In the wading pool

Well, well, well… my internship has come and gone and with that – so has my post-graduate program. 22 and finished a degree as well as a certificate program, leaves me to ponder this very insightful question… what the hell am I going to do now???

Recently I was a good friends +1 at a swanky industry party during TIFF. The two of us, dolled up to the nines, meandered around, cocktail in hand to find the 30somethings wondering – who were these powerhouse 20somethings without crows feet? While I flinched at the thought of mentioning the word “intern” (dun, dun, dunnnn) when asked what I did for a living, I slowly realized that my baby face may give it away. I stood beside my 26 year-old guest list go-getting girlfriend who is a standout at her age and is a complete mover and shaker in the media industry. And right there, while flipping through the glossy pages of LUSH magazine, I realized that being an intern ain’t half bad. We all need to start somewhere, so here is where I started getting my feet wet in the wading pool.

I started this blog to serve two purposes – 1) to fulfill a course requirement, and 2) to pass by time during my internship as I was told there would be a ton of downtime. PRivate PRactice initially was set-up to discuss issues in Public Relations (hence the PR in the title) as well as complete course assignments (see post on getting no satisfaction). What I have slowly learned is that my blog has expanded into a forum of my own personal thoughts as well as a more focused run down of the jumbled ideas in my head. I assumed my teacher would read – she was forced to – and possibly fellow classmates who were procrastinating working on client projects. To my jaw dropping surprise, I have found that many of my friends and family have tuned in to see what I write and leave comments or chat with me about topics that I have been so blunt about. Who knew that my wit and charm would attract so many! Yet, the course is done, and so is the internship…

So where do we go from here? Well first and foremost I am taking a break, not so much from blogging, but just from the PR world in general. Having attended school for 20 years without a break from work or the constant cry of 20 page papers, I am traveling and spending a little time on me. As for this blog, I will most likely continue to write about my feelings on branding and the business of Public Relations, but I will also include more of my personal thoughts just as I have recently. The title of this blog stemmed from a television show in which a woman independently starts a new chapter of her life in the corporate world after a turmoil break-up. Following in those same footsteps, I too have re-discovered a lot about who I am through this chapter which I am about to close. There have been growing pains, and pains resulting from 8:30 am classes; but the pay off has been reminiscent of a certain Britney Spears song – and to that I say let the next chapter begin.

So thank you for reading, and keep reading, because if you don’t… I will be rather disheartened!

We Are Family

The boys club. I remember when that simply meant no girls allowed. Now, it means a multitude of things, however the boys clubs that resonates closest with me – is a football club.

The Toronto Argonauts have taken a lot of heat in the media recently as they have released numerous players with very little regard for the personal side of business. From Khalil Carter’s public tearing down of the organizations loyalty to those without an NFL title attached to their name, to the recent publicly debated hot topic on Off the Record -July 10th, 2008- of Michael Bishop being put on Waivers – it isn’t looking so pretty. But does it have to? After all this is a business, and how many times while growing up did the boys club oust its members. Problem is, this boys club has branded itself as a “family friendly” club, and living up to that has proven to be a tough task during the start of the 2008 season.

Over the past few years, the Toronto Argonauts Football Club have stated over and over again that they are a family… right. Now in light of my current situation with the organization, I am merely going to prove that brand loyalty is essential in building a relationship with fans – those are the people that pay the boys salaries by the way.

Here is the simple breakdown. You tell fans that the team is one big family. They, resonate with this idea and in turn buy into the brand. From here, they purchase season tickets, team merchandise and even show up to team events. What does this mean? Cash for the owners, and pay cheques for the players. Now here is the problem with this equation. When you do this, you create a relationship with these fans, this is called brand loyalty. When fans start hearing that you are not living up to this brand, they no longer trust you. Not trusting your brand means not buying into the brand and so on and so forth. This means no money.

Not a smart move. Brand loyalty is organization survival. Especially for the Toronto Argonauts who have struggled with establishing and maintaining a good brand, the last thing they want is the public questioning their intentions. I would love to say this is just a game, but it isn’t, it is a business – and a personal one at that. The flipside to this is that you have a lot of voice boxes – players and in the CFL, cheerleaders – who don’t buy into verbal diarrhea. Releasing a player from a team who claims to be a business is one thing, releasing one from a family – whole other ball game.

Family – a group of people who are related that treat each other with a special intimacy or loyalty. (Does related by double blue blood count?)

Last time I checked, releasing players means releasing families or trading them off to another part of the country. That isn’t business, that’s personal. As one family to another, wouldn’t it be appropriate to sit down your player and let them know why they are leaving your family? Maybe too much to ask, but hey you were the one who brought everyone to the Sunday dinner table.

Currently this boys club mentality has leaked into the girls club. “It’s business, it’s not personal,” tends to be the mind frame running consistent within their head office. Maybe they missed the class on the Golden Rule, “treat others as you want to be treated,” but treating those who represent your brand with anything less than respect doesn’t cut it. Your brand can lose loyalty from within and in turn that projects outwards losing loyalty from fans.

This post is not to discredit the organization as a whole. I believed in this brand for two years. However, the intention is to be a slight wake-up call for whoever may stumble upon it. Brand loyalty is important, that’s why the real boys clubs do so well.

Here she comes..

And the winner of Miss Universe 2008 is… the new star of MTV’s Pageant Place! Oh wait, I mean Miss Venezuela.

Thank you Mr. Trump for bringing the universe yet another energetic, embarrassing episode of the Miss Universe pageant. This is like the Superbowl for women. I had my computer out (pad of paper is so five years ago) and kept score. Now the competition kept with all fairness of the scores being flashed after every pose and wink (or as Tyra Banks puts it, smiling with your eyes). It came down to Miss Colombia and Miss Venezuela who truly dominated the competition from the get-go. A few things, however, from this point on tended to bother me – this goes far beyond the two clenching each others hands waiting to hear who would be crowned.

The “Token Girls”:
What boggles my mind is all the “token” girls that need to be put in the top 15. Stop worrying about the press already Don, your PR rep can handle it!

Here are our “token” girls of 2008:
Miss Kosovo – first time this country that borders Serbia and Albania has ever been included, and therefore she gets face time!
Miss USA – standard rules apply here, no one expects Miss USA to be left out.
Miss Vietnam – keeping the host country happy.
Miss Japan – she won last year, but you get top 15 just for realizing you have no hope in hell of winning.

That leaves 11 spots up for grabs! Now come on. I like to watch a fair parade of women in bikinis and overbearing evening gowns. Inserting the obvious just cuts away from the fun.

However, the last two Miss USA’s – Rachel Smith and Crystle Stewart – have proven why their spot needs to be moved from “token” to “tradition”. The press that these women have, and will receive, over their falls in the evening gown competition could not have been thought up by the brightest PR practitioner. This kind of press is golden! Youtube, People, NY Times; they have all shown and wrote about the infamous fall of 2007 that left Rachel at the bottom of the top five. This year, Miss USA was left out of the top five altogether after her kerplunk. PR tactic? Probably not. An excellent topic for an episode Pageant Place Season 2? Absolutely!

Pageant Place Pitty Party:
Miss Universe would not be Miss Universe without the admiration of young women everywhere. With young women comes… boy bands? No, MTV! What a fantastic melding on traditions. In order to communicate the key messages, and high drama of the Miss Universe, Miss USA and Miss Teen USA organizations, Donald Trump decided to team up with MTV and create Pageant Place. This show documents the lives of the three women who live together in a New York City apartment.

Adding in spicy mixes like former Miss USA Tara Conner, a real pro at winning over the media, this show does the trick for their market – teen queens are now interested in being the “it” girl on Pageant Place. From woe is me attitudes to stuck up diva disasters, Pageant Place offers a real life look at what it takes to walk with a tiara on your head in public. Not likely. This, if anything else proves that someone wasn’t thinking when they decided to air the organizations dirty laundry. I understand that Tara Conner’s rehab mess had to be publicly dealt with, and what better way to show off her new clean edged outlook on life than on MTV. However, the messages communicated on the show leaves teens impressed and all others wondering why the melodrama? I guess they are hitting their target audience, after all, even I watched.

Can Miss Universe hack it?:
Bringing it back to tonight’s Miss Universe pageant, Dayana Mendoza will now become the “it” girl who will replace Riyo Mori, former Miss Universe 2007, in communicating all the ideas Donald Trump wants to showcase for the 2008 pageant season. Problem is, can she do this? In order to not take the heat on bashing a rather gorgeous woman from a foreign country that I would like to visit, I say view her interview for yourself. It is not a language barrier, more a filter that I think she may be missing. Panties? Really! Give this woman some media coaching and frankly I think she will be fine.

The brand identity of Miss Universe seems to change daily – beautiful, speaks well, world appeal, etc. always seems to find itself in the mix. Hopefully this year’s winner doesn’t take too much advice from her in-house companions – they tend to whine or fall their way into the press.

The Ethics Police

School is coming to an end – sigh. And truthfully all I can hear in my head on constant repeat is a classic rendition of SCHOOL’S OUT FOR SUMMER… SCHOOL’S OUT FOREVER!! Thank you Alice Copper for giving me my latest theme song in life. However, with the end of school comes the most anticipated part of the program — INTERNSHIPS! Now I realize no one should get as excited as I clearly am (hence the capital letters) for slave driving for no money. Ok, fine. This will not satisfy my craving for shoes, but it will satisfy my thirst for knowledge.

At a recent interview I was asked to discuss my mandate on ethics in PR. For example, if I was against bottled water, would I be able to work on a bottled water account? Does hellllls yes count as an answer? I mean I am trying to secure the best internship possible. However, the reality is this – you have to give truthful answers in order to make it in this business, so here is the truth.

Ethics in business is difficult. Not because it is hard to be ethical, but rather it is hard to decipher what in fact is being ethical. Be true to you? True to your company? True to your credit card payment that is due Tuesday? Regardless, everyone has their own criteria for ethical standards. I may not believe in bottled water, yet you knock back a case per week. Who is to say who is right?

My answer was straight forward and along the same lines of ‘you get what you pay for’ – which is why my free sandals are currently destroying my feet even as I type. If you work for a company, you need to know their ethical practices. Especially when it comes to a PR agency, they represent numerous and diverse clients. If you would stand in front of a water bottling manufacturer locked to a bucket of water screaming for the madness to stop – you probably wouldn’t want to work for Evian’s PR agency (just a thought). Therefore, do your research. These people are paying you to be the bright, insightful, creative little ‘thinking outside the box’ PR practitioner that you are – start being one. “Ummm, I didn’t know that I would have to work on a bottled water account..,” doesn’t fly very well.

If you have done all your research (pause for pat on the back here) then you are all set!! Right? Wrong! You may still be asked to work on a brand new account that you do not agree with. Now I was asked this very question. Right or wrong, to each their own, I decided that sometimes you need to put your organization’s needs ahead of your own. Unless they are representing something deemed socially unethical, suck up your pride and work with the bottled water company. There is a market for them, their business is needed by the thousands if not millions of consumers that purchase their products, so look at it as a learning experience. Provide key messages to an audience you don’t, or wish to not, belong to. Won’t this come across as a determined go-getter to your boss!

Ethics is touchy, and frankly I did not think I would be asked about my ethical practices in my internship interview. But I am glad I was. It made me start thinking about who I could and could not work for. Not only that, but it made me realize that you do have a choice. Before stepping out into the work force, breaking free from student-hood, there needs to be a discussion you have with yourself (possibly over a good glass of vino) that allows you to establish your own ethical practices. From there, finding an agency that matches up will allow you to keep your ethical practices in check.

Leave room for flexibility, after all being the ethical police isn’t your job – communicating messages effectively is.

1-800-FLO-RIDA

Recently I was watching an episode of MTV LIVE, when Flo Rida was partaking in an interview of sorts. Flo Rida, maker of the hit “Get Low” – or better know as apple bottom jeans, and the boots with the fur – spoke of his Myspace page and what makes him unique.

You can call him! Really, he has a cell phone that he answers solely for fan calls. The telephone number is at the top of his Myspace page encouraging fans to pick up the phone for a chat.

This sounds like a fabulous PR stunt! Ok yes, he could be doing this for the sole purpose of connecting with his fans, but frankly I believe some genius who graduated from a high-end communications program thought this would be “different” and get hits on a page that includes his music.

Now Flo Rida does say he answers, I have yet to call as I still need to practice my freestyling. However, maybe this is a new way for musicians or producers to connect with their fans. Every musician has a Myspace, a website, a fan club, but a cell phone?! Brand new!!

By making yourself accessible, you are connecting further to fans which will later increase your sales. Believe me, if Brad Pitt started answering my calls (please answer), I would be buying the entire awful Ocean’s 11-22 collection

Lipgloss Feminism: the Re-brand

In class today there was talk of branding yourself. No, not with a hot piece of metal. Creating a self brand – how do you describe you. While this may seem like an easy task, it is a daunting one that I will need to succumb to on Friday. Now, I will enjoy it once I wrap my head around it but really, this isn’t an easy thing

Describing yourself means admitting to flaws. We all have them, let’s not beat around the bush. Flaws make us who we are, but really, are we going to brand ourselves with all the bad? No. The key is to take those flaws, admit them and see where the have brought you in the number of years you have existed on this pretty planet. From there it should be easy to tell the person who you are, flaws and all, and focus on the goods.

Branding Piece 1: I am a lipstick feminist – no not a stripper – a woman who is a force to be reckoned with but still shaves her legs. Lipstick feminism doesn’t have to be about women who turn what society deems as degrading into empowering. It can also be women who are comfortable with being a head turner both in looks and in intellect.

That’s a piece of my brand, and really branding doesn’t have to be a label. I am not all of a sudden labeled as a lipstick feminist and that’s it. And by the way, it should be changed to Lipgloss Feminism, let’s keep up with the times shall we folks.

Branding Piece 2-1,000: I am reader, a sister, a conversationalist, an event planner, a professional cheerleader, a daughter, a writer, a dancer in both reality and in my underwear, an avid reality show junkie, a watcher of highly well written television programming, a sports enthusiast, an avid snooze pusher, a bop around singing in my car to music listener and so on and so forth. That makes up a brand, the many facets of you.

I guess the difficulty is pin-pointing it for the task at hand. How do you make a brand to be released into the world of PR if you are still defining the ‘you’ your brand is trying to define? As well, I may define myself in a different way than others may – branding me could be another form of judging me. Or better yet, judging others and labeling them in a whole new way.

As communicators we need to look at branding as a work in progress. Products change, and therefore brands change – we are hot commodities too! Our brands will continue to change and thats ok, just as long as we aren’t going under the hot metal, we should all be fine.

As for my brand… still working on a logo.

Hello world!

This is me… you’ll get to know me and my PR beliefs soon, so keep it locked.