In the mix of things: Introducing the PR concept as a marketing strategy

LOGO of FCB CREAD and Co Ltd at the entrance of the company

Client Press Release Report

As the placement and internship have recently reached the 10th day mark, nothing really outstanding was presenting itself and even started to doubt about the learning factor outcome at the end of the journey.  From advertising booking, media booking, press release, media monitoring and small basic copywriter workloads to be actually doing something useful and productive in terms of Public relations content was a total blunt in term of working experience for PR but great for communication experience knowledge.

Newspaper Storage of  FCBCread& Co Ltd

Later on that day they was a Request of approval form from an Airline company and I was ask to summarise and rewrite it for designers, commercials and the Communication department. 

The next day, there was a meeting about that project and discussion around the project, the depth of this campaign and set of opportunities that it would be for the Cread & Co Ltd. 

This is where the opportunity for me to step in as an intern and provide knowledge not only about Public relations as someone who studied this methodology of marketing communications, explain its purpose and also the opportunities but also introducing of what as a PR student, I have learn during those three years of studies with the Virgin airlines case study. I explain the concept of Virgin airlines from what it was and how it has succeeded despite the marketing challenges it had, showcase case studies about Virgin Airlines and provide new insights for the Branding, design and Innovation team to enlarge their scoop of strategies that they might apply. 

List of Expertise that the FCB Cread and Co Ltd has a Advertising and Communication Agency

Furthermore that allow to grow my communication  and Public relations experiences in terms of research not only in a short and concise manner but also in way that it will help the concept team from the BDI section would understand and give him new angle to approach his strategies. The other important outcome was to be able to do something PR related and introduce to the company the very concept of public relation during my explanation stating the important things when regarding airlines companies that it deals with people, how public relation works in the Service and hospitality industry context and thus stating how Virgin Airlines proceeded to best up its completion via Public relations and services.

An explanation towards corporate communication in terms of Image and reputation while stating the ways to improve it and methods that was use by other successful Airlines companies. Therefore the concept that employees being the very image, first hand contact to the clients and first impression of the company image was an important task ahead. Another methodology proposed Stating Transmedia Storytelling strategies to bring forward something valuable that already have a strong culture influence and showing it in storytelling manner with blogging, employees’ culture development (Virgin airlines fake stewardess as example), adverts that people can be remember  either with sponsors or have something specific that trigger people thought to associate with the company with it,  and creating new customer bonding practices with the use of Anecdote experience in sponsored or media content.

Other suggestion I was able to introduce what was content marketing experiences for Airlines and how to write for an audience, personalising  the customer experience by introducing such as mobile application usage which can allow passengers to order drink, snack & duty free item from their mobile devices and also access airline-sponsored content,including videos, newspapers and games. Which was only possible because of the understanding of the public relations, analysis through research and exploring the new technologies its facilities in this fast pace technological era we presently are.

Understanding the work place Environment

Understanding the work place Environment

I tried to upload on my instagram account but it takes an eternity to upload and display all I wanted for this blog post. So let's go, As the second week of my internship come to an end, the opportunity to meet and familiarise with others members of the company come in hand with the knowledge acquire with it. Taking the opportunity to learn from others of what their jobs consist of within the company mostly as an observer is not only is a great way of making professional contact but also the allows an internal insight of the company works. 

As a disclaimer: First of all I am not a Fan of Instagram using this #CurtinPRIntern #PUBR3002workspaces is a nightmare for me being more of the PC / Laptop guy. So I download a third party app InstaPic to be able to upload on this social media app.

The Kitchen and dinning room at Cread Ltd

This is not a surprise, sharing a meal is often the best way to get to know people and know start making connections.

As most of them being communication professional either as Marketing officers, retail designers, Finance and accounting department, Human resources department or strategy officers. Their time is usually precious and it hard to get to know them during their working hours as being most of the time hang up to the phone or communicating with client using emails or simply out of the office for business purposes.

Cread Ltd Retail marketing department

 The Retail Marketing department

The official placement place I was assigned to but its is just because there was space issues. This department consist of a marketing officer dealing with the media directly for booking, advert placement and act as a media liaison for the company with media outlets and the company client. This is the home of most of the designers of the company working on adverts, brochures, annual reports and strategic design requirement for the company. 

Cread Ltd Design Branding and Innovation department

Design Branding and Innovation department

This department can be called the brain of the company as it is where communication, marketing, Branding design and all decision making take place. This is also the place I am able to learn from and discover how events such street guerilla tactics, the application of the 4 Why's of marketing applies, the purpose of a big Idea in the story telling and copy writing for radio script, television scripts and Facebook and social media strategies with the use of visual identity

Cread Ltd  Second Meeting room

The Main meeting Room with the CEO

For my working experience that I was able to acquire either a web designer or freelancer, I never met a such friendly character  and experience in his profession as the CEO and Executive Director of Cread Ltd. This room is either where meeting with Clients occur or the meeting with the DBI team or marketing officers occur. This room is where generally all strategies of the company are approve and decision making task are taken for the company. 

Those areas of the company is full of resources that I can exploit as a PR Intern, the internal communication among department is excellent and the convivial atmosphere mix with the pressure of deadline creates a unique working environment. This allows a better understanding of the communication world, its realities, flaws and joys which is a blessing in disguise. 

It’s the final Countdown

Hey! It is so close to the end! The countdown has finally begun for last semester of my degree (and possibly a lot of you too) to be finished!

So, here I am, my final two days and I am feeling two conflicting emotions; deflated and excited.

Let’s get the negative out of the way shall we? Deflated, reduced and disheartened is my emotion towards my time at HBF coming to an end. Throughout my placement I learn a diverse range of industry skills and knowledge and also made many friends whilst doing so. I have gained a high level of confidence not only in myself to pull through in times of pressure but in my writing skills, established my drive and my passion to make the most of what I can achieve and make a career for myself.

Onto the positive (my favourite mindset!) my final days have been simply marvellous! It started with writing some more internal communications articles for HBF’s intranet page ‘The Pulse’. Internal communications has proven to be an area of Public Relations I am finding myself drawn strongly too. I adore the idea of aligning and engaging staff through interesting and inspiring articles as well as internal initiatives.

One such example is the HBF Wellness Launch; an initiative put in place by HBF to increase the health and wellness of employees in the workplace. To effectively manage the launch Jodie and myself held a meeting with the Wellness consultants to develop efficient execution of the launch across all branches and the head office.

The meeting was interesting revolving around the launch event for HBF Wellness Program ‘HBF Balance’ bringing health and wellness to all HBF employees across 6 planes: Physical, Mental, Relationship, Social, Financial and Career health. The launch involved preparing a healthy breakfast to provide employees an idea of what constitutes as healthy and help them on their way to leading a fuller, healthier lifestyle. The breakfast bags were delivered throughout all of head office and all the branches with about 500 employees collecting their breakfast bags.

From my experience this simple equation sums up how I feel towards my future PR career:

Health Initiatives + Public Relations + Internal Communications = Where I want to be!

Straight after my meeting with Jodie and the Wellness Team the girls took me down to the HBF café (all 100% health food might I add – made on the premises) and surprised me with a PR team morning tea to say farewell and thank you for all my hard work – I feel truly blessed to have been a part of such a wonderful team of inspiring young women, and man - my manager Andrew! Women truly do dominate the PR profession haha.

Completely unrelated to PR in any way, shape or form, was that I made mini baked cheesecakes for my team to say thank you for helping me. The reason this is so exciting is that:

1. I eat sugar free; and
2. I eat gluten free

BUT, despite my mini cheesecakes being sugar and gluten free, I had each team member personally come over to thank me for such a delicious tasting dessert, my manager Andrew claimed they were “Sensational” and very well presented! Just another skill to add to my LinkedIn maybe?

Anyway catch you all later – I’m off to enjoy some more cheesecake!

Kiara xx

The Corporate Lasso

Happy week 5 everyone!

Okay so this blog is about how in-love I am! With my HBF placement of course ha! Over the duration of my internship, after getting my article published in the paper (yay again), I dove into a new line of work in PR – Internal Communications.

I worked with Jodie Leishman learning all there is to know about internal communications. Working in the not-for-profit sector, stories produced were welcoming and stimulated a sense of community amongst staff.  Thankfully they are also a lot less demanding and rigorous than outbound media releases and so much more fun to write, on the basis that I produced 15 article during my 20 days at HBF.  I love the idea of internal communications! There is something so enriching about creating a unified body of knowledge around an organisation of over 900 staff members and developing a piece that invites all staff to envision the same goals and work toward them as a team.

Those 15 intranet article were a large facet of what I produced during my internal communications experience, I thoroughly enjoyed the idea of knowing that my article will have the power to encourage over 900 HBF staff to take part in many of the wellness initiatives put in to play by HBF around the workplace. Of those internal articles published on HBF’s intranet system ‘The Pulse’, favourite article is posted below:

The Global Corporate Challenge an exciting ongoing event for the corporate world to reach their quota of 10,000 steps necessary each day for a healthy lifestyle. I produced this article from an energetic and playful perspective (one of the perk of internal communications is that you personality and style can shine through in your articles) in hopes that my energy and my love of fitness would radiate through my article and impact each HBF employee positively. Being in an already health conscious industry a lot of employees were already taking steps to change their lifestyle, a rule of thumb created was that all employees have to take the stairs instead of the lift (I did not abide by this rule, as most days I had already completed an hour of cardio or weights before 7am hit haha – my HBF team were very forgiving thankfully!). This article remains my favourite as it aligns perfectly with my beliefs and the results from this story were fantastic with employees packing healthy lunches and only healthy treats and muffins were to be allowed into meetings. A truly inspiring work place to be a part of!

Just before developing this blog contribution, I stumbled upon Holly Hazels “Don’t dread the red pen” blog entry raising the topic of constructive criticism on personally written pieces. I felt immediately connected to Holly’s blog as it related to my intranet articles. My first intranet article had a lot of edits to ensure that the language and tone matched that of HBF, however with each article the edits became minimalistic. It felt wonderful to eventually adapt to HBF’s style of writing.

Hope all is well, and that everyone is thoroughly enjoying their internships! I am currently in the process of seeking out my second work placement. Wish me luck!

Kiara Natasha xx