it will not take much to turn the fortunes of Southend around. An airline signing to base a couple of airframes at a site would not make much difference to Luton and Stansted however if that was at Southend it could transform the balance sheet and in turn the airports prospects.
Agreed that just another 2 or 3 airbuses or 737's carrying good loads based at SEN would indeed turn the airport around and would probably be quicker to achieve than trying to attract around 9 non based airbuses or 737's into Southend each day.
But there lies the old problem again that with no public transport links to and from London for the first and last flights of the day. SEN based aircraft have a connectivity issue with the big smoke that all the other London airports don't have.
There are also quite a few horror story reviews appearing on the net about passengers having to sleep on the platforms overnight because the airport won't let passengers back into its closed terminal. Also complaints about £120 taxi fares to London for those that don't want to sleep at the station or spend a night in a hotel.