MY DREAM HAS BEEN INTERRUPTING BY MEDIA CLIPPINGS

I remember my excitement when doing my first media clipping for my PR media unit. At that stage I found it very interesting and important in term of PR tasks. I still think that it is very important to use a media clippings for any kind of organization as it is the only way to take control of managing media coverage and see how news affects the organization. Moreover as Van Der Meer states (2005, 1) “More than just clippings, PR research and evaluation provide insight into whether your message is received and understood”. Indeed media clippings give a view on how people receive and understand the different messages sent by the different organizations. However, I do not find it interesting and exciting anymore.

I have been collecting information from all kinds of media for two big media clippings for the Faculty of Business and Economics of University of Melbourne. These media clippings are an on-going activity for the Faculty of Business and Economics. They employ people who are called media monitors to focus only on this special task. They really rely on the outcomes of their monthly media clippings as University of Melbourne is a well known institution which is often cited in the media. The main goal in term of results from the media clippings for University of Melbourne, is to be able to monitor their image and evaluate how often their lecturers and students are cited in the media. Where as it seems to be very exciting, it has not gone that way for me.

It was a very long and hard process. The way I had to process was the following: I had to go into a special platform in which all the information concerning Universities or education in Australia are localised and scanned to only keep information related to the Faculty of Business and Economics. I was in charge of December and January media clippings. Those two months represent a really heavy flow of information because of the annual big entry to university in February. Indeed, masters programs try to get as many students as they can during this period and for that they need media to talk about them frequently and in a good way.

Doing a media clipping for an organisation is much harder than doing one for University homework. In fact, when it comes to doing it for an organisation, the topic is already settled as well as the way to process and present the clippings. Within an organisation the task can turn out to be very repetitive, that has been the case for me.

Independently of the lack of interest I found in the task, I must admit that it has been of a great help in term of getting experience with the media. Moreover, I discovered a new set of publications and I had the opportunity to apply my knowledge to a practical way.

Van Der Meer, C. 2005. Communication World: Understanding Media Analysis. Vol. 22 (3):32-35. p://content.ebscohost.com/pdf9/pdf/2005/CMC/01May05/16947413 (accessed February 16, 2009).