It's coming, it's coming...it's gone.

The adrenaline that comes with planning an event and being there as it happens is much like watching a sports car speed past you. It’s coming, it’s coming, it’s gone. There is so much excitement that goes into waiting for an event to come around and this excitement definitely does not leave when it passes by.

I am currently completing my internship with Momentum Forum Events, a not-for-profit events management company founded by Barbara McNaught. Momentum Forum holds annual events to support worthy causes.

The ballroom set up for the luncheon

Since beginning my internship, the main focus has been on the Xoticar International Women’s Day Luncheon that was held on March 7^th in support of the prevention of violence against women.

As part of my internship I have been lucky enough to try my hand at many different tasks such as managing emails, researching sponsors, monitoring and updating social media pages and websites, compiling guest and contact lists, communicating with the media, writing newsletters and helping to develop media releases, scripts and advertisements. I have also attended a photoshoot and interview for an editorial in the lead up to the event. This experience in itself was great because I was there from the moment the story was pitched through to the final article in the paper. Being both a public relations and journalism major it was interesting to see the process from both sides.

Me with Dana, Rhea and Barbara

Saying this, the highlight of my internship so far has definitely been helping out at the event. It is an amazing feeling when you see all the hard work that has been put into the planning being enjoyed by the guests.

The event was held at Crown Perth and had the U.S. Consul General Cynthia A. Griffin as a guest speaker, Dana Vulin as a testimonial speaker, Nez Erok as the guest performer and a Ruth Tarvydas fashion parade.

There were also four luxury cars on display from the event’s naming sponsor Xoticar. The event had a great mix of celebration, inspiration and emotion that touched everyone in the room.

Before the event we received some great media coverage and this continued after the event.

International Women's Day received coverage on both Channel 7 and Channel 9  news

as well as a spread in the social pages.

From a public relations perspective it is really exciting seeing your event picked up in the media and receiving favourable coverage. It is not only great for the cause but great for the organisation.

The Lamborghini, one of the four cars on display.

The focus at Momentum has now turned to the annual Men In Black Ball and there is no doubt it will come around fast. If there is one thing I have learnt so far it is that the public relations and event industry moves quickly and you need to buckle up or run the risk of being left behind.

Kiara Bonasera

15523055

Curtin Bentley 

Media Receptionist For A Day

Hi, I’m Joanna and I’m doing my last semester at Curtin Singapore! I’m currently doing my internship at Grebstad Hicks Communications, also known as GHCasia, a boutique PR agency specialising in travel, tourism, hospitality, properties and luxury lifestyle. I chose to intern at a PR agency as I believed it would be a good training ground for me to learn all the basics of a PR practitioner.

As I started my internship during November, which is also the peak period for most agencies, I had to learn fast in order to catch up with the tasks that my colleagues had assigned me. During the first week of my internship, some of the basic tasks that I handle are mostly media clippings, daily news translations and occasionally, help out with research for new businesses. Initially, I thought to myself, “Media clippings are really tedious!” as I had to cut out the coverage from newspapers & magazines, and to do a lot of cropping for online clippings. Gradually, as I started to understand the importance and value of media coverage for our clients, I LOVED doing media clippings.

In that same week, I was also activated to be a media receptionist for a client event! I got so excited; I was literally counting down to the event date every single day!

The event was indeed an eye-opener for me, to not only meet and greet the media, but also look at how the media interacts with both the host and the attendees to get a story published the following day. That day, I learnt the importance of planning ahead – be it spokesperson training or making the necessary preparations to ensure that the media gets sufficient materials to run a story – which would then determine the outcome of the coverage.

That’s all folks!

Joanna Wang Li Mei

15257040

Curtin Singapore

Media Coverage and Exposure

This blog post was done on October 4.

Finally after two months plus of my internship here, we have received media coverage on a project which we were involved in. The project ‘Travel Smart’ is an initiative which promotes a more even distribution of travel demand during the busiest times of the day (http://app.lta.gov.sg/apps/news/page.aspx?c=2&id=add9c932-28f7-42e7-a3be-1e9d0b6e2847).

At the media launch, the associate director for transportation of my company was invited to present on the scheme and provide the media with details on the scheme; how it works and the benefits that participants will gain by taking part in the scheme. The media launch was organized by the Land Transport Authority (LTA) of Singapore; although I was not present at the event, it was one of the rare times where our company received media attention and exposure. In the press release done by the LTA, my company was mentioned and several media called later on to clarify some details with regards to our company background.

After the media launch, the associate director received invitations to “Talk Back”, a show on 93.8FM which discusses current affairs. We provided her with a very rushed and brief message rundown the day before the radio show. It being a “live” show gave her more pressure to perform well and to put across the messages that we had drafted for her. However, we had to be given the green light to proceed with participating in the show by LTA; given that they were our clients we were rather tied down by what they had to say, should the messages contain any information that were considered confidential or sensitive, we would have been liable for the mistake.

The media coverage that was given to the project had helped to introduce the company to the media, many of them had queried if we were from the UK or US and not based in Singapore; and what is the description of services that we provide for our clients. Given our extensive range of services rendered to our clients, it became apparent that it was hard for us to categorize the service that was rendered to the LTA; a study and implementation along with recommendations for a strategy to ease peak hour commuting for the public.

This is an exceptional case whereby the communications team had not really done anything for media exposure but it was given to us in terms of approximately eight newspaper headlines, short air time on both radio and television; and provided us with a chance to introduce the company to the media and build up media relations thereon. Most of the clients however, are unlike LTA and would not have included our company’s name in the press release. Architectural feats would have only mentioned the property developer and not the architectural or engineering firm behind it. Public Relations have always been done independently by the clients; instead of joint ones along with our company. Hence the LTA project has been one of the rare cases which have helped us obtained media coverage.

Of course there are plenty of upcoming projects such as a small part of the Resorts Worlds Sentosa (RWS) which cannot be named due to the confidentiality of the project that can garner media interest. More plans would definitely need to be drawn up with the clients to co-release press releases.