Imagine you are a PR practitioner hired to promote Concordia College event. What steps and tools would you use and why?

If I was hired to promote an event on campus my first thought would be to consider which students are going to be our target market. This is done in order to know how to approach the target market and know their likes and dislikes. If my target market is the entire student body then I would start considering various ways in which I could reach out to them and promote the event in a way that is appealing and fun for them. Since the only people I am interested in targeting are Concordia students, I would ensure that all the marketing is done on campus and any other school related website. I would definitely use the following:

• Print publications – by posting posters all around campus students would be constantly reminded of the upcoming event. Of course these posters would be colorful, have catchy phrases and somehow tell students why they do not want to miss the event. I would also print it in the Compass, since this publications is seen by many students throughout the day.
• Viral campaigns – by creating a video with Concordia students highlighting aspects of the event, students will feel more inclined to attend.
• Email – emailing students would also be a technique of mine, since by doing so the email acts as a reminder to the students.
• Word of mouth – creating a big buzz about the event would also be another tactic. By doing this, I let the students interact and also create in them a sense of anticipation.
• Social networking sites ‘Facebook’ – advertising the event of Facebook will allow me to create blogs about it so students can talk about the event, which leads to promotion of the event. Also, by using Facebook as an advertisement technique I am able to reach out the students in a more personal manner and show them that we are interested in what they think.

What are the four models of public relations?

Public Relations has many models, but Grunig’s four primary models are the ones that stand out because they describe the evolution of PR.  The models go as follow:

1.)   Press Agentry/Publicity model: this is a one-way communication method, which uses persuasion and manipulation to influence audience to behave as the organization desires.

2.)   Public Information model: also uses a one-way communication channel and it basically uses the press releases and other one-way communication techniques to distribute organizational information. When working within this category, practitioners are often referred as ‘journalists in residence’.

3.)   Two-way Asymmetrical model: is the most common PR practice today. Its method consists in sending out information and then doing research to see if the public understands it in the way you intended it. If this is not the case, then you might have to refine your methods and research.  

4.)   Two-way Symmetric model: is the most conducive for optimum mutual benefit. It involves researching the audience and finding out what is important to them and how they get their information, as well as evaluating how the public and the company see their relationship as mutually beneficial. 

What are the key elements to successful public relations?

Public relations comes down to seven basic steps: research, including public opinion polls, surveys, questionnaires, interviews, focus groups and literature searches; all done in a continuous process. By following all of these steps you know you are contributing to becoming successful at PR, but the most important element to remember is the assessment of public attitudes. Without adequate background on the people you are trying to reach and how they think it will be almost impossible to communicate effectively and reach the audience.

Without research and evaluation you will not be able to identify the customers’ needs nor the public’s attitude for your client. Another point that we must keep in mind is that PR is a detailed strategy and it has to be managed well. You should be able to multitask and balance everything out since many important factors will come into play. Also, we have to remember that the goal is to foster public support, since they are the key element towards success. Lastly, evaluating a campaign will always be good and it should be the last step in a strategy, because feedback is what will help the PR people figure out what worked best and what did not.

What are some of the specialties or functions of PR?

Public relations can be defined as: organized activities intended to favorably influence the public. People within this business have multiple responsibilities and employ various methods to target the people, these methods are: advertising, direct marketing and related tools and techniques in representing their employers’ or clients’ interests. PR is a job that requires multiple skills and specialized expertise and knowledge for the execution. The complexity of the field makes it hard to focus only on one thing, which is why PR has been divided into specialties, making it easier for people to select what they need or where they want to pursue a career. Amongst the different specialties we are able to find: publicity and media relations, promotion or selling, community and government relations, public information, special events, employee relations, lobbying and issues management –which also include reputation management and crisis communication. Also within these categories we are able to find those who serve as an early warning system and those who provide technical support for other management functions. 

mashable.com

Mashable.com is a news website. It was founded by Pete Cashmore and its primary focus is to present the user with social media news, but it also covers news and developments on entertainment, online videos, mobile, business, technology and the web. This site was ranked as one of the world’s largest websites and it recently acquired Blippr, a micro-reviews service based on the concept that users can review games, books, movies, music and web applications.

The site is extremely user friendly and is loaded in content. It has an option of singing up to receive news directly in your inbox, which a lot of people like since it makes it more ‘personal’. It also allows a connection between Twitter and Facebook, which again creates a more personal feeling to it. Blogging and commenting on articles is very popular and it gives the website a friendlier look, since everyone is welcomed to do it. In all it is a pretty interesting website and the fact that they even encourage people to write for them makes it more motivating in my perspective.

Are books an obsolete medium?

I do not believe books are an obsolete medium, even though there are several alternatives to books, people still rely on them. Teachers, students and people who read for fun are still purchasing books and will continue to do so. Although technology has created e-books, kindles and nooks people still buy books. Yes, e-readers are easy to carry and they have other benefits like WiFi, an e-reader will never give you the same experience a book can. Personally, I have used both books and e-readers and I find it much more engaging and easy to concentrate when I use a traditional book rather than an e-reader. I am not saying there are people who love technology and will purchase one of these just to keep in the collection and use it, but there are also millions of other readers like me who prefer a simple book in which annotations can be done easily and there is no way it will break down. The fact is, if you are the kind of person that loves to read books or curl up and do some reading, the experience you get of smelling the printed pages, grabbing the book in your hands and flipping the pages will never be compared to scrolling or tapping ‘next’ on an e-reader.

Just like every other piece of technology e-readers have advantages too because they do not occupy too much space (compared to a 1000 page book), they are easy to carry, there is WiFi connection in them and you can purchase an e-book at any time. But, just like there are positives there are also negatives to these and owning a technological object means you need to always be careful with it by constantly making sure you keep it safe, it does not fall anywhere and giving it maintenance services like cleaning it up and emptying the memory every now and then. Books do not require most of the things mentioned above since they are easy to place, do not require maintenance and do not have a limited memory space. 

How do conglomerates affect print publishing? Are there positives and negatives associated with conglomerates?

“Beginning the 1960s, a major trend in publishing was the merging of houses, as well as the consolidation of retail sales outlets. One of the first mergers to occur was Random House's purchase of Alfred A. Knopf in 1960. In 1965 RCA acquired Random House for $40 million and added it to RCA's roster of media companies, which included NBC Radio and Television. In 1980, Random House was acquired by Advanced Communications and became part of the New house family's media empire. During this time a number of publishers, including Crown, Fawcett, and Ballatine, were merged with Random House. In 1998 Bertelsmann AG acquired Random House. Simon and Schuster was acquired by Gulf + Western in 1975. From 1984 to 1994, the company acquired more than sixty companies, including Prentice-Hall, Silver Burdett, and Macmillan Publishing Company. With the addition of these educational, professional, and reference imprints, Simon and Schuster's revenue grew from $200 million in 1983 to more than $2 billion in 1997. In 1989, the Gulf + Western corporation restructured and emerged as Paramount Communications. In 1994, shortly after the purchase of Macmillan, Paramount was bought by Viacom Inc., which also owned MTV. In 1998 the company sold its education, professional, and reference units to Pearson PLC, which later merged with Longman” (Greco).

This mass consolidation has made unlikely partners out of former competitors. By bringing down competition, publishers can focus more on the quality of the jobs rather than the quantity they sell and therefore the quality of every piece of information we get will be much higher. But as positive as this is, it has a negative side as well since all of those who do not have the economics or alliances that this massive conglomerates do, will not be able to be a part of this. Also, another negative aspect might be that the houses that are bought by this bigger power will no longer have a say in what they want to produce or how they wish to run things. Freedom of speech might be affected with this.

Greco, Albert N. The Book Publishing Industry. Boston: Allyn and Bacon, 1997.