My Interview on How a Fitness Club Owner Deals with Public Relations

My public relations experience is mostly from two intense stints at the public relations consultancy Nam Consult and as the chief publicity and marketing executive for the poetry, music and art extravaganza, The B.O.G.O.F. I joined Nam Consult as an intern in January 2009 and after my internship was asked to stay. At Nam Consult I learnt about the challenges in running a PR business. In retrospect I learnt a deep appreciation for what it takes to be an entrepreneur in Marketing and Communication. The drive and persistence need to keep going in the field are astounding.

Public relations is a management function, a PR professional uses public relations as a way to manage their relationship with different publics on behalf of an organization. For our team’s proposal on Chick-fil-A we are managing and focusing on improving Chick-fil-A’s relationship with vegans and vegetarians.

Public relations is a very cost efficient way to display the product compared to my own advertising of the product and costing a fortune to pay for something when I might not even get my money back out of it. I am going to use company news, promotional events, and sponsorship programs this way I can reach a larger scale of an audience at relatively a fraction of the cost it would take me to pay for my own marketing.

Luttrell, Regina. Public Relations Tactics. Dec2014, Vol. 21 Issue 12, p12-12. 3/4p. , Database: Corporate ResourceNet

The most recent definition of public relations, according to the Public Relations Society of America (2012), states that “Public Relations is a strategic communication process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their publics.” Through the rapid advancement of modern media and technology, there have never been more outlets and opportunities available for accomplishing the goals of public relations. Believing the development of social media has not created serious changes in the way public relations practitioners go about their duties would be foolish and a fast track to falling behind in this rapid world of communication. The main goals of public relations are “to

[Client] is expanding from marketing into public relations (PR) services. The initial scope for [Client] PR included public sector, non-profit, consumer brands, healthcare, technology, commercial, and industrial clients. While [Client] has long-term potential to serve diverse audiences, the persona project kick-off meeting narrowed this scope to healthcare/medical, technology, professional services, and non-profit. This narrowed scope is indicated by five boundaries in Figure 1.These boundaries represent a clear direction to conduct persona research for ideal clients. This is a suitable niche for persona research because the boundaries align with underlying PR strategy, intersect with team capabilities, and conform to local markets. While ideal

Over the past two and a half weeks as a class we have been assigned to talk to a variety of different public relations departments in companies of our interest. Through the struggles of being hung up on immediately or put on hold for 20 plus minutes, this assignment not only allowed me to learn how the PR field works via telephone and email, but what type of field would I be interested in working for. Through all the ups and downs, I have found three businesses that have interested me and would possibly interest me in the future.

I help Health Coaches in a unique way by providing specialized training & industry insight and industry on custom-tailored marketing for their special niche. Instead of spending hundreds of hours on ineffective self-promotion or thousands of dollars on outsourcing to marketing agencies, they will LEARN about effective marketing strategies and highly effective tools - and will be able to effectively APPLY these strategies to their own business. My services empower Health Coaches to clearly distinguish between services that require outsourcing and services they can provide on their own - and will enable them to promote and excel their business on a professional level.

In order to truly comprehend the role of PR in the fashion industry it is essential for us to first have a deep understanding of what Public Relations actually means and how it is applied to modern society. As mentioned before, relationships are not automatic or effortless, they have to be planned and sustained. Public Relations is a function that helps establish and maintain mutual lines of communication, understating, acceptance and cooperation between an organisation and its public.” (Harlow, 1976). This is done through different management strategies such as media control, press releases, promotion, and

"Public relations is the management of communication between an organization and its publics." (Grunig & Hunt's, 1984)

For some people public relations is a very important, strategic element in the smooth and effective function of the company. As Baines, 2004 stated: “The purpose of professional public relations is to create understanding. It is unlike advertising, whose main aim is to generate awareness and sales, or propaganda, whose aim is to suggest what individuals should believe.” (Baines et al., 2004, p.6) Throughout my report I will be focusing on Pedigree company - one brand from the large corporate, giant Mars, Incorporated as well. I will be assessing how they use Public Relations techniques to present and manage their image and reputation as a large corporation. Pedigree is one of the world’s largest and the most recognizable dog food producer. Their products carry a wide range of different tastes. This ranges from dry to wet foods (canned to pouched) and is intended for puppies as well as adult dogs. The versatile of products give the opportunity to even the most demanding customer to help them find the perfect taste for their canine friend.

XYZ Enterprises wish to conduct an interview to fill the position of Public Relations Officer. The company is committed to adding a progressive, ambitious, result oriented, and flexible person to join our dynamic team. Public relations officer ensures that the information and the communication strategies of the organization that presents it to the clients, public, and other stakeholders are evaluated. They promote smooth information flow in the organization (Botan & Hazleton, 2010).

In a hospital setting, Public Relations and Marketing requires one to establish connections within the immediate environment, with the board of directors, with potential investors, extended department employees, the media and of course an online presence. When holding the position of Public Relations, one wants the hospital staff’s support. There are instances that will be challenging and the Public Relations manager seeks to have everyone on the same page. The board of directors have great power; they can bring a project down in no time. A Public Relations Manager also wants to have a working knowledge of new technology which might require him to engage in networking beyond the local area. Experts have noted “networking stimulates stakeholders to engage in international exchange to gain new knowledge and experiences as well as presenting their work abroad and to further exchange” (Klemenc-Ketiš & Kersnik, 2014). In this way, the Public Relations Manager wants to be valued by the board in that they know the manager has knowledge of technology investments that could benefit the hospital. As a Public Relations Manager, one wants a working relationships with the media. The media can be harsh. Should there be a local crisis the Public Relations Manager seeks to have the media report events in a positive manner. In order to have these skills and draw entities together, it is essential to obtain the best education possible.

Public relations are the most important part of a company. It has the relationship between advertising and international public. The primary purpose of public relation is to target audience in different ways and gain the business in public status. Companies would like to use media for creating communicate with people, and promote their business into the world. Organisations would use four of the basic models in public relation to describes and communicate to the international public. The four basic models are press agentry/publicity model, public-information model, two-way asymmetric model and two-way symmetric model. Within these models, it can tell the company behaviour and how the organisation using models communicate with others.

As the name of the discipline implies, public relations is how an organization builds beneficial relationships with its key stakeholders. With effective communication as the practices’ primary tool, modern day organizations have taken advantage of proficient practitioners to boost exposure of their company and its message across to international audiences.