Changing The World With PR: Women's Week

In the early part of my internship, Sarah my supervisor gave me few the working calendar and task to do during my internship at Topdog Factory, and one of the special occasion that I was given to handle is the Women's Day!


First thing that came to mind was the perception on Muay Thai and MMA was something not for the faint hearted, and especially for women, society may look at it as being very testosterone-driven sports, harsh and brutal. After some discussion with my director and also my supervisor, the idea of depicting "strength & beauty" was a go, to incorporate that idea in a short video and also announce of a one week promotion for women that sign up within that week with will get free 1 month training when they sign up for the yearly membership fee.

That week, we had more than 10 new clients (all female) that signed up!

Was it a good publicity?

For a short video that didn't take much time and money, yes.

The idea of a woman opening up a martial arts training centre can be very amazing. This itself was newsworthy and definitely has helped out in terms of having a good reputation for being very open to the idea of women practicing martial arts and self-defence techniques. It has encouraged many women to take the risk and try out something out of the ordinary.


Topdog Factory- Women's Day 2016 from Joshua Hajok on Vimeo.


Then, to enforce the idea of our Women's Day/Week promotion, we took it to the newspapers!

I'm happy to say that I've wrote a news article, and it was proofread by my supervisor. I was ecstatic!




:)


The process of connecting with the media or journalists would be on how to approach them on your article that you would like them to publish and the fact that having a 'connection' plays a big role in dealing with the news publishers, disregard of which media platform they are from. My supervisor helped me a lot in this, and i am ever grateful for that. Its not as easy as just e-mailing them the article but approaching them even on e-mail and follow up with a phone call to make sure they've received the e-mail. Then there's the media monitoring process. You can do the normal check-every-news for the next one week, or if you have strong relations with them, you could just asked them to tell you if they submitted it to be published. Definitely a good learning experience for me.



Joshua Anthony Hajok
16342222

Traditional Public Relations - So much more satisfying!

Over the course of my internship at Corporate Sports Australia i've spent a significant amount of time completing tasks generally thought of as 'traditional public relations' - such as media release production and distribution.

After writing a number or media releases on the city to surf, i am a firm believer that tradtional PR tools still have a place in today digitalised society.

Of the last four media releases i've produced, two have generated some excellent free publicity in The Sunday Times! yay! and some were also featured on the City to Surf website. In my opionion seeing some recognition of your hard work in print in the newspaper is so much more exciting and satisfying that simply maintaining a presence of Facebook.

Except when i told my mum and she couldn't understand why name wasn't on the article. 'No mum, i didn't actually write the article, i wrote the media release. Which the journalist then decided to write an article based on.' She definitely did not share my excitement.

Corporate sports are very into championing the notions of 'tragedy and triumph' within media release content. As interns we were pushed to seek proactive stories that will connect with the wider Perth community, tapping into emotions through, inspiring stories of everyday people - like them! And then hopefully encouraging them to get off the couch and run a marathon!

Earlier in my placement i wrote a media release on the cutest couple ever. Now in their 70's they have run every single City to Surf to date! And they were probabaly the nicest people i've ever met, they even sent me loads of old photos and media clippings from marathons they've competed in around the world.It was nice to be able to recognise their acheievement and give them something back through getting the story published.

Writing media releases at my internship gave me an opportunity to showcase some of the skills i've picked up over the last three years of studying and i now have some great pieces of work to include with my CV.

It's Spring think Pink!

Media Release to Published Article

My supervisor and CEO of Momentum Forum Events, Barbara McNaught head that two men from Perth were going to attempt to climb Mt Kilimanjara next year to raise money for Breast Cancer research. We immediately contacted the two men to see if they wanted to come on board with Momentum and come to the Pink Ribbon Ball to help promote their cause. The two men, Ryan Thompson and Greg Chapman both from Acton Southern Suburbs Real Estate both agreed to attend the Pink Ribbon Ball in pink suits to help promote their cause and help gain publicity for the ball. 

After they agreed, Barbara instructed me to write a media release promoting the fundraiser and the ball. This was quite daunting as I had not written a media release in a long time but was up for the challenge because I knew it would be great publicity for the ball. Once I had completed the media release, Barbara checked it and we had to think of a catchy headline. We agreed on "Men in Pink" and then sent the media release out to Barbara'a media contacts. We sent the media release to The West, The Sunday Times and the Western Suburbs Weekly newspapers. 

Almost immediately Linda Parri from The Sunday Times, a sponsor of the PRB replied and said she would love to write an article. We gave her Ryan and Greg's contact details so she could ask them a few more questions and organise a photograph for the article.

A few days later, on the 9th of September, I was reading The Sunday Times when I stumbled upon the article in the Confidential section. I couldn't believe my eyes that something I had written and helped to produce was printed in the newspaper. The article look wonderful, I was thrilled that the hard work had paid off and was in a great position in the newspaper!

More exciting news for Momentum!

Each week it feels as if we are sending out hundreds of sponsorship emails asking organisations to become a sponsor of Momentum Forum Events. Sponsorship is a crucial element at MFE as this makes the events possible. The emails get sent to large organisations including mining and oil companies, banks, car dealerships, wine and beer houses and financial companies. Finally, we got some exciting news! Savoir Faire Cosmetics decided to come on board with Momentum as a Diamond sponsor.  Savoir Faire also came on board with the naming rights for the International Women's Day event in 2013 and a Diamond sponsor for the Pink Ribbon Ball 2012 and the Melbourne Cup for Canteen luncheon 2012.

Savoir Faire Cosmetics infuses global expertise with personal experience to fashion a line of cosmetics that delivers what it promises with elegance. Their make up range offers the choice of sheer to intense lasting coverage, ensuring their products re the perfect complement to your everyday life and beyond. They recently gained the naming rights to the Savoir Faire Perth Fashion Week and were the makeup brand used for all of the shows.

After liaising with the Savoir Faire team back and forth over email, the contract was created and once signed, SF officially become Momentum's newest sponsor. This meant I had to activate their sponsorship by putting in place all of the benefits they received as a Diamond sponsor. This included updating the website by putting SF in the competitions pages, adding the SF logo to the PRB flyer, reprinting the flyer with the new logo, sending the new logo in the correct elements to The West and The Sunday Times for the print advertisments and sending out a new e-newsletter announcing the new sponsorship to the data base of 8000 people. 

Point & Pay

After a series of advertisements for the PRB were published in The West, The Sunday Times, STE and the Western Suburbs Weekly, the final two were published last week, Saturday the 15th and Sunday the 16th which included the Point & Pay barcode (see image below). This was very exciting as I never knew how the barcode worked but was excited to see if it would see us more tickets.

Now that the final advertisement for the PRB have all been published, we are now still trying to sell as many tickets as we can! The hardest part of my work at MFE has been trying to sell tickets as this year it has been incredibly slow. 

I look forward to more exciting news next time.

Elizabeth Thomas
14848799

A Job ONLY for the multitasked!

Hey guys!

I have just completed my second week at 32 Degrees South Group and I really love it! It is a small company and therefore there is so much to do all the time! There are opportunities in every direction! They are so happy to let you tackle something because they NEED you to help.

I must say I have truly realised the importance of my journalism degree since I have been writing news articles for their news pages as well as media releases for their clients. I have also been given the job of blogging on their website (different topics that have to do with Perth, entertainment, classy events etc.) and am getting used to 'tweeting' and 'fbing' relevant things to the company and clients.

Our teachers were not wrong when they mentioned the importance of social media in today's business world and I can understand how we as graduates will be highly sought after because of our ability to use these platforms. I am so appreciative for this opportunity at this organisation because they really want you to get the most out of the experience. I did my first 3 tweets yesterday and got 'retweeted' a few times, which was great!

You never stop thinking about the job in this line of work. On my lunch break I was reading the newspaper and came across the FRESH section. I quickly noticed the millions of 'not to be missed' Perth event dates and knew that this would be a perfect idea for our company. Now I have been asked to develop a 'twitter calendar' so that we know what to tweet about when these events come around.

As I said in last week’s blog, the biggest assignment I’ve been given by the organisation is to try and develop their community image, get their name out there mainly using social media. It is incredible that we have these tools. When you tweet about an event, you make sure to tag the relevant companies and they immediately notice that you’re supporting them. If you support them, then they will support you. And so the cycle of recognition continues.

I am developing my skills in social media, media release writing, understanding which things are most important and need to be done first, how client relationships work and how much paper work goes into asking for a grant or sponsorship! As I said before I’m also developing my journalism skills at the same time however, it is only with the understanding of how the media releases are picked up by the papers and turned into articles that you truly know what to put into the release.

I have done two articles for them, one of which has gone up online (I will link below) and another, is currently being approved by the South West Development Commission who is one of our event partners (and they may want to use my article for something else). I have done another article template ready for Monday afternoon when I am not there about our client’s Gala dinner, which should also go online. I have written a press release about an event for another client, which was approved from both ends with NO changes.

I value this experience so much and am so lucky to be working with such interesting, nice people. I am learning so much and am appreciative of any feedback even if it’s not all positive. At the end of the day, you are working for them for free however they are putting time into you and are giving you work that will bring in money for them. They are relying on you, so even if you think your way is better, it’s not up to you. You learn how everyone has different ways of doing things. That’s the best part about this experience, because nothing becomes monotonous. There are many ways of doing one thing.

I have been lucky to get such positive feedback and constructive criticism as well. There is so much to learn and I wish I had more time to give them! I actually feel unmotivated to do my other work because I want to continuously give them content and help out.

Its only second week and it feels like its been forever (but in a good way!)

I envy the other employees abilities to multitask and get a million things done in a day. I hope I one day can produce so much content in a day that brings successful results for a company.

I hope your all enjoying your placements!

Until next week! 

XOXO 

Martine 

Linked below is the article i wrote for oZAPP Awards- one of our clients 

http://32dsg.com/?post_type=news