Learn. Innovate. Spread the Stoke.
With PRSSA friends meeting FourSquare Day Founder Nate Bonilla-Warford (@NateBW).
Recently, PRSSA National hosted a “tweet-up.” And if you have no idea what this means, don’t worry. I had no idea either until about a year ago when I attended PRSSA National Conference in San Diego. It’s basically a discussion on Twitter that happens using a specific keyword or link, specified by a hashtag (#). This creates a link so everyone can discuss that particular topic.
Anyway, the topic for this tweet-up: agency versus corporate public relations. We discussed pros and cons of both environments, as well as best practices as an intern or entry-level public relations practitioner.
With reference to the agency-side, PRSSA National Professional Advisor Sonja Popp Stahly (@SonjaPoppStahly) said: “At an agency you’re surrounded by lots of other PR pros, so lots of people to learn from, lots of potential mentors.” I think this is very true. I interned at Quiksilver last summer — corporate experience — and am now interning within the PR department of a full-service agency. However, there are many opportunities to meet different PR pros outside of the agency. These opportunities are everywhere and, as a student especially, I have found that these individuals are extremely willing to help out and teach. Take advantage: meet and learn as much as you can. As Julia Wendzinski (@jwendz) says, “If you can’t get an internship with both [agency and corporate], try setting up info interviews or job shadow days. Take advantage of being a student!” She is very right, and I couldn’t agree more. Even before interning in an agency, I was able to meet so many PR pros and learn from these mentors. PRSSA has fostered many of those experiences.
But don’t look to all these experiences expecting fame and fortune right away. With most PR internships being unpaid and employers looking for the “experience,” you’re going to give a lot. I’ve definitely had my own struggles, and I’ve made a few mistakes. But through mistakes, we learn and we improve. I always remind myself: don’t give up. Keep my goal in mind, and pursue my passion with every possible ounce of determination.
Last summer I met Bill Byrne. He was just featured in an article on Malakye, where Byrne discussed his start in the profession and gave some great advice for how to integrate public relations into the entire marketing mix. He says, “ads, media relations, events, street and guerilla tactics all should play a part.” The real deal: working directly with clients to craft a story, and figuring “out how to work with media outlets to tell those stories to [clients'] audiences.” Additionally, in contrast to the popular belief that you need to know the right people, there’s also a lot more to it than that. It comes back to crafting the right story for your client and getting it to the right media outlets.
It’s not all about developing press releases and blasting these out. In fact, journalists hate this. I’ve toured ABC Action News in Tampa, and I’ve talked with several journalists. This is not what they want. They want meaningful stories that matter to them and to their viewers.
When deciding on corporate PR or agency PR, try both. That’s the only way you’ll find out which one you prefer. If you like to stay busy with lots of very different tasks, you might like agency PR, where you’ll usually have to wear a lot of hats. As Byrne says, “It keeps things fresh for sure.” And if you like being fully committed to one story and one brand identity, you may like corporate, which often pays a higher salary, may not involve as many long hours as agency and often plays a very integrated role with the rest of the marketing mix.
The full transcript of the PRSSA tweet-up on corporate vs. agency PR is available here: http://bit.ly/aq3JCC
