I have officially finished third week at my agency. I did not realise time went by so quickly when I was at Cardinal Spin.
I only have another week to go!
Anyway, my third week was not as busy as my second. However, there was heaps of work to be done, it did not feel as a lot. It was probably because I now have the idea of how things work.
The good thing about my internship was that I was going to the office everyday. Since I go everyday, I have developed a good understanding of how things work on a general basis. Also, as they say, practice makes man perfect.
Doing the same thing everyday does get boring. But with the PR industry, there is always a different thing to work on everyday. Or there are different ways to do the same thing. Anyway, what you do, you get better with practice.
Apart from doing the data entries and updating the media trackers and adding the clippings to the folders, my main job in this week was to send pitches to the media for upcoming events.
Sending pitches to the media is calling out to the media for your client events. It may seem like an easy task, but it is not. It takes about an hour and two to draft the pitch and get it approved.
Then send it to each and every person for the media from digital to print to broadcast.
It is indeed a big number and requires great amount of concentration. This week was a test of concentration in a true sense.
Sending out the pitches is not the only thing. If the journalist or blogger has not replied by the next day, another follow up pitch needs to be drafted and approved. And then send it out to all the media people who haven't replied.
It is a good practice for an intern to gain command over professional dialogue with the media through email or over the phone.
At the end of this week, I feel confident about communicating with the media people or at any professional level in a professional manner.
Of course over time, with the nature of public relations, a PR professional develops a relationship with the media people due to high amount of contact very frequently.
It is very important for the PR professional to develop a good relationship with the media people and it only happens over time.
This week's main learning point for me was how to develop media relations and maintaining it.
A high level of industrial language command is very necessary for this.
A prompt and quick reply is always appreciated by the media. So always be alert and keep checking your emails after regular intervals.
Another week to go, hope I get as much as I can from this agency and better my industrial understanding.
2 comments:
Hey Saket,
Calling out to the media is definitely one of the most daunting things to do when starting out as an intern. Sending emails are tough when trying to phrase the message correctly, however, phone calls tend to put you on the spot. What I found hardest was trying to convey the pitch to the media succinctly, as journalist are always on deadlines. I tended to write out what I was going to say, and questions to ask on a notepad before I called just so the message was delivered efficiently. With practice comes perfect however, and soon I got the hang of it. I'm pretty sure you would've too. Good luck to the rest of your internship, I hope you experience a lot more in the field!
Kim
Hi Saket,
As I also interned at a consultancy, I completely understand where you're coming from with the time and detail it takes to distribute media releases to target media. It is a very long process, as you have to find the details for the selected media, find out their deadline dates, draft up a release and get it approved, write the pitch and get it approved and then email it out to each contact which could take hours! Really great to hear that you've been able to do those kinds of things, it really puts you in a position to learn quickly and refine your writing skills. And there's nothing more rewarding than that feeling when the journalist you've pitched to is interested in covering your story! I feel that university studies have really come in handy with regards to these types of skills, and despite what people say about 'the media release being dead,' I would still argue that it is one of the core skills of public relations, as it is where the majority of coverage is generated for clients and where relationships are formed with media.
All the best with the rest of the internship!
Tayla
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