It’s the FINAL countdown…

Its the Final Countdown

Click here to view the top 10 things I learned in my PR class! I had a great time learning to Blog and will continue to after this class!

 

LOVE vs HATE

In my Public Relations 2330 class we were asked to punctuate a letter that is written to Tom from Sheila. Half of the room was to add punctuation to make he letter sound as if Sheila were in LOVE with Tom; the other half of the room was to make the document sound as if she HATED Tom.

Here is the format that we started with. It has no punctuation.

Dear Tom I want a man who knows what love is all about you are generous kind thoughtful people who are not like you admit to being useless and inferior you have ruined me for other men I yearn for you I have no feelings whatsoever when we’re apart I can be forever happy will you let me be yours Sheila

My side of the room was assigned the HATE portion and this is what we came up with:

Dear Tom. I want a man who knows what love is. All about you are generous, kind, thoughtful people. who are not like you, admit to being useless and inferior. You have ruined me for other men I yearn. For you I have no feelings whatsoever. When we’re apart I can be forever happy. Will you let me be? yours ,Sheila

The class participation in this project was extremely high. Maybe some of the ladies had just gotten out of a rough relationship and needed to vent. The point of the exercise was to show how important proper punctuation and grammar are. It is very easy to misunderstand a written document because one cannot here the tone of the sender.

For any girls or guys out there that are inspired to write a love letter to someone click here to see some tips! If you would like to write a proper hate letter, just switch all the advice from the site backwards!

 

How am I supposed to explain THIS to my Future Employers?

If you live in Statesboro or surrounding areas you have seen the local commercials of Northland Cable. If you have missed out on this wonderful experience, I have posted some of these masterpieces for your viewing pleasure. This is just a taste of the type of marketing techniques that are deemed acceptable in this area. I have to say that my little sister’s elementary school, Camp Creek Elementary in Lilburn,Ga, has a better marketing department for the 5th grade news show. In fact, as stated in the Statesboro Business and Lifestyle Magazine, 30 second commercials only cost about $8.00 per spot. That is less than two meals at Mcdonald’s. Does anyone know the going rate for a quality superbowl commercial? – What a difference! How am I as a marketing student supposed to explain to my future employers that I understand the ins and outs of advertising when for the past four years I have been exposed to these types of campaigns?

As you can see, it is a common theme of these folks to invite their friends and families to star in the home-made commercials. Could they not have taped a real banquet, or at least asked more friends to sit in chairs in the back of the room? P.S. cute kids at the end- who’s their agent.

I think Spongebob would be offended that his song was used in such an embarassing style. Come on, even a cartoon can do it better. I am pretty sure that the Spongebob theme song has a copyright, and it is illegal to use it in a different form. By the way, from what I have learned (and correct me if I’m wrong) one should not advertise for one’s competition that is directly accross the street.

Please, don’t show us inside any of the properties that you are renting out… I’d rather see how cool you look in your convertable. I am very excited to see that your handy man actually fixes things though, at least someone around here does.

 PLEASE check out this interview with “Bubba San” in Statesboro Business and Lifestyle Magazine! He states that companies need to brand their business. So what is Car City branded with?- foolishness? Low quality? They dont even show the cars in their lot! So without any further stalling… HERE WE ARE LADIES AND GENTLEMEN… The pride of Statesboro! CAR CITY!

Look Y’all… They wash ‘Em too!

 

Public Relations Departments and Firms Ch.4

From the Textbook”Public Reltaions: strategies and tactics” by Dennis L. Wilcox and Glenn T. Cameron.

Here are just a few facts from chapter 4.

• Larger companies tend to include PR in their policy making process because they tend to be more sensitive than others to policy issues and public attitudes.
• The first corporate PR department was started by George Westinghouse in 1889.
• Corporate Communications is often used as the department name instead of PR.
• Other names include: corporate relations, marketing and corporate affairs, investor relations, and community relations.
• Sometimes the name “public relations” or “PR” gets a bad rap, so the other terms are used to keep the department from being labeled negatively.
• The head of the department is usually named one of three titles: Manager, director, or Vice President.
• Various levels of management influence the PR department in order to effectively reach the target audience.
• Outside PR firms may be good resources and have new and different ideas that a company has not considered, however they may lack full-time committment and may be more expensive than having an in-house PR department.

 

Marketing on the Chapter Room Floor

While listening to “Marketing Over Coffee” with my sorority sisters on the chapter room floor, we found some pretty interesting facts. 

These two men record their conversation in a Dunkin Donuts about the different marketing techiniques that different professionals use and the effects that they have.

They started out by talking about a new barcode technique on baseball cards and even billboards. A person can scan barcodes with their cell phone and computer to bring up websites and interesting blogs that have to do with the product that they scanned.

Moving on from that, the men began to speak about email tracking and the use of  TWITTER. They reitterated several facts that Professor Nixon has spoken about and over the course of this semester, I have learned are very important as well.

• The Marketing Over Coffee” guys have over 9,000 people following them.
• They stated to keep it professional, no one wants to hear when you are feeding your children.
• Post often.

 

Uh-Oh… When Technology Goes Wrong, It’s Nice to have a Hard-Copy.

President Obama has often been characterized by the public as a great speaker.  During his campaign I fell into  the group that  was mesmerized by his ability to use words so well and speak so eloquently.  I have grown up as a republican and still believe myself to be, however I was always embarrassed by former President Bush’s inability to sound professional, energetic, or unfortunately even intelligent when speaking to the country.  Of course he is intelligent; I know this,  but  it is very clear that Bush is not the best public speaker, and not many republicans are. So when Obama began his campaign I was most enthused to watch some of his speeches. He has great stage presence and a deep passionate voice. He spoke clearly and with great emotion. What I didn’t know, was that the entire time (even walking around the room) he was looking at a teleprompter with the exact words of the speech written out. I understand the need for a teleprompter, but usually it encases only outlines so that the speaker does not loose train of thought. Most public speakers keep a hard copy in front of them or on note cards. In my public speaking class at Georgia Southern University we were not permitted to use any notes on certain assignments and must complete the speech from memorization. Unfortunately, President Obama was not prepared for this type of malfunction at his “Town Hall” meeting that was supposed to be impromptu Q&A from citizens around the country.

What should his PR team do to combat the negative press that they receive?

What if it happens more than once?

Let me make myself very clear in that I am not making fun of the President. I am just commenting on a PR connection and was wondering how people would handle the publics reaction.

 

48 Hours of Twitter

Twitter From the start of this course till now, Twitter has BLOWN UP! I have been so surprised to see celebrities that I am interested in post on Twitter. Ryan Seacrest, Britney Spears (well… her staff), and Oprah all update me on what is going on in their lives and those around them. I am also following FOX news and CNN; I like to see how differently they report on things or if they even cover the same stuff.

As a new Tweeter, I enjoy following more than Tweeting. I use it as an “updater” so that I can get quick snippets of what is going on. I get Enews texts sent to my phone so that i know the latest gossip in HOLLYWOOD.

Twitter is a social network that connects individuals using short messages that are only about 160 characters long. This is about the size of a text message for your phone. This is very useful if you sign up for the part of the website that allows the messages to be sent to your phone. If you are busy, like me, and don’t have time to read the paper or watch the news but you still would like to be knowledgable about what is going on, then follow a news station. They will update their status with breaking news sent right to your phone. You will be “in the know” before anyone in your office or classroom! This is also a great way to keep up with relatives and close family. My mom and sister live in Atlanta while I attend Georgia Southern University in Statesboro. When my sister, Cloe, updates her status about winning her volleyball game or getting an “A” on an assignment, I emmediatly am notified and can call her when I get a chance. If I post that I am broke and eating Ramon Noodles in hopes that my mom will put money in my account, I receive links from my mother to sites to teach me how to better manage my money. (Thanks.)

One of the things that I tweeted about during this assignment was the success of War of the Wings, a philanthropy event hosted by Kappa Delta. At the end of April KΔ presented a check to Prevent Child Abuse Bulloch County for $6,400.00, which was 80% of the money raised at the event. The check ceremony was at Picnic for Prevention, an annual picnic to raise awarness. The other 20% of the money raised was sent to the national Prevent Child Abuse America office. Thank you to all who came out and participated!!

 

War of the Wings

On April 2, 2009 Kappa Delta Sorority hosted its annual War of the Wings charity event for Prevent Child Abuse America. Restaurants all around the Statesboro area donated thousands of hot wings in support. Over 300 students and community members came to enjoy the food, the music, and the atmosphere. Southbound the band performed for two hours, followed by a pie eating contest, soda chugging contest, and last but certainly not least, the HOT SAUCE chugging contest! Entree fees for these contests were $50.oo, and tickets to eat were only $5.00. This ticket included a full plate of wings, a drink of your choice, and dipping sauce. T-shirts were just $12.00 and we SOLD OUT.

Picnic for prevention is held at the end of April. This event is put on by the local Prevent Child Abuse Bulloch County chapter infront of the Statesboro Court House. Many organizations come out to advertise their contributions to PCA and also play games with the children and their families. There was facepainting, music, and food for everyone. Kappa Delta presented a check for $6,400.00 to the local chapter at this event. Hopefully next year will be just as successfull!

 

Thanks B.Nixon!

After being super frustrated for pretty much the duration of this course because of my issues with computers I finally decided to meet one-on-one with my instructor Barbara Nixon to get some advice. I am not completely computer illiterate, I mean< I grew up in the 90’s, but this blogging stuff really had me down. At one point my posts only consisted of paragraphs of boring information and links to websites that were not even embedded into the post. One night (actually, it was morning… 4:00 am to be exact) I was so upset and frustrated that I started crying. Embarrassing, I know.

In the session with my instructor she calmly explained how to use some of the media applications so that my blog mights actually come to life. It was so easy to do, I just needed someone to actually show me how. I guess I am just a visual learner. I was only in the computer lab with her for about 10 minutes… but in that 10 minutes I was cleared of all anxiety.

Here are some simple things that I learned that might be of interest to new bloggers or other students in our class.

• To put a picturein your blog:
  • Go to google images or any other site that you are interested in and find a picture relevant to your post. Right click and copy the picture. While you are editing your post Right Click to paste the pic where you want it. Then click on the picture and two buttons will appear. If you choose not to use the pic then click the right button that looks like this , if you want to use the picture click to the left on the button that looks like a landscape. A box will pop up and here you can change the size and position of your picture. Copy and paste the URL from where you received the picture and even change the caption. EASY AS PIE. Then click update.
  • To embed a youtube video click SHARE at the bottom of the video. Below that will pop up a link in a box that you can copy. Back at your post click the button that says add video above your toolbar. It looks like film. Click from URL and just paste the link into the blank box. It should be ready to update. It will not show up as a video while you are editing, but it will show up once the post is published.
  • To make a link to a website be embedded onto a word like Kappa Delta find the site and copy the URL. On your post highlight the phrase or word that you would like to link then click the button on your toolbar that looks like chain links . Paste the URL into the box and click the drop down menu so that it opens a separate window when the link is clicked. Then update!
  • If your toolbar looks like it is missing elements click on the button that says show kitchen sink.

I hope this helps anyone out there that gets frustrated with this stuff! After I learned how to do these simple steps I had such a better time BLOGGING. Thank you Professor NIXON!!! 

 

News Releases, Media Alerts, and Pitch Letters Chapter 14

Here is an informational snippit on how to develop your own personal pitch when meeting new and important people. It is called “The Elevator Speech,” and is designed to help you boil down who you are and what you do to a less than thirty second phrase. Have you thought about what you would say if someone asked you how you spent these last 4 years?

From the Textbook “Public Relations: strategies and tactics” by Dennis L. Wilcox and Glenn T. Cameron.

Three social medias that are important to the field of PR are News releases, media alerts, and pitch letters.

A news release (press release) is a document that is made to provide the information of a firm to a mass media publication such as a newspaper. A media alert brings attention to an event or news conference for reporters and stations so that they can be available to cover the event. A pitch letter is a short letter or note to the editor in hopes to grab their attention. This form is usually accompanied by a media kit.

• In all cases it is important to follow some simple rules.
  • Do not describe products with words such as “unique.” These phrases are over used and dry. Reporters want to know actual characteristics and uses of the product. Not opinions.
  • Avoid words such as “world class” and “leading Provider”- anything that tries to position your company.
  • Be direct and to the point.
  • Use the inverted pyramid style of writing to make sure important information is not cute by the editor.
  • State the 5 W’s: Who What Where When Why.