BB Readings: Sept. 25th

The first blog that I checked out for our blackboard readings today is Katie Paine’s blog on measuring PR.  I think one of the main posts that interested me the most was the post linking me to the information on how social media is used by nearly 70% of adults.  I found this post very interesting because it points out that there are so many different forms of social media out there today.  I was thinking with a narrow mind because I was only thinking of the new arenas that I have learned about in class such as twitter, blogs, and PROpenmic. Outside of these outlets are facebook, youtube, and even ebay that I was not even considering because I participate in them so regularly.

On that note, we also read Paull Young’s post on his Charity:water social media case study.  One point that Paull noted was that facebook was far less effective than twitter and I think the very fact that I took facebook for granted as social media in the before paragraph is a good indication why this outlett was uneffective for the case study.  To embellish, I go to facebook every now and then, maybe not even every day just to see if someone has written on my wall or posted pictures of me etc. because I do not recieve emails, or I might visit the site for a specific reason, like to message someone for example.  The only time I look at birthdays is if I have some free time and see the link on the side. More particularly, on the new facebook it is even harder to find the birthdays so I am not as accustomed to this.  With twitter, on the other hand, all it is composed of is the statuses of different people so that is what I am going there to find and to view, plus it is not complicated and is updated regularly for me.  Therefore, I enjoyed this post and the information found between facebook and twitter. Lets hope all social media does not grow this “lazy” with me…

Found: PROpenmic helps with Internships and so much more!

Being that I have not dedicated much of my time to PROpenmic thus far, I decided to try and figure it out by browsing through the different areas a little more. One of the most interesting finds of the day for me has been the group Jobs & Internships.  I just posted on some collected tips acquired from two different sources on internships. I wish I would have discovered this sector of PROpenmic before I posted the blog because it is a great discussion board where students and professionals can go to post, for students, seeking “ad’s” where they can upload their resume and sample writings and link to their blogs and twitter accounts so that companies looking to hire can easily access their work.  For professionals, they may upload a brief summary of their company and what they are looking for along with links to their blogs or websites.

On a side note, one of the companies that I checked out through this group is Affect Strategies located in New York. Their company interested me foremost because of their location and this lead me to look at their website where I found a very interesting press release they did on twitter and the ten reasons why a comany should use this form of social media.  This particularly interested me because I am so new to twitter myself that it was good to see why it is important for companies, who in the future will hopefully be hiring me, to use this outlet. It even lists other “micro-blogging” sites that could be useful to a company such as Pownce and Plurk.

Now, go check everything out, I hope you find it interesting as well!

Chapter 9: Tactics of PR

Key Ideas:

• Tactics- A public relations action designed to have a particular effect on an organization’s relationship with a particular public.
• Third phase of the PR process, after research and planning.
• Tactics & Traditional Publics: Employees, News Media, Investors, Community Groups, Governments, Customers, Voters, and Businesses.
• Accomplishing the Tactics: Delegation, Deadlines, Quality control, Comm. within the team, Comm, with clients or supervisors, and Constant evaluation.

Collected Tips on Interning:

On September 4th, 2008 in Dr. V’s intro to PR class we got a chance to speak with Kipp Bodnar for a duration of time. During this call with him he spoke on things that employers look for in an intern. Some of the highlights included:

• Important to be involved in social media through blogging.
• Read! News, broad readings, or for pleasure.
• Know your accomplishments and be able to speak on them.

Additionally, I found a post from the podcast Inside PR (#105). This post was made on April 1st 2008 and was on the issue entitled “Hiring Interns: the good the bad and the marvelous”.  From this podcast I pulled out the following important points:

• Again, active in social media.
• Volunteer and Service work is key (even if you do not have too much comm experience).
• Attitude (would rather work with someone with a good attitude than a lot of skill).
• Have good email etiquette.
• Bad things to do: Say you do not want to do admin work, this is a stepping stone to law school, and don’t list such detailed info as your Elementary school…

I thought these points were very interesting, I’ll let you know if I find more and if anyone else has anything to offer please reply, I would love to hear more pointers!

Chapter 8: Planning

The beginning of this chapter gave an example of bad public relations and bad planning through the Millennium Dome. This made be curious so I googled “bad public relations” + “bad planning”. One of the most interesting stories I found was about the 1965 caravan of Stars. This was a great public relations move that went really really wrong and then had a decent recovery. Check it out at: http://tiny.cc/uuz1V.

Moving on to the main points from this chapter:

• 3 Categories for Plans: ad hoc, standing, contingency
• PR plans have goals and these goals must tie in with the mission-statements and values
• Good plans are: realistic, flexible, win-win propositions, and values-driven

Chapter 7 Reading

Research and Evaluation:

• PR needs a way to be measurable otherwise jobs are easily lost, therefore we have research and evaluation.
• Two key questions: What do I want to know?/How will I gather that information?
• 5 ways to conduct PR research: Secondary (library) research, Feedback research, Communication audits, Focus groups, and Surveys.

Chapter 4 Reading

In this chapter I realized:

• the organizations of the “publics” in PR (traditional/non, latent/aware/active, intervening, primary/secondary, internal/external, domestic/international)
• the role that government plays
• that questions must be answered before a relationship can be built with a public

I was particularly unaware the role of government on PR but after taking a political science class I can relate a lot to the practice of PR. For example, in political science we studied the importance of gatekeepers and now I can make that connection to PR through press releases and the Kablooie Microwave Popcorn example.

“I’m only brave in text”

Lately I have been noticing a trend… whether good or bad I will let you decide. Here is what has been on my mind on the subject of bravery in text.

Whether it be through blogs, facebook, instant messaging, twittering, or even text messages people are becoming “brave” through these outlets. Many feel able to express their “true selves” and ideas through the sources listed above. Why? Maybe we are more willing to address someone if we cannot see how they can physically and emotionaly react… or maybe we’re just tired of being in a bubble and these are our vices?

Now, how does this begin to affect PR I’m beginning to wonder? Are companies going to be more willing to say in text and blog they are one way but truly be a different company when they come into contact with a human being?

Let me know your thoughts, I’m finding this topic very interesting…

History of PR/Ch. 3

There were a few central ideas which I derived from this chapter but the most central idea that surprised me and made me glad to know more about PR history is the fact that:

• PR is not as new a profession as I once believed and also that it has been in practice in some way, shape, or form since the beginning of time.

Other important points about PR history:

• PR has been slowly evolving and is shaped not only by the happenings of the world in which it lives (9/11, p.80) but also the people. ( Ivy Ledbetter Lee, p.67).
• PR has been visible in many points throughout our history, much in unpaid positions (Ex: woman’s rights) as well, as seen in Dr. V’s correspondence with Dr. Russell.

Shopaholic the MOVIE

Exciting news for fans of the Shopaholic series and those who are interested in learning more about Becky. There is now going to be a MOVIE for the series! I don’t know how I feel about Becky not having a British accent and Isla Fisher playing the infamous character but check out the trailer and let me know what you think!