The Ending of My PR Journey

Greetings to all PR practitioners,

Sorry for the very late update. Eventually, this is my last post to share my PR life in KSL City. 

Throughout the three-month PR internship program in KSL City, it is a wonderful experience which I have never experienced before in my life. Then, I have learned and gained lots of practical knowledge and experience in terms of PR. But, clearly, KSL City has put many efforts in event sector by using social media, media relations and lots of internal promotional tools in order to increase media coverage and media exposure. KSL City believes that it can build the corporate image directly through the highest rate of media exposure. 

In fact, the PR which KSL City practiced is MPR (Marketing Public Relations). It means it is more focusing on achieving the marketing goals by using PR techniques and it mostly link to the event sector since there are many events will be held according to the event schedule. As a PR officer in KSL City, the job scopes include creating awareness of the coming events and dealing with media especially the mainstream Chinese print media (Sin Chew Daily, Guang Ming Daily, Nanyang Business Daily, China Press and Oriental Daily News) in Johor Bahru. Many channels have been used to create awareness of the events which comprise the hardware (lamppost bunting, TV wall, billboard, light box, glass door sticker, elevator door sticker, elevator internal poster, mall pillar, mall façade, car park barrier and bus sticker) and software (official website, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, SMS blasting and E-mail blasting) as well as media release. Through a variety of approaches can capture a wide range of public attentions and reach the public broadly. Thus, this is the opinion after the research and experience that I have done within my internship program. 

Last but not least, three-month of my PR internship placement is over. The department which I work for is just like a big family since all the colleagues are kind and friendly. Before I left the company, I have been given a precious invitation to attend the company annual dinner at the 5-star hotel of KSL Holdings Berhad which is the KSL Hotel and Resort. It was a wonderful night for all the employees of KSL Holdings Berhad to have an opportunity to relax and chill with each other after a whole year of fighting with their works. Obviously, it might be a tool to enhance the employee relations indirectly. Apart from employees, some relevant business partners were also invited to the annual dinner as a token of appreciation for their supports in KSL Holdings Berhad. It was a pleasant night and everyone is enjoying that precious moment together by having a sumptuous dinner and chatting with each other.  

Ultimately, I would like show my appreciation to my lovely colleagues as they have truly give me a helping hand when I need help or facing obstacles and they always show their concern to me frequently throughout the three-month internship program. I think I am lucky that I have met a lot of kind people who willing to give me the guidance to perform better in my workplace. At the end of my day, a farewell gathering was conducted for me  after work and we were having a memorable moment together. So, thanks again my colleagues and thanks KSL for giving me such a great experience in my life.

The Annual Dinner 2013 of KSL Holdings Berhad 

The Farewell Gathering with my colleagues at the end of my day

Although this is the ending of my PR journey but I know there will be another journey is going to begin soon. Guys, time to say goodbye and it is my pleasure to share my internship experience at here. 

Thank you.

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Cheong Wei Chung (Quan)

Curtin Sarawak Campus, Miri

Chinese New Year Promotional Fair 2013

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 10^th 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!         

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Cheong Wei Chung (Quan)
Curtin Sarawak Campus, Miri

Media Event – Meet the Stars of Once Upon A Time

Hello everyone,

Sorry that it’s been a while due to the busy working life. As I mentioned in my last post, I would like to share the experience of my first media event in KSL City with you all. The media event called “Meet the Stars of Once Upon A Time” was held on 06^th of January 2013 at 12pm in KSL City. It was a fantastic experience for me and I was glad to have the opportunity to get involved in this event.

“Once Upon A Time” is the most anticipated Malaysia Chinese New Year movie in 2013 since they have achieved the big success of their previous Chinese New Year movie “Ah Beng the Movie: 3 Wishes” in 2012. It has broken the box office record of Chinese movies in Malaysia with more than 7 million ringgits and become the box office champion among all the Chinese New Year Movies from foreign countries. Then, the same production team has decided to produce a new Chinese New Year movie called “Once Upon A Time”, with the collaboration of the most popular Malaysia’s Chinese broadcasting station “MyFM” and the well-known Malaysian satellite TV station “Astro”. So, the majority of the main characters in the movie are the DJs from MyFM and the production crews are the production team from Astro.

In fact, KSL City would always like to involve in those media events in order to bring crowds to come to their shopping mall. On the other side, those media companies would also like to have a place with crowds for them to promote their products. Therefore, most of the media events which held in KSL City are the collaboration between the shopping mall and the relevant media companies. In business, this is what we called a win-win situation for both of the company. Besides, the KSL Hotel & Resort will be another advantage for KSL City since it is the only shopping mall which has integrated with a hotel in Johor Bahru. So, there are not only the tourists who come to Johor Bahru will stay in the hotel but lots of companies will also request for accommodation package from KSL Hotel & Resort if they want to stay overnight in Johor Bahru. After the discussions and meetings with the relevant companies, the package can be dealt flexibly. 

Then, KSL City has their own event team which under our department to handle various events or activities that will be held in the shopping mall and it is leaded by our event team leader – Mr Sam Chern. I was glad to have an opportunity to experience the first media event of KSL City in 2013. Before the media event started, there were lots of preparations had to be done and 2 persons which were my senior – Ms Agnes Lee and me had been assigned to help with this media event. Firstly, Mr Sam Chern had conducted a “phone meeting” with the person in charge of the media event – Ms Carine Yang from “RAM Entertainment” Kuala Lumpur in order to clearly know the demand and objectives of both side.  After the decision had been made, we had begun to take action on our responsibilities which had been promised during the meeting. Thus, as a PR person, I had been assigned to spread out the news of the media event through the KSL City’s official website, Facebook page, TV walls in the shopping mall and the façade poster in order to create awareness and promote the media event. RAM Entertainment had also promoted the media event through MyFM, Astro, Once Upon A Time’s Facebook page and the mainstream Chinese print media (newspapers) for getting more fans to support them.

The poster of the media event "Meet the Stars of Once Upon A Time"

Clearly, those communication tools were useful and it had successfully created the gimmicks before the media event started. Some of their fans had made a call to KSL City and asked for the information about the media event. Then, Mr Sam Chern had leaded us to decorate and set up the venue by putting up the backdrop poster, fixing up the stage and PA system as well as placing the chairs and tables at the day before event started. Other than that, my senior who are  playing the role as a PR officer of KSL City - Mr. Rey Ling had also made a call to invite all the mainstream Chinese print media such as Sin Chew Daily, Guang Ming Daily, Nanyang Business Daily, China Press and Oriental Daily to attend the media event. At the actual day of the media event, all the journalists had well-prepared under the stage before the artists arrived. Those artists had reached KSL City on 12:15pm and the media event “Meet the Stars of Once Upon A Time” had finally started on 12:30pm at the atrium of KSL City lower ground floor! There were 5 artists – Jack Lim, Jeff Chin, Phoebe Yap, Bernard Hiew and Jym Chong with the director Silver had attended the media event. Since most of them were the DJs from MyFM, they had become the hosts by themselves in this media event and lots of humorous topics had been brought out by them for making more laughter.

Firstly, a brief introduction about themselves and the characters in the movie had been given by the artists at the very beginning. Then, a Rubik’s Cube Competition had been conducted by using the props – the magical Rubik’s Cube which used in the movie had been given to the 4 chosen lucky fans for competing the speed of rotate the Rubik's Cube and the voucher of certain products as well as the free movie ticket of “Once Upon A Time” had been given to the winner of the competition. Next, the artists had performed the theme song of the movie “Wind and Frost” for their fans. After that, a group photo had been taken with the fans and the artists. Ultimately, all the fans can buy the merchandise which relevant to the movie at the reception counter and get the autograph from the artists by signing on the certain merchandises such as the magical Rubik's Cube, print-T which the collaboration  between the movie and Giordano and so on. Most of the fans had requested to take photo with the artists during the autographing session and they also willing to coordinate with their fans. Then, the media event had been ended successfully after the autographing session and the ending announcement had been given by the host.

The photo of the artists and the 4 chosen lucky fans who have participated in the Rubik's Cube Competition 

        

The group photo of the artists with fans

The photo of the artists with fans during autographing session

The group photo of the artists with the persons in charge from KSL City

Last but not least, I know it’s quite a long post but I would still like to share with you all about what I have experienced and learned from such a successful media event. In fact, the media event has been attended by more than 500 supporters and it has also successfully obtained the media coverage from the mainstream Chinese print media which is the news about the media event had been published on Sin Chew Daily (the Chinese print media who has the widest readership in Malaysia) at the next day. Hence, what we can see is KSL City has successfully obtained what they want from the media event which is the crowds and the media coverage by increasing more shoppers and building image of the shopping mall. And RAM Entertainment has also successfully promoted the movie to the public and gets more people to support their movie during Chinese New Year 2013. 

The news about the media event "Meet the Stars of Once Upon A Time" which published on Sin Chew Daily

Finally, PR have actually played an important role in a media event instead of event planner. PR persons have to take the responsibility to create awareness and inform the public to get them involved to the event. In business, the statistic represent everything and this is also the only thing which will be concerned by most of the boss. The number of attendees will be the final result to define the success of an event. Therefore, PR persons have played the role as a key person who can increase the number of attendees by using the effective tools in the right way to reach the target audiences specifically. To conclude, the keys of success of a media event are to plan well, communicate well, prepare well, execute well and end well. Then you will definitely obtain what you want from the media event in order to achieve your goals and objectives. These are what I have really experienced and learned from this media event in real life.

Next post I will talk about my first exhibition - Chinese New Year Promotional Fair 2013. It is another amazing experience for me to learn and gain the experience of how to make a successful exhibition. If you want to know more, please don't miss my next post. See you!

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Cheong Wei Chung (Quan)

Curtin Sarawak Campus, Miri

The Beginning of My PR Journey

Greetings to all PR practitioners,

Due to the accessibility issue on logging into this blog, it has screwed up my posting plan but fortunately the problem has been solved at the end. So, some of my posts will be the “expired” content but I would still like to share with you all. Anyway, my name is Quan and I am currently doing my internship in KSL City Johor Bahru, the shopping mall which under KSL Holdings Berhad. Generally, it is hard to get a PR position to work for because there are still lots of Asian companies or some smaller companies have combined the PR workload into the advertising or sales and marketing department in order to cut down their companies’ budget. Thus, most of the companies will not really offer the specific PR position and KSL City is no exception as well. Then, I have been assigned to work as an intern in Marketing & Leasing Department but I am doing the PR job which arranged by my seniors and manager.

KSL Holdings Berhad is one of the listed companies on the main-board of Bursa Malaysia and it is also a successful company who able to maintain its profitability based on its competitive advantages of being a reputable developer with quality control as well as contemporary concept and design. Although KSL Holdings Berhad is a construction-based company but it is not a typical land developer and it aims to become a diversified developing company by involving various industries such as townships project and luxury residences, retail and commercial, as well as the hotel and resort. Then, KSL City is one of the “products” of KSL Holdings Berhad which is integrated with KSL Hotel & Resort. Strategically located in the city centre, KSL City offers a complete shopping experience with entertainments and accommodations. Therefore, KSL City has currently become one of the largest shopping malls in town and it has also stand out as one of the central landmarks in Johor Bahru.

KSL City Johor Bahru

In my first day of work, I was introduced by my Marketing & Leasing Manager – Mr Darren Tan and my Senior Marketing Executives – Ms Lindy Lim and Ms Sherly Phoong to my friendly colleagues from every department and I was also brought by my senior who are playing the role as the only PR Officer in KSL City – Mr Rey Ling to take a look at the whole shopping mall for getting familiar with the place that I had to work for these 3 months. During the first 3 weeks, I was assigned to do the media monitoring which include the print media, online media and broadcast media. Other than that, I had also had to help the future events in the preparation stage because the future plan of year 2013 has been scheduled accordingly when they are in the end of year 2012. The events which will be held in year 2013 are Meet the Stars of Once Upon A Time (media event), Chinese New Year Promotion Fair, Food Fest, Perfect Home Expo, KSL Bazaar, Wedding Expo and Mooncake Fest. But most of the media events will be added time to time. Hence, everything is quite new for me and I am glad to have this opportunity to learn from my manager and seniors as well as experience the real business world before I step into the society. 

Then, the next post will talk about my first media event – Meet the Stars of Once Upon A Time. It is a fantastic experience for me to learn and gain the experience of how to make a successful media event. Do you want to know more about it? So don’t miss my next post! Stay tuned!

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Cheong Wei Chung (Quan)

Curtin Sarawak Campus, Miri