1# Nervous First Week : How the real world compares to university

My first day at Magenta PR was one of those times where your breakfast doesn’t want to stay down.

I've done quiet a few internships over my degree in film and events but never in a PR consultancy!

 From what we learn at university every thing is different, this is the real world after all.

I think this is one of the reasons I was so nervous because this is it, this is how you are going to be first seen in a PR professional light and your industry reputation begins.  

Instantly the variety of consultancies hit me, something university doesn't go into depth on. Magenta PR is a high end creative boutique which focuses on marketing, PR, events and brand management for clients from the retail and fashion industries. There are so many niche different consultancy's that cater for all different markets and the fact that even small Perth has such a variety was really interesting. 

Compared to our in class learning because of the different client range that magenta has, some aspects of public relations principals the consultancy does differently. 

An example is putting money figures on each media report of our client and/or product and complying it all in quarterly publicly reports. We are told in university not to do this as you can't put a money value on negative public relations and reports. However in this case I agree with their methods because of Magenta's clients industries as well as the maintenance of the consistency of the data and reporting. It helps put year to year reporting into a context for clients. 

At Curtin we don't spend a lot of time on Press Kits and their presentation, delivery and content. This is understandable due to the large amount of learning we must do in our course but it is something that is really important. This is especially so for Magenta, I sat down and did a total of 161 invites, press releases and envelopeson my first day. It was invites to an event and press kits for one of their clients and everything down to label placement had to be perfect. It is an extension of the consultancy's brand as well as the clients and encapsulates them in a physical manner on paper. Graphics, color, envelope and paper quality as well as the information of course presents the client to media and influential people and is extremely important.

BIGGEST RULE I LEARNT THIS WEEK:

It’s something I already knew from university but not even close to this extent- it comes down to the details! The more detail you have and give your client, media, and relevant other target audiences the more your client’s objectives and also your personal brand has to gain.