read a regional newspaper do not read a national newspaper - after all you would be more interested about a murder that happens on your doorstop than you are a murder 100k away....

Walsall Advertiser distribution

This map shows the distribution in purple stripes of the Walsall Advertiser - this information allows advertisers to determine who it reaches and where.

This needless to say takes a lot of time and work by the regional team. They have to think of a whole strategy within a localised area, which requires specialist knowledge of all local titles, radio stations,TV stations and outdoor panels etc, in order to target the audience they want. The regional team are fantastic and not only are they specialists across all local mediums, they are also the comms planners! 

Trouble is, regional can get a bit forgotten about within massive national campaigns but what that they do is absolutely imperative and they do a bloody good job at it too!