PR and Journalism

Working in a publishing company means it’s always busy as magazines have to be printed on time and with no errors at all. Because Mongoose is a publishing company I’ve had the pleasure of not only working in the Pr division but also the Editorial where I’ve written various articles in the Newsweek; had to write about the best universities in America, Australia, Thailand, Singapore, Taiwan and Japan. It was challenging as I could not just copy and paste from the websites online but had to structure the articles in a way which would be interesting to the readers. I also had the chance to write for Arrivals which is a booklet given to foreigners at the airport in Malaysia. In this I wrote about the best hotels in KL, Best apartments and so on so forth. But the really exciting experience I had in the Editorial was when I was asked to go to a movie preview of Gulliver’s Travels; this was very exciting as only press was invited. The free pop corn and drinks made me for a second think of leaving the PR department lol! After the movie I had to write approximately 150 words of what I actually thought about the movie, what “I” thought, made me feel like a real journalist. These past few days I’ve learnt that there is mutual dependence between PR and Journalism. But hey this week I’m back to PR, and there’s an event (World Press Photo) coming up soon and it’s so hectic doing all the media invites and RSVPs. But I’ll talk about that on the next post! Bye :)

Time Out Malaysia For Kids: PR Plan

The objective of this PR plan was to publicize or make known the new edition of Time Out Malaysia for Kids. This magazine is new in Malaysia and the first of its kind. The main objective of the magazine is to inform the public in Malaysia that there are various wondrous locations where kids can go out and have fun like; Sabah’s Turtle Island National Park, KL Bird park, butterfly Farm just to name a few, other than cinemas, bowling clubs and fast food outlets. The magazine also features restaurants which serve child friendly meals which make it convenient for families to go out together and have fun. The magazine is basically trying to change the Malaysian mentality of children being more seen than heard.

I had to find appropriate media channels in which the Malaysian community was more focused in, considering that the company PR department had no budget. I found it difficult because at school when we had to come up with a PR plan, we would simply list billboards, and TV adverts, events and so forth. But this was the real world you couldn’t just come up with a list of tactics that were not realistic. While doing the PR plan I got frustrated as my supervisor declined most of my ideas because every idea I had involved a budget and most of the company events had been done as it is the end of the year. She advised me to try use the media as much as possible as the company had already established a relationship with various media outlets. So here are some of the ideas I came up with;

The best way to get Time Out Kids Magazine out there is to make it appealing to blogers, because if blogers believe it is good they will defiantly write about it. Or maybe we can start our own blog about Time Out Kids magazine which would contain articles about kid’s activities.

We could also start a fan club or online magazine for Time Out Kids magazine. In it we could give people limited information so that they feel the need to buy the magazine itself.

There could be a press release about the magazine in the newspaper to inform the public about it including bloggers. To make it more interesting there could be a treasure hunt map or quiz in the newspaper. The clues of the treasure hunt would be in the Time Out kids Magazine so this would encourage parents to buy the magazine.

There could be a different design of snakes and ladders whereas the squares on the game represent ‘Things To See’ in the magazine. The catch is in the newspaper the places to see will only have the first three letters of the place thus persuading the buyer of the newspaper to buy the Time Out Kids magazine if there want to know where to have fun with their family.

I loved doing the plan as it was assigned to me individually. It made me feel responsible and capable, though there were disappointments here and there. I learnt that disappointments should not stop you as an intern. We have to open our minds in order to learn more and humbly accept we are wrong when we are wrong, because we are just babies in the industry. And oh check out our website www.mongooseasia.com to learn more about Time Out Malaysia; it will get you to the best restaurants, resorts, spas, shopping malls and there’s plenty of prizes to be won.

Overall I learnt that Public Relations cannot survive without the media. The media is very vital for so many tactics in PR plans. PR has to develop and sustain its relationship with the media for good coverage and this is exactly what I’ve learnt in university. And as we’ve been overcome by the new era media like social network sites, PR should use them to the maximum as they are cost efficient. Blogs are by far the best mode of communication as people share their experiences and recommend products to others. And right now mum bloggers who have liked Time Out Malaysia For Kids have recommended it to friends and family on their blogs. Job well done for me :)

Good Internal relations! :)

Today there was meetings held by the Managing Director and all staff members were present. We have recently moved to a new office which is totally awesome, its spacious but very cold, so the “Boss” was inquiring about how the staff felt in the new surroundings. There were issues about the air corn (in which I had a say in) and the toilets. Recently there has been a suggestion box in the kitchen in which the staff can comment about anything they felt uncomfortable with. In my opinion this shows good leadership skills as the leadership allowed free communication at the meeting, everyone was free to say what they felt. As I remember correctly face to face meetings with staff members helps strengthen internal communications because first hand information is derived. To end the meeting the Managing Director announced that there was going to be free breakfast for every staff member before working hours began WOW! The motto of this was to have “Healthy workers” This was a way to keep the workers happy and healthy. Way To GO Mongoose!!!