Spring in the Valley

Hello Bloggers,

This is my first post, however I have been reading about everyone else's exciting experiences and by the sounds of it we have all managed to find some truly rewarding placements.

Firstly I should let you all know that after having attended one of Katharina's seminars last semester, prior to actually starting this unit myself, I was able to talk to some past students about their experiences and was lucky enough to secure direct contact details to a lady at the City of Swan. All having run smoothly I was successful in securing a placement at the City of Swan and was able to begin prior to the start of this semester. At the moment I am currently working within the business and tourism development department focusing solely on the Swan Valley. I presently attend the City of Swan on Wednesday of each week, allowing for me to experience and assist with a broad range of projects over a longer period of time.

At the moment there is only a small team of people carrying out all business and tourism development projects for the Swan Valley, therefore making for a very heavy but stimulating workload. Some of the usual tasks include writing media releases and distributing these to relevant media outlets on our database, editing documents prior to being released, assisting with the development of the new website, attending meetings in the Swan Valley for particular events, updating our databases, writing feature stories, and creating flyers for the countless tours available in the Valley at different times of the year.

Whilst only having been at the City of Swan for just over a week I found very quickly that an essential part of working in public relations is knowing the product, or in my case the businesses and people, that you are trying to promote. The lady that I work with at the City of Swan has built sound relationships with the countless business operators in the Valley over time which are highly valued by both parties. This setup makes for a much smoother and cooperative working environment, making the completion of tasks much easier.

The Swan Valley has many annual events that bring large crowds from far and wide to explore and discover what the Swan valley has to offer. The main focus at present is the new look Spring in the Valley for 2010. This year there has been a change to the structure of the event whereby it will now run month long throughout October with exciting activities and entertainment provided for people of all ages to enjoy. This has been the main task that I have been working on since starting at the City of Swan, writing countless media releases and actually gaining coverage in the Sunday Times as well as some online media outlets and small community newspapers which has been quite rewarding.

Spring in the Valley is just around the corner so be sure to check out our new website, http://www.springinthevalley2010.com.au/ to keep up to date with all of the happenings of Spring in the Valley 2010 and be on the look out in the Sunday Times and your local community newspaper for the latest updates! You can also join us on facebook and encourage your friends to join to make sure that no one misses this fantastic month of festivities!

Until next time, happy blogging!