No BS: What is PR?

Public Relations is a fascinating, but somewhat mysterious field. It seems that because it has “public” in the name, it would be wide open with readily available information on what goes on. However, when you search something like “what is public relations”, you’re met with vague, jargainy descriptions that sound as if they could be applied to any job. Google defines PR as “the professional maintenance of a favorable public image by a company or other organization or a famous person”. While this definition is correct, it gives little insight into how this is actually done, or what the people in charge of the “maintenance of favorable public image” actually do day to day.

Recently, I started a PR internship at a firm in DUMBO. My firm specializes in PR for alcohol brands, but is expanding into fashion. In this piece, I will attempt to give a jargainless explanation of what I do every day, as I’ve learned about PR quickly on the job more than I have in 4 years of wanting to go into the field.

Media Lists

Public Relations professionals create and use media lists on a daily basis. This is one of the things that separates us from marketing or advertising: we don’t pay for coverage. We contact journalists, either freelance or at a publication, and provide them with information about our client that they will hopefully spin into a positive story on their outlet. These media lists have countless people on them with information such as their email, publication of employment, and what city they reside in. It is important to keep these lists regularly updated, as journalists are constantly switching between outlets and moving into freelancing.

Press Releases

To these media lists, we send what’s called a press release. Say a liquor company (one of our clients) was holding an event to raise money for charity. Our firm would send out a blast to certain journalists who we have relationships with and who write on food and beverage, inviting them to the event. Once they RSVP, we make sure that they come, have a good time and write a story about our client the next day -- which is one way press can be generated.

Event Planning

This is the part of PR that everyone knows about... or at least thinks they know about. For events like the aforementioned one, the PR team gets involved at every step of the way. We help pick out venues, invite press, plan activities that show the client in a good light, and attend the events to make sure everything runs smoothly. It’s important to note that while these events may be fun, everyone in attendance is working. The PR team is making sure that the journalists couldn’t possibly have anything bad to say about the client, the client is also trying to get on the good side of the journalists, and the journalists are gathering writing material.

Media Monitoring and Press Clips

Besides solely gaining media coverage for clients, PR firms are responsible for keeping track of all media coverage. Maintaining a file of coverage for each client allows the firm to understand where the client sits within the minds of the media and the public. This includes keeping in contact with journalists so that the PR team gets a heads up before a story goes live, setting up Google alerts so that notifications come up when a client’s name is mentioned, reading articles, and working to take down any inaccurate or harmful information. Once these articles are viewed by the PR team, someone is responsible for “clipping” it, or filing it away in the client’s archive with clips of all the relevant information about the piece. This includes the publication’s name, the date the piece was published, as well as every part of the piece the client is mentioned in.

Working on all of these things is part of a normal day working at a PR firm. I hope this provided a bit more clear of an idea of what PR professionals do on a day to day basis, without glamorizing the profession too much like the show “The Spin Crowd”, if anyone remembers that. PR really is  a lot of sitting on the computer, reading media stories, compiling lists of journalists with contact information, and making sure to put out fires tactfully as they arise.