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Strategy Director Guy Abrahams, from the advertising agency TMD Carat, challenged publishers to "stop thinking of sites supporting the newspaper and ask how your newspapers are supporting your sites."

He said newspapers' competitive advantage was that they had a portable, hard copy of the website.

Brian White, of Real Media UK, advised newspapers that their websites should not look totally different to the print products and he also urged them to keep users interested through e-mail and mobile access (WAP and PDA).

In a session on content, former publisher Martin Bond, of Good Guys, said the traditionally unsexy regional press had found a new 'sexiness' online.

"As the rest of the media are fragmenting, we are slowly retrenching our franchises online. The regional press is still the most trusted medium there is, and that translates online. We are the first point of reference on a daily basis; the first resource in every local area. We are the ultimate 'clicks and mortar' business."

John Haile, of the American Tribune Company, gave a fascinating insight into how the Orlando Sentinel developed from a traditional newspaper to a multimedia news operation operating on cable TV, internet, radio as well as in print.

Reporters have been trained in television news production and all the photographers go on every job with a traditional camera and a video film camera.

"If we don't go out to find new revenue streams, our tradition of strong journalistic enterprise will not survive," he said.

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