Working in a PR Agency

What is a PR agencyAnd would I want to work there anyways?

Matthew Gain
Agency junkie
4 different agencies
1 in-house roll
Perpetual student
Alumni of University of Newcastle

Edelman 2012
What the hell is a PR agency?

What do PR agencies do?

Multinationals:
Work on big brands
Opportunity for travel
Big support networks
Large teams often times with multiple practice areas
Wider briefs beyond simple media relations
More exposure to the wider marketing mix
Boutiques
Smaller teams
Exposed to a wider range of work
Potentially less opportunity to grow
More engagement with the senior staff
Potentially more exposure to clients in the early stages
Likely to be specialised

Corporate:
Wear suits
Manage mergers and acquisitions
Senior level corporate counsel
Is as often as much about keeping your client out of the press
Shareholder relations/analyst relations
Business pages

Public Affairs:
Wear suits
Manage engagement with the government
Deal with ministers, advisors
Try to impact government policy – eg getting drugs on the pharmaceutical benefits scheme

Healthcare:
Wear lab coats
Pharmaceutical companies cannot advertise
Manage communications to healthcare professionals
Their objective is to get your doctor, pharmacist or other healthcare professional to recommend certain treatments or drugs to you

Technology:
Wear gaming t-shirts
Either consumer technology or B2B technology
Work to distill complex tech into understandable concepts
Have to work with some very geeky media

Consumer:
Do not wear suits, but must wear skinny jeans and have a haircut
Work on the brands you know and love
About getting excitement about new products from Xbox through to fashion brands and even toilet duck
Work with consumer media, but also tap into experiential activity and increasingly Facebook

Digital:
Wear digital watches…
These are the guys that get paid to Facebook and Twitter
Manage blogger engagement programs
Build Facebook communities
Understand SEO
Image by Jye Smith

Average day in the office:
There is no average day
Start at 8.30
Finish around 6.30ish
Media and social monitoring
Media calls
Client meetings
Journalist drinks
Facebook management
Team management

Edelman 2012
Media consumption today

Social media advertising
Sponsorship negotiation and facilitation
Paid seeding
Influencer identification
Blogger engagement
Online issues monitoring
Crisis readiness and management
Social content creation
Edelman 2012
The new PR skills
Website development
Web development project management
Web strategy and property mapping
SEO
Social stream creation
Online community management
Video content creation and distribution
Social platform SEO

PR case studiesSome of the work I have done in my career

Halo 3 – Xbox (UK):
Modeled on blockbuster film launches, Halo 3 landed in September to enormous fanfare, mainstream anticipation and broke all preceding entertainment launch day revenue records

International preview tour for mainstream consumer media
Launch media push focussed on direct comparisons with the revenue set to be generated by Halo and those of blockbuster entertainment launches such as Spiderman 3 Movie and Harry Potter books
Red carpet launch and after party attended by a cast of high profile celebrities, mainstream media and paparazzi photographers

In excess of 100 National pieces of coverage on the day preceding and day of launch
A total launch window audience reach in excess of 724 million people
21 magazine front covers
Top news item circulating on BBC and CNN broadcast news the day preceding and day of launch
Major four page article in the Daily Telegraph Saturday Magazine

Edelman increased awareness and users for a first-of-its-kind communityplanning website: PlanBig.com.au

Edelman 2012
TweetLevel:
The election battle for Twitter

Work experience – we make all our hires through work experience
Read widely – understand the media, understand blogs, get engaged
Have a digital footprint:
Blog, Tweet, Facebook
Set up a Facebook Page – understand how that works
Think laterally and also think creatively
Edelman 2012
Getting a job in a PR agency

Get in contact
Matthew Gain
Blog – matthewgain.com
Twitter - @matthewgain
Email – matthew.gain@edelman.com
HR – anita.gilbert@edelman.com

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Working in a PR Agency

by Matthew Gain on Aug 21, 2010

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Working in a PR Agency — Presentation Transcript