Hi everyone,
It’s me again and sorry for late! In
this post, I would like to share another experience which is the indispensable
event and focal point throughout the years in Johor Bahru – Chinese New Year
Promotional Fair. Chinese New Year is the most important Chinese traditional
festival for Chinese, so lots of fairs or markets are set up as the Chinese New
Year is approaching. They usually feature Chinese New Year related products
such as cookies, hampers, clothing, decorations and so on. It is convenient for
public to purchase all the Chinese New Year necessities all under one roof.
The official poster of the Chinese New Year Promotional Fair 2013
In order to conduct a successful
fair or exhibition, a sufficient preparation is a must for both of the
organiser and exhibitors. Since I joined KSL City during the mid of December,
so most of the plans of those coming events and fairs or exhibitions were
scheduled accordingly before the beginning of a new year. Then, I was given a
precious opportunity to play the role as a PR Officer to in charge the PR
aspect of the Chinese New Year Promotional Fair 2013 with my senior – Mr Rey
Ling who plays the role as the only PR Officer in KSL City.
Firstly, I received the proposal and
the layout plan with the price list of the promotional fair from my senior and
a briefing was also given by the person in charge of the fair who are the marketing executive - Ms Dora Gan in order to know the basic concept and
information about the fair. Then, I accessed to the exhibitor database for
getting all the contact details of the past exhibitors who participated the
Chinese New Year Promotional Fair before and sent out all the invitations to
them through the company email. The marketing team will follow up with those exhibitors
who are interested to participate in this year and some potential exhibitors
who have not joined the fair previously will also be targeted by our marketing
team.
Furthermore, a huge workload came to
me before the three weeks of the promotional fair. Since I was assigned as a PR
Officer, I had to manage the online media such as the KSL City’s official
website and keep promoting the fair before it started as well as updating the
official Facebook page of KSL City about the latest news and photos of the promotional
fair. Meanwhile, all the promotional tools which can be used to promote or create awareness of the fair were arranged
by me such as the lamppost buntings, billboards, light boxes, lift door stickers,
lift-indoor posters, bus stickers, façade poster and glass door sticker of the
main entrance. Then, I had to communicate with our talented in-house designers –
Ms Kolsuwan and Mr Dickson Chen who designed all the artworks of our promotional
tools and confirmed with our partner printing company to print out and installed
all the things at the actual date according to the strategy of our marketing
team in order to promote the fair effectively and gain more shoppers to visit
the fair.
Besides, I also had to make a call
to all the mainstream Chinese print media such as Sin Chew Daily, Nanyang
Business Daily, China Press and Oriental Daily to come to KSL City for having a
press conference with our Marketing & Leasing Department from shopping mall
site and Food & Beverage Department from hotel site in order to promote the
Chinese New year Promotional Fair 2013 and the Chinese New Year Reunion Dinner
Package simultaneously. So, my work had crossed the two different management
teams from different sites but under the same chairman – Mr Ku who manage the
whole KSL City and KSL Hotel & Resorts.
At the day before the promotional fair,
I had to supervise the whole procedure for setting up the
location with our marketing team in order to make sure the fair can be held
successfully at the next day. Some issues came out such as misapprehensions or
miscommunication between the exhibitors and we had to solve the problems on the
spot immediately. At the actual date of our Chinese New Year Promotional Fair
2013 which was the 10th of January, everything was going smoothly
and nicely.
One of the booths in Chinese New Year Promotional Fair 2013 (total - 36 booths)
Moreover, I also have the opportunity to make the daily announcement
about the promotional fair at the info counter through the broadcasters within
the shopping mall. During the promotional fair, some little arguments and
miscommunications between exhibitors and the management of KSL City always came
out due to some dissatisfaction towards the arrangement from management. This
is a common issue that always appear in many events, but fortunately, all the
problems were solved by our marketing team and me in order to avoid any
sabotage towards the image of KSL City. Therefore, communication skill is not
only indispensable for PR practitioners but even marketing executives also need
the good communication skill.
Other than that, I was given the very precious
opportunity by my department manager to prepare for my first media release to
create awareness of the promotional fair after the first two weeks according to
the strategy of our marketing team. The objective of this strategy was to
stimulate the so called “purchased atmosphere” to the peak during last two
weeks of the promotional fair. Then, my first media release was published at the
second day after we sent to the mainstream Chinese print media – Sin Chew
Daily.
Ultimately, the promotional fair was
ended at the day before Chinese New Year Eve and every exhibitors had finished dismantle
before 12am. Throughout the whole promotional fair, I have really learned lots
of new things such as how to promote or create awareness of an event in an effective way to draw more shoppers’
attention and visit the event as well as the whole event flow and procedure
from the very beginning until the end. Everything is new to me and quite
challenging when I first handled the whole PR aspect of an event. As we can
see, PR is playing a very important role to create awareness of an event
through different effective ways such as media release, social media networking
site and so on. Hence, this Chinese New Year Promotional Fair 2013 was
considered as one of the successful event that organised and planned by KSL
City.
Finally, it is sad to say that next
post will be my final post throughout my whole PR journey. But I hope that my
sharing and experience is useful for all of my PR peers. Goodbye and see you in
my next post!
15623269
Cheong Wei Chung (Quan)
Curtin Sarawak Campus, Miri
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