Third week is done, the end is coming and I'm not ready for it!!!

Third week of my work experience is over but the thrill and excitement of the work force hasn't even slightly subsided. This week has been a great learning week and has allowed me to have some real insight and experience in the field by helping to write a media release for the Camp Quality Supper Club. It was a really fantastic way to really hone in on my skills and learn what was really needed in the industry these days. The media release was submitted to several newspapers and was set to appear in the Community News and The Sunday Times. Definitely adding that one to the portfolio.

It was absolutely fascinating to see the preparation and the talent that goes into organising an event such as the Supper Club, even down to the invitations as the event was Alice in Wonderland themed, it was truly amazing.

A few more databases were tackled in this fateful week too, after work I like to go home and just not speak so that I can stand the sound of my voice the next day when I'm stuck making phone call after phone call verifying names and positions.

I start to get sad every time that I remember I only have one more week to go in this position, it really has been such a great experience and after having become quite close to quite a few people and finally getting the hang of the train and morning traffic that plagues my path to Subiaco every single morning without fail.

One more week to go, better make the most of it.

Blogs and Database Management

As I am getting closer to the end of my internship at SurfAid I have noticed a considerable improvement in my work and also the responsibility I am taking on within the PR department of the company.

I was recently given the opportunity to write blog posts for the SurfAid website for the Lawler SurfAid cup. While I have read numerous blogs, I haven't had the opportunity to write one one in a professional context, and found that I enjoy writing this material. Working alongside the communications manager we looked at changing the information from the press release material from the event into a less formal style of writing for the blog, which accompanied a video from the event.

I also had the opportunity to look at the internal management of the customer database from the SurfAid website. This was really interesting as it allows to see how successfully communications are received by the database, which I think is a really effective way of looking at how changes can be made to online communications. By looking at the people who receive and acknowledge communications, alternative methods of can be made for the future based on the demographics and figures provided by this information.

Throughout my internship I have learnt that are so many different aspect to public relations as well as tools and online resources that can be used to make our job a lot easier! It's fantastic to be exposed to all these resources and have the opportunity to learn from them and also consider what I would and wouldn't use in the future.

With one week to go I am that I have a lot more confidence in dealing with corporate clients and I have noticed a significant difference in my performance and my understanding of the industry!

The importance of accurcay accuracy.

Hi everyone!

I have now officially finished week eight of my internship and thought I would pop by and tell everyone about how I went throughout week four to week six at St John of God Murdoch Hospital (SJOGMH) in their marketing and public relations department.

I've decided that from now on I will be choosing a theme or topic for each blog post that best represents what I have learnt within the given time frame. Though the last three weeks weren't as hectic as the first three I definitely feel that I have gained a greater appreciation for the importance of accuracy in the field of public relations, and that is what I will be talking about today.

We were taught throughout our public relations degree that accuracy is paramount in everything we do and we need to adhere to the highest standards of verbal and written communication and ensure all our facts and details are correct. It was also stressed the importance of checking and rechecking all of our work as once it was published, printed, exposed, etc. it is harder to correct.

Any mistake in accuracy, no matter how small, can have a huge impact on your organisation. It could be monetary (costs associated with reprinting if it was grammatical, time lost from redoing work) and can impact your organisational reputation or image in a negative way (one example is the backlash Myer experienced from their grammatical error on their early bird gets the right size campaign). When faced with these sorts of consequences it does surprise me how organisations can make such mistakes in the first place.

But how does this apply to SJOGMH? Well aside from the fact that you should always be checking your work and aiming for 100 per cent accuracy, I have been spending a lot of time updating our contact database and organisational website.

I know a few of you have had the joy (sarcasm) of updating databases during your internship. Though it isn't the most stimulation of jobs I did gain a real life appreciation for how important accuracy is to SJOGMH. My primary focus was on updating the top 50 and top 100 doctor lists which is used by the public relations and marketing department and the hospital executive for various reasons, such as deciding event guests’ lists and for recognition.

On top of working on updating the database I was also charged with doing a small update to the organisational website. SJOGMH went through a small rebranding in which the official name of the hospital changed from St John of God Hospital Murdoch to St John of God Murdoch Hospital. As a result I had to check all the pages on the website and change the name of the hospital to the new name. Whilst doing this check I also picked up some spelling and grammatical errors that I fixed in the process.

It is through these tasks that it was reiterated to me the importance of accuracy. If I had the wrong number or address for the doctors on the database then they could not receive official invites to hospital events which could decrease morale and/or waste tickets on unfilled spots at events. If I didn't update the hospital name on the website it would cause inconsistencies in the branding of the hospital and spelling and grammatical errors portray a lack of professionalism of the organisation. I know and accept that mistakes can happen but completing these tasks I learnt that I had to be accurate if I was going to succeed, and sometimes there are no short cuts or easy options if you are aiming for accuracy.

All I can hope for is that between now and the conclusion of my internship I continue to keep accuracy at the forefront of my mind so I don't slip up and make a small (but important) mistake.

Until next time.

PRintern.

Welcome to government work!

                                             

On the 16^th of July I commenced my placement at the Department of Sport and Recreation in the programs and services area. My first day was a blur of introductions and paperwork as well as health and safety briefings. I’ll admit that I was only able to remember a small portion of the people I met that day.

My first task assigned to me was to fix the Clubs online database. The database is very important for the organisation as it embodies their main value of encouraging physical activity, health and recreation for people of all ages in Western Australia. The database contains just under 3000 clubs and allows members of the Perth community to search for a club nearby that they are interested in participating. The problem I was faced with however is that most of these clubs had not been updated since the concept was launched in 2007, meaning many of the emails sent out to the clubs were being bounced back. While I understand being able to communicate to stakeholders and publics is a very important factor for success in public relations I can only hope that I will be given some more tasks during my time at DSR to complement my skills and prepare me for the real world. Although it has given me the opportunity to improve my skills in excel and creating spread sheets which were lacking.  

An issue I was having during my first few days at the department was my lack of understanding as to what the other staff members did, what their role was. It baffled me that every morning at exactly 10am half of the staff would leave to get coffee, while I remained at my desk trying to fix a very large database. While it is only early days I am not sure government work is for me, I am very passionate about sport and health and desperately want to work in the industry one day but I think I would like to be involved in something more community based that provides me with more interaction with different people, maybe the not for profit sector! In saying that, I have enjoyed my first few days at DSR, everyone is friendly and helpful but I do hope I can be given more tasks to get my teeth stuck in to during my time here.

Lucy Morrison

Not-for-profits… even for The Profits

When most people think of not-for-profits they think of the ill and the disadvantaged and helping cure a disease or improving quality of life, however my new role is one that challenges this traditional thinking. The members and recipients of the not-for-profit organisation Pro Subi are the businesses of the Subiaco CBD, which varies from bars and cafes, to bookshops and clothing stores. You may ask why these stores need the help, can they not market themselves and handle their own Public Relations. The answer is ‘yes’ they can, however due to increased competition for the decreasing disposable income, the importance of marketing Subiaco as a strong, united brand has bought about the necessity for the work of Pro Subi.

Despite the uniqueness of the beneficiaries of Pro Subi the challenges and rewards of the work are the same. The two employees that run Pro Subi have a passion for what they do, work tirelessly through lunch breaks and battle against limited budgets with high expectations.  I have already experienced the reward of the work that Pro Subi does, as it feels like a community with people interacting and expressing their thanks for the work we do for them not only on an individual level but for the benefits for Subiaco as the brand.

My first jobs in the first few days was database entry, and editing and updating the database, which seems to be the first jobs of many interns and upon assignment is followed by an apology for the tedious nature of the job. I would like to pass on this piece of advice to my fellow PR interns is that database work may not require a tertiary education but do not underestimate its importance. Throughout my time in work experiences I have come to learn the value of this “tedious” jobs, as not only is the database worth a lot of money but also in most cases can lead to the success or failure of events and initiatives.  

Now 8 days into my internship and I can reassuringly tell you that having completed working on the database I have moved on to further utilising my PR skills.

Event Day...

Hi,

It was event day yesterday for the HBF Run for a Reason. I was so excited, my second event in as many months. I think I was even more excited because of the tireless effort I had put in over the months from February to now. I was pleased when the event went of without a hitch and all participants had a great time.

Throughout the campaign I was able to go the monthly meetings held at HBF headquarters and log all data into rather organised spreadsheets (If I don't say so myself). Lifeline WA were holding a competition to increase fundraising and create an incentive, this is also where I came in. It was my responsibility to write up the terms and conditions and make sure they were clearly stated to all participants and posted online. I had to admit this was actually fun, it was tedious but something different from database work, what was better, was that Melissa barley had to edit them.

Although event day has been and gone, this does not mean the work is done. Fundraising still goes on for up to one month after the event and Lifeline WA's competition does not end until the 10th of June, this probably means we will not be done with HBF for at least the next month.

Along with working on the HBF Run, I have also been working on the BDSC, Lifeline WA's pinnacle event of the year. My tasks for the BDSC are EDM's and the wine wall, basically I am the one who writes up the EDM's and send them to the email database, I have also been researching the 1920's (so many interesting things happened in the 20's) so I can introduce fun facts of the 20's to the EDM. As well as EDM's I have also been working on the wine wall for the BDSC, I have been making cold calls and researching numerous wineries to gain donations of cartons of wine for the wine wall. Cold calling is very scary and I can safely say that it is a rather less enjoyable task I have to do. As much as I don't like it, I will admit it is great experience to which I am grateful for.

Till next time...

Regards,
Karla Cavalli

it's just not the same without Gravy... Part 5

This week was all things Kitsch! You don’t have to stop reading; this doesn’t mean I will be talking about tasteless, unrefined matters (although, it may contain tacky images), but I mean Kitsch Bar and Restaurant – Gravy’s fifth client presented to you thus far. Kitsch is owned by Iain Lawless – who also owns Lawless Cooking, a client of Gravy’s that I spoke of in my last post. It’s an Asian style bar/restaurant situated in Leederville that has a very eccentric, untailored style to it.

Similar to Lawless Cooking, Gravy handles their promotional communications (e-Newsletters, social media accounts, email enquiries, etc.) and is in charge of the marketing and management of their cooking classes which are held throughout the year on Monday nights (a night that Kitsch is closed). My job with Kitsch is to respond to email enquiries – some of which I redirect to the General Manager of Kitsch if it is regarding a restaurant booking or function; otherwise it is generally concerning a cooking class in which I then inform people of, book them in, and confirm their payments. Gravy promotes the cooking classes via Facebook and e-Newsletters to Kitsch’s database. I have created posters for all of them to make it a bit more eye-catching and to get people’s attention. You can see a few of them below:

  (a small bio of Paul Cherry is yet to be added to this one)

And there are many more! These are just my favourites J

As you can see, it's not just Kitsch chefs that participate in these cooking classes; we are simply the host for the classes and chefs from all over Perth are asked to demonstrate their own special cooking styles in a class tailored for them. It is a great way to engage and cater for all sorts of food lovers over Perth.

As for the posters, I had no guidance or direction given to me when creating them, let alone any templates or formats that I had to work by; so I was free to go about it however I wanted (which I LOVE)! I obviously stuck to the Kitsch style and theme which is retro, a bit crazy, crude and (obviously) kitschy. Google was my best friend through the process of creating these – trying to find images that portray a certain cooking style in a kitschy way isn’t as easy as you might think! And as I have said time and time again – I am by no means a graphic designer! This means I have to make do with what Google and Microsoft Office gives me… but they don’t turn out so bad if I may say so myself J

As I said, we send these and other promotions and communications to our database. This database is quite well developed as we have a birthday promotion set up so that every person on our database receives a voucher for Kitsch to use in the couple of week around their birthday. You will be surprised how many sign-ups we get from having this promotion in place. I am also in charge of distributing these vouchers out and have a reminder system set up on outlook for all of our customer’s birthdays.  It is also very well received by our customers as it is a nice gesture tailored specifically for them. You can see where you are able to sign up for this promotion on the Kitsch website: Kitsch Bar and Restaurant.

Kitsch is probably the least demanding and the most constant of all of our clients. Tasks never usually change and all of the processes needed for our correspondence are in place. All in all, an extremely smooth running operation – something VERY uncommon in the consultancy industry!

Until next time...

--Sarah

it's just not the same without Gravy... Part 1

When I come into work Wednesday morning, although having been there for 8 months now, it feels different. A good different. A wonderful different! I look at everything differently, analyse my usual day-to-day tasks MUCH more, and see Gravy Events & Projects in a whole new light and think of the light I could bring to it with my final PR Professional Practice report at the end of this semester.

I truly love my job and I cannot wait to share some of my experiences that I have there with you all. A quick background on the organisation to give you an understanding of where I sit and why I do the things that I do: Gravy Events & Projects is only 18 months old now, founded by my amazing boss Ivana Brekalo whom has over 10 years experience in the PR industry and who I think of as a great mentor to me. I am her first and only employee which means I am very involved in most things (which is VERY exciting!) and am lucky enough to really enjoy every duty that I am given by her. Gravy is a communications, marketing and business consultancy, specialising in project and event management. We have four ongoing clients: The McComb Foundation (a burns injury research foundation, founded by Professor Fiona Wood), The Bra Bar (a boutique lingere retail shop with 3 different locations across Perth), Kitsch Bar & Restaurant (an asian style tapas restaurant based in Leederville) and finally Lawless Cooking (a catering company headed by Perth celebrity chef, Iain Lawless). Each client has different needs from us and throughout my blogging you will get a sense of exactly what that is.

As of 3 weeks ago, Gravy re-signed their contract with The Bra Bar. This entailed discussing and re-evaluating ways to better use our time with the client's budget to the most efficient and effective way. This resulted in the decision for myself to basically take over the management of the client and thus made sense for me to be on-site (at their office location in Perth, behind their Perth store) for 5 hours every Wednesday. Ivana still oversees all of the projects undertaken and offers input and guidance where needed, but essentially, I now handle most of The Bra Bar's marketing and communication needs. (How exciting is that!!)

The Bra Bar is very consistent with their needs which means my 5 hours every week will be fairly similar week-to-week (so I will only bore it with you this ONCE I promise!) Facebook is a key communication tool that we use to communicate with The Bra Bar customers. I monitor comments and feedback regularly but will generally only post out communications via Facebook once a week (in this case, every Wednesday). This usually includes posting photos of new arrivals in store with relative prices (and am luckily enough to sometimes score a sale this way!), collaborating special events and current news with The Bra Bar (for example, Wednesday was the last day of summer, so in saying this in a post I also posted a photo of the huge range of stockings we had available; Valentine's Day as you can imagine was a big event for The Bra Bar also! And the list goes on...) and lastly use Facebook as an additional medium to communicate sales and campaigns that The Bra Bar is having. I love Facebook and I really do think it is an amazing tool for companies with low marketing budgets to get their word out there without paying a single cent. It is particularly useful for retail companies; as I have mentioned, it can work as an online store too!

I certainly don't believe Facebook and other social medias are the be all and end all though, especially with The Bra Bar and I will explain why. The Bra Bar employs advertising tools (usually in community papers promoting sales) and I create posters, flyers and newsletters for them also (to the best of my ability with no graphic design experience and the ammaturity of Windows Office programs, but I make do!). We send out a monthly e-newsletter as well as supplementary emails promoting particular campaigns each month to a database that has grown to about 3000 emails now! We obtain these email addresses by doing monthly in-store competitions where Bra Bar customers fill out a competition slip with their contact details to go into the draw of winning a lingere set worth up to $100. Most of The Bra Bar customers have email addresses; but not all (actually, not many at all of the 3000) have Facebook. Social media is generally used to communicate with younger generation people (and I have noticed some people ask to be unsubscribed to the emails are actually Facebook fans and would thus like their information given to them that way) which is why it is very important to keep up all forms of communication to suit all kinds of different people.

In addition to communication tools used to connect with existing customers, we have also recently begun new journeys into building the awareness of The Bra Bar to bring in new customers. This has been done by colloborating with "Show Me Perth" which is a wonderful organisation that helps pull people into the Perth city and promote the wonderful aspects of the city. Another tactic to build awareness was to support some not-for-profit charities such as Miss Universe and Pink Gig. All of these avenues help get The Bra Bar brand out there and most importantly, to specific target audiences.

The Bra Bar really is such an amazing company and it does get tough working with such a small budget and a very niche market, but it is a challenge that I love and am passionate about as it opens my mind and gets me thinking about the endless opportunities that PR offers companies and to not always think advertising is the answer.

Next post I will go into more detail about the other clients of Gravy's, however, throughout my posts I will still have a heavy focus on The Bra Bar, as I have said most of my time is spent there and am heavily involved in that particular client's projects.

Until next time...
--Sarah

Consultancy Work

Heard about the Perth Fashion Festival? McHappy Day? If it wasn't for PPR (Professional Public Relations) you may not have! These are some of PPR's clients:

Note: these were taken after Friday drinks, I may not have been holding the camera steady.

Hi, I am Liam and I am doing my internship at (you guessed it) PPR - and 'I'm Lovin' It' (McDonalds is one of PPR's clients and yes we do get free burgers).

So far it has been most exciting. Lately I have been busying myself with database maintenance - oh and they made me sign something to say I won't steal any of their information so DON'T ASK!

I have been creating a media clippings file for the Perth Fashion Festival - and unfortunately Sarah Pauley, the 'Face of Perth Fashion Festival' (the hottest model in Perth) will not return my calls :(

I have also been updating contact lists (ie stalking journalists).

My main goal at PPR is to get an insight into the workings of both the consultancy and the industry as a whole.

At the moment I am looking for talent to appear in McDonalds stores for McHappy Day. We are contacting sporting types, politicians and minor celebrities (TV personalities, etc). Perth has hundreds of Z list celebrities, so if anyone can help me with contacts please send them my way!

P.S. On Monday 20 September, the winners of the PRIA campaign awards were announced. PPR won three. Go PPR!

Source: www.pria.com.au/news/id/1016

Felicity works in the office across from my desk. Nicole and Peter work upstairs. What an awesome bunch of people I work with!

Liam :)