Media Relations in the Public Relations Profession

Jill Harrison is the manager of Public Relations and Image Development at the Greater Oklahoma City Chamber in downtown Oklahoma City. At a young age she has accomplished a successful career in the field of Public Relations. She is APR certified and she has received many awards in her field.

Jill Harrison, Manager of Public Relations and Image Development

Photo e-mailed to me by Jill Harrison

She received her degree in Journalism and Mass Communication with an emphasis in Public Relations and a minor in Spanish from the University of Kansas. In April of her senior year she began to look for a job for after graduation. She sent out her resume and other information to potential employees looking for a job. She also sent information to her advisor. One day her advisor received an e-mail about a job and recommended Jill for it, and that is how she found her first job.

I asked Jill what they hardest part about her job is and she laughed and said it depends on the day.

“For the most part working in media relations I have had difficulty because reporters have become so busy with covering so many different stories,” said Harrison. “Even when you send them newsworthy stories they do not always have time to cover it. I know they are very busy with so many stories, but they tend to be very short with you and are difficult to work with.”

I asked Jill what she would recommend to future Public Relations professionals such as myself and she was very passionate about her answer. She strongly recommended the following things:

1. Show up
2. Be on time
3. Have a good attitude
4. Never say something isn't your job
5. Try
6. Ask Questions

Find tips on being a successful intern

“There are some things they are not able to teach you in school,” said Harrison. “These tips are all things you should know before going in to a job interview. Some things come from learning and experience, but there is nothing more important that good work ethic.”

Meeting with such a successful Public Relations professional such as Jill was such an amazing opportunity. I enjoyed getting to know her and she is definitely someone I would love to be my mentor as I enter the professional world.

It's Not the End, It's Just Another Beginning!

It's Not the End, It's Just Another Beginning!

I could not have asked for a better college experience. Period. Let's just say that the first year of college here at OU was completely dedicated to have a good time, being in a sorority, meeting as many new people as possible, and create a good academic foundation for myself. After having successfully achieved all of those goals as a freshman, I decided to enter into an internship that just so happened to fall in my lap, starting my sophomore year.

Public Relations was my major from the beginning, or at least I wanted to be somewhere at Gaylord. But honestly I didn't have a strong definition of what the field really was about until about two years ago. I said "sure" to being offered an internship working for the Athletics Department in Media Relations. As a sophomore, I totally thought that doing something "career-like" was distracting me from my social life/social development in college, but I found a way to balance it out, considering I only volunteered for 10 hours a week. Two years later, I stepped it up to 30 hours a week, paid, and in charge of covering a sport. As strange as this sounds, I got to the point where the more responsibilities I was given, the more I liked my job and the more I craved more challenges.

I am so blessed to have taken my internship that I took so blindly in the begging. I always say I had no idea what the heck I was doing when I first started, and I didn't know what sort of direction I wanted to head into in public relations. Luckily for me, God always does, and that's why I'm only excited about my future. Although I'd love to continue on about my crazy-good college experience, here are the top-three things I've learned through chasing my ambitions in public relations:

1) Always do what's right. PR is all about ethics, right? I have to say this is the most important item I hold on my list of things to do when it comes to my work. Doing what's right is a universal ideal that's honest and can put all of us to the test at one point of another. Each of us has the choice to decide doing what's right.

2) Know your surroundings and pay attention. As dumb as this sounds, I have recognized most recently that this is one of my downfalls. I'm not talking about walking alone to a car at night. I'm saying do research. Read the news, especially the local news, know the trends and get in as much information as possible, whenever possible. I admit I've always been lazy at this, but I'm improving as we speak (as I blog, really). I've always heard the phrase "knowledge is power" but I never really took it to heart. All I have to say is "better late than never." If I'm in public relations, I better be more in the know!

3) Finally, always remember what matters and what is most important. SO MANY TIMES I as a younger college student, I ran into a tough issue, a challenge arose, or I have been just plain annoying/irritated with someone. I don't know at what point exactly I decided to grow up and stop about getting frustrated about things that I couldn't control, or just the petty things, but I'm glad that I did. It's a continual challenge, but staying positive helps me work towards remembering what's important, even through the tough times.

I'm so excited for my future. As corny as this sounds, I'm really excited to continue learning. All of my life I've learned things from a textbook or in a classroom setting, and now I'm learning more from people. I never expected to learn anything about myself in the process, but I'm glad I did. Bring on the future!

Picture courtesy of the University of Oklahoma Athletics Department.

Media Training 101: A Guide to Meeting the Press

by: Simone Fraid

For my ethics study, I selected the book Media Training 101: A Guide to Meeting the Press by Sally Stewart.  

Stewart founded SA Stewart Communications, an organization that helps businesses formulate strategic actions for marketing, communication, and media relations.  She also was a reporter for USA Today, and therefore understands public relations from the perspective of the media.

In the book, she gives a wide range of advice, from dealing with crisis to creating a media kit.  Through it all, she weaves each topic together with its relationship to the media.  

And though she was a member of the media, she provides a very objective view of the media.  She concedes that they have a great deal of power, but that they also harbor resentment against public relations and so they must be dealt with carefully.

Pretty much all of Stewart's advice stems from the same idea: public relations needs to be about facts.  She says reporters are resentful of fluff and non-facts.

She also advises the reader to how to be a strategic communicator and get noticed in the press. Stewart tells businesses to use creativity and interesting angles to get their point across, but always while sticking to the truth.  She tells also them to be tough and have a thick skin when the media doesn't act in their favor.  

The entire book is a manual full of tips and steps to improve a business' positioning in the media.  As Stewart says, it's not a substitute for having leadership and good experts to guide a business' media dealings, but it does give solid instruction that would be useful to anyone dealing with the media on a regular basis.

Sports PR Today

by Callie Cady

Jason Rademan has been the Director of Media Relations for the Dallas Stars since the 2002-2003 season. He graduated from Penn State University in 2000 with a Bachelor's in Kinesiology.

Rademan's background includes an internship with PR department of the Orlando Magic, followed by a graduate assistantship with the athletic department at the University of Oklahoma. He then worked as an intern with the Dallas Stars PR staff for a year before being hired full-time. As a full-time employee he started out as Manager of Media Relations and Team Services until last summer when he was named Directorof Media Relations.

The Typical Workday

Gamedays start at 7:30 am, getting the game notes, clips, stats and roster sheets prepared for that night's game. Rademan covers the morning skate, handles all the media requests for the morning, then heads back to the office. He gets to the arena again by 4:30 and handles another round of interviews in the afternoon before the game begins. Rademan also runs the press box during games, moderates the intermission (or bench) interviews, and then does the same after games. After the last of the media is gone from the locker room, he types up a set of postgame notes that are sent via email to all the local media. On non-gamedays, Rademan covers practice, works on the game notes for the next game, handles interview requests and plans for the rest of the homestand/road trip.

Advice for a Graduating PR Student Who Wants a Sports Career

"I think it's very important to get any kind of experience you possibly can in the sports field, to network with those you work with and to always try to get the job of the person immediately above you on the totem pole. Any and all experience is valuable, any and all contacts you can make in the industry are more valuable, and you should always want to be doing more within the framework of your particular team/department/company."

-Jason Rademan

How to pitch to bloggers

How to pitch to bloggers
Carrie Musch

Blogs have created valuable opportunities for the public relations discipline. They allow PR professionals to communicate with target publics in a unique way. Professionals who participate in online conversations engage their publics and are in a better position to influence them.

So, how do you get bloggers to blog about your client? Follow these four rules and you’ll be a blog superstar.

Be blog worthy. Bloggers have little tolerance (even lower than journalists) because their thoughts aren’t edited. Attracting a blogger is easy if you’re behind a great company or product.

Know your blogger. Your pitch must be relevant to the blog, which means researching more than just the title of the blog. The best way to determine whether your pitch will be a good fit is to subscribe and get involved. This will also help you make connections before you need them. Ogilvy PR’s Web site has a collection of feeds from some of the most influential blogs out there. Linking IS the sincerest form of flattery.

Be persistent. E-mails are received and forgotten. Respectfully send follow-up e-mails to get a conversation going. Don’t be offended if a blogger isn’t receptive to your first pitch. Keep subscribing to their blog and you’re sure to be successful at another pitch.

Schwag is good. Schwag for bloggers is a great marketing investment. Bloggers don’t make a lot of money from their blogging efforts so gifts can go a long way. You can’t buy bloggers, but you can give them an excellent opportunity to post a photo with some honest commentary, which is why the first rule is so important.