PR at the Awards

This weekend celebrated the 31st Annual MTV Video Music Awards and the 66th Primetime Emmy Awards.The Emmy Award acknowledges those who excel in the television industry, with nominees for categories such as Outstanding Drama Series, Outstanding Comedy Series, Outstanding Lead Actress - Miniseries or a Movie, and more, while the VMAs recognize those who excel in music videos. Major events like these need stellar PR in order to run smoothly.

Chances are you've seen some type of post - whether it be Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram - about the Emmy Awards. There are multiple key times when actors and actresses themselves, directors, supporters, and the PR/Marketing team push the event:

• When the event date is announced
• When the nominees are released
• Short time leading up to the event
• During the event
• Day after the event

An award ceremony such as this leaves a good amount of opportunity for coverage. If you saw posts on your personal social media feeds leading up to the event, then you'll surely see a few today, being the day after (including this post you are currently reading.) One of the great things about these well-known award ceremonies is that even without social media, everyone would be talking. The show leaves so much to discuss - did your favorite show win an award? Did you see Nicki Minaj perform? Who was the best dressed and who was the worst dressed? Celebrities can slide through the red carpet unnoticed or making the biggest scene - it's up to them and the PR team.

Celebrities themselves take on their own PR with their personal social media accounts. Lena Dunham, writer of HBO's GIRLS, shared a few Emmy-related tweets over the last month or so. Fans find it exciting to hear about what their icons are up to & what better way to reach out to them then through humor.

Fashion is additionally a major part of any awards ceremony. It's certainly a time when what you're wearing actually matters. If you (or your client) show up unpresentable, it will be noticed. If you (or your client) show up in something outrageous, it will be noticed. For instance, at this year's VMAs, Katy Perry walked onto the red carpet with friend and rapper, Riff Raff, in what seemed to be a public appreciation of Britney Spears and Justin Timberlake. This kind of outfit choice is not just about getting dressed for paparazzi - it's a message!

(Source: Daily Mail)

Lessons In Event Planning

If you search “Event Planning” in Google, you get flooded with links to hundreds of party planners and extravagant wedding photos. For the past year, I was given the opportunity to intern as a Public Relations intern for an office that puts on some of Philadelphia’s largest events, none of which entailed a wedding or your typical club-party. From Marathons to Mayor’s ceremonies to the largest free concert in America, I had the opportunity to work on a variety of events that taught me so much more about event planning than I could ever learn in a Google search. Here are just some of the things I learned:

Stay Calm Under Pressure

As much as you wish they would, the reality of events is that they never go on without at least one unanticipated bump in the road. Whether that means having to come up with an alternative solution, being thrown into a task you did not anticipate having to do or feeling completely lost, I have learned that the best thing to do is to stay calm. Staying calm helps others around you stay calm too, it makes it easier for you to come up with solutions and it shows that you can handle just about anything that gets asked of you.

Stay Organized

More often than not, an event won’t be taking place right next door to your office, meaning that running back to get something you forgot is not always an option. By staying organized, not only can you ensure that you have everything that you need, but it also makes things easier to find when you’re in the heat of the moment while working the event itself.

Be Prepared To Work Long Hours

Working in events for the first time, I never anticipated just how much work and just how many hours go into planning for and working an event. Whether it is pre-event planning in the office or early call-times, be prepared to devote a lot of time to an event. The plus side is, that though you may be working long and strenuous hours, there is no better feeling than watching your event come alive before your eyes and waking up the next morning (after your first full night of sleep in a while) and feeling extremely accomplished.

Keep these tips in mind, and you'll be on your way to event planning success! 

This guest blog post was written by PRowl staff member Rute Barkai. 

That's Logistics

“You have to think about the event logistically. Where will the press stand and how will we separate them from the attendees? And we need to remember to tape down that microphone wire. These are things they don’t teach you in class!” A PR veteran at my former internship was always trying to pass on whatever advice and knowledge he could to the next generation of professionals. “It’s all in the logistics,” he would say.

I would typically nod my head in compliant agreement without giving it much of a thought. But when I actually stopped recently to consider it, I realized universities don’t tend to instruct their students to think of public relations practices in terms of logistics. We’re not taught to consider the practical scenarios that the speaker could trip over a mic wire or that the photographers need to stand on a platform to get the best view. And in a small office, it would be up to us as PR practitioners to take care of those small details that can make all the difference.

But of course, schools cover all the vital information needed in this industry- the traditional skills like public speaking, press release writing, media relations, even persuasion. All are necessary for succeeding (or simply getting hired at all) in public relations. But there are some skills, such as thinking critically while executing a press conference, that can make or break that success.

Maybe skills needed in on-site media management, for instance, cannot be taught in the classroom. Perhaps the only way to gain this knowledge is from a direct, and sometimes hectic, experience working an event. Most elements of PR, and life in general for that matter, are best learned and perfected through practice.

I bring up this topic not to speak critically of degree programs but to spark a discussion among public relations students and industry professionals. Is it a university’s responsibility to teach us to think logistically in order to create effective PR practitioners? Or is it up to us to get the hands-on experience in order to set ourselves above the competition?

Live-Tweeting Tips

With a few national and regional conferences under my belt, I have truly embraced live-tweeting. It is a really easy way to generate meaningful content for your Twitter account - if it is done well.

Be sure to keep the following tips in mind, provided by this PR Daily article, to ensure you are adding value to the conversation and remember to have a charger handy because live-tweeting definitely drains a smartphone's battery!

1. Use the event hashtag

If there isn’t an event hashtag, make one up. Just keep it short, because every character counts. Using a hashtag will group all your tweets, enabling people searching for the event hashtag (or the hashtag you think up) to find them. It also makes it clear to your followers that you are tweeting about a certain event , not just spouting off random sound bites.

2. Tag speakers and companies in your tweets

This will not only make your presence known to those participating, but will also increase your chances of being retweeted.

3. Engage with other live-tweeters

Use the hashtag to search for others who are tweeting and start a conversation. From there, you can always ask to take the conversation offline.

4. Don’t tweet too much

You will overwhelm your regular followers who will not appreciate a barrage of out-of-context tweets. Though there is no ideal number of tweets, you should decide where the balance lies between over-dominating the conversation and not contributing enough.

5. Take pictures, and incorporate them into your tweets

Tweets with pictures are 94 percent more likely to be retweeted, according to Social News Daily, so use that camera.

The Truth About Event Planning

No matter what kind of public relations you end up doing there will be a time when you have to plan an event.  It might be a facility opening, product reveal, press conference, or even a media cocktail party.  Whatever the occasion, there is a lot that goes into an event from the guest list to pitching its details.  Public relations professionals take care of the various aspects of planning an event, but for the most part never really get to enjoy the activities.

I recently got to help out at the NATAS Mid-Atlantic Emmy Awards.  It was a wonderful experience and I really enjoyed it but I dressed in black tie attire and ended up spending the night in the green-room.  We were live tweeting the event, but didn't actually get to sit in with the award nominees in the ballroom.  This is a good example of how a lot of events end up being for PR professionals. I think, however, that the experiences you gain from being a part of the planning process are more valuable than what you would get from attending the event--I know that was true in my case.

If you like being the brains behind the operation and don't mind being backstage instead of the center of attention, public relations event planning will suit you well.  Of course, there are event planning firms that are more than happy to hire public relations students so don't worry if you crave the spotlight and want to enjoy the fruits of your labor. 

What event planning experiences have you had? We'd love to know!