Wish me luck!

So as it has come to my final week of my placement and I have finally finished writing my report on my placement it is great to have a chance to look back and reflect on my few months at Concept Marketing. There were so many learning experiences I had from bettering my writing skills, to learning off my boss some great communication skills, attending a networking event, completing projects and most of all getting to know all the people in the team. It was great the other week to have a night out with some of the office girls for dinner and drinks and to see another side of everyone outside of the working environment; it definitely helped to open up and get to know each other on a more personal level. Whilst I did encounter struggles sometimes with always meeting deadlines and managing the work load this has greatly improved my time management skills and organisation. I started my placement report quite early on and am really please with the final result, it really is true that when you start to write it all the words will just come flowing out and you don’t actually have to be worried about not getting enough information in it. Because you write it from your experience it really is an interesting and fun report to put together. I hope to gain a full time position at my placement now that I will be graduating after exams, which will soon put my resume and interview skills to the test! Wish me luck!

Creating an online pressence for Period Panties!

This week in placement I was lucky enough to be invited out on a meeting with the boss. He briefed me that we were meeting an associate advertising agency to talk with one of their clients about building a website through Concept Marketing. The client is trying to launch online a fashionable line of Period Panties (yes very awkward topic with your male boss!) I had noted that the client had not conducted a lot of research into their competitors and prices so I conducted some research of my own and developed a competitor analysis on two of the client’s online competitors. I looked at the website designs of the competitors and analysed how these had positive and negative affects on the brands. I discussed whether they were seen to be targeting the correct market through their images and textual content. I then researched into the online prices they were offering as well as the range and fashionable characteristics of the underwear in comparison to that of the client we had met with. This was really interesting, being able to see the different approaches people go for when looking at their online presence; I’m looking forward to see what the clients think of some of their competitors strategies and how they decide to develop their website to make them unique and different. Thanks for reading Emeline

Letter Writing Skills

So I am well and truly into my professional practice, and there is not long left before it is all over!

On my latest day in the office, I was given a simple letter from my boss to send out to potential prospecting clients. All it was, was a simple black text on white paper. My boss wanted me to brand and edit the letter to engage the audience he was targeting. When I saw the list of names and their companies I was mean to send this letter too I had to take a big breath to get my head around how on earth I was going to turn this boring bit of text into something AMAZING.

I firstly read the letter about ten times, spell checked it, and grammar checked it and ensured it actually had flow to it. I added in a few descriptive words and took out a couple that were repeated a bit and set it out like a letter should be with the prospects address and date in the top corner, and the correct signature format at the bottom.

I then took the letter to our designers and briefed them on what I was after. The letter was all about how our marketing and PR Company could help your company sour in their field of expertise. so after looking through some images with the designer we found one of a man in a business suit with a toy aeroplane around his waist running. We thought this was quite funny but still in tune with the letter so that was the chosen header image, we captioned below it “let us help your business sour!”

We added in a footer of the companies details and then I added in a few lead generation boxes about calling us for a free consultation or signing up to our monthly newsletter to hear about our marketing tips. With the text I proceeded to underline key points, and bold important sections of information to ensure these would not be missed by the reader.

Once I had completed my draft I showed my boss, and while he was greatly impressed there were some changes he wanted to make it more personalised and like the letter was having a conversation with the reader rather than being as formal as it was. A few more drafts later and it was as close as perfect as you can get.

Although letter writing had always seemed a simple task to me, I really learn how you could take just a simple black letter text and make it into something engaging and actually capture your reader’s eye through imagery, colours, formatting and lead generation. I don’t think my letters will ever look the same from now on!

Until next time
Emeline

The importance of Speling and Grammer….

So it is my third week into my work experience placement and all was going well until I made the ultimate PR error….

I had been set a task to write introduction text, source 3 articles and a joke of the month for a client’s newsletter. I was briefed that the introduction text had to be topical and relevant to Perth. Seeing as it is the beginning of the football season, and the target market being male I thought it suiting to start my introduction with the latest in the AFL news. Having moved to Australia just a few years ago from England I’m still not up to scratch with my AFL knowledge and who’s who’s. So I undertook some research into the players, teams and latest news going around trying to get myself up to speed.

Whilst my Introduction text came together well, was engaging and relevant all that the brief had wanted, I made one huge, crucial, embarrassing mistake… I spelt Mark LeCras name wrong. Yes that’s right, I spelt it Mark LeGras… what was worse is that I had no idea until the newsletter had been sent out to half the database, had to be stopped mid way when the client rang in anger at the lack of proof reading to my account manager who had to deal with the flak of my error. When she told me what had happened I was absolutely mortified!

The way I dealt with the situation is I apologised hugely, fixed my error and now proof read every single thing I write at least 3 times before sending it. I was glad to be given another news letter task at my next day that I was in, to prove that I had well and truly learnt my lesson.

Remember everyone to spell check, grammar check and proof read EVERYTHING.