GCSU Purple Glove Dance

Relay For Life in Baldwin County has reached a new level and it includes dancing around in "Purple Gloves". A national campaign that benefits 4THEFIGHT against cancer will donate $5000 to the group or organization with the winning "Purple Glove Dance". The contestants must upload their video to Youtube and the video with the most views wins $5000 donated to their local Relay For Life. A few Georgia College & State University students came together to film GCSU's efforst in winnign this contest. This event was great PR for Relay For Life because it gives contestants an interactive way to get involved and support the fight against cancer. The people who headed it up at GCSU got many RSO's involved and I personally believe that the video is wonderful. Everyone I know at GCSU got very involved in the filming and excited for what the video represents. I really hope Baldwin County Relay For Life wins this money because our video has a very good message and did a great job promoting what the true meaning of Relay is about. To view the GCSU Purple Glove Dance, click here!

Real World 2010

On Friday Feb. 19, the Georgia Chapter of PRSA hosted Real World PR for members of PRSSA at the Loudermilk Center in Atlanta. It was a day for PRSSA members to gain insight from professinals who already are working in our fields of interest.

It started out an early morning departing from the Milledgeville Starbucks at 5:30 a.m. and driving two hours. We arrived to breakfast and an opening session which was a general overview of what the day would entail. They gave us a few key points for meeting professionals. First, always smile. Second, have a great elevator speech that includes who you are and things you do. Third, take notes on the back of the business cards so you will not forget what you two talked about. Fourth, network with your peers. There were students from all over the southeast there and it was a great opportunity to learn more about what they are doing in their classes and with their internships.

We later had our first session and the one I attended was entitled, "Agency or Corporate". Agency was described as a 24/7 job where the employee can always contact you. You have weekly meetings with your account team but other than that you are working on your own client. Corporations is more about how important PR is to your business to ensure good communication. Both are very fast pace, entail a variety of things, require working with perfection and can be unpredictable. Some other valuable information they shared was you need to stay at a business for at least three years. If not you will seem uncommitted. They said quality writing was very important and also be a good reader. Learn how to write short sweet sentences. I learned about becoming APR certified and how important it is. "PR is a management function, not a marketing function." I do not believe I am cut out to work in an agency. Everything is too cut throat and fast pace for me and I like to focus on one thing and perfect it rather than jump from client to client.

The second seminar I attended was "Focus on Healthcare, Nonprofit and Government". I learned that will all three of these you are presented with a lack of resources. You use what you have. You do however have a lot of ownership in how you want to take the PR. It is important to be a sponge and soak up all the information you can because you may not be familiar with the section of work you do and need to be familiar with the terminology. It is important to make friends with reporters so they will go to you for information. I like the pace of the Nonprofit because it is for a good cause so it is not as cut throat as some of the other sectors.

After this session we ate lunch and listened to Sean Cassidy speak on the evolution of entertainment and celebrity PR from publicity to brand building.

After lunch we had resume critiques and sat at a round table with a professional about what a good resume should look like. Unfortunately our table leader was not very helpful but I did get a girl's awesome resume who was at my table and I will play off of hers for ideas.

Over all I had a great experience at Real World PR 2010 and learned a lot of valuable information. Public Relations is such an exciting field to work in and I am excited to be apart of it and see where my future will take me! #RW2010

Ms. GCSU Campaigning

It's that time of year again when banners hang, Facebook groups are made and tables by the fountain are abundant, Ms. GCSU campaigning. Sororities and large RSO's at GCSU take this week to campaign for their candidate and try to get their member to be GCSU's homecoming queen. In my personal opinion the campaigning at Georgia College is WAY over the top. Most schools make a Facebook group and stickers and call it a day, but not GCSU, we must think of slogans, and make it a cat fight to see who will win. Chalking the sidewalks causes the most controversy and thankfully GCSU decided to make it illegal to chalk this year which I know all sororities were thankful for. Phi Mu has big shoes to fill because our Keri Allgood was Ms. GCSU last year and we would love to carry on the title. In Phi Mu this campaign is the job of the Public Relations Chairman but it literally takes the whole sorority to get the job done. My roommate is a candidate so I have done a lot of the campaign work for this year's Ms. GCSU elections. As a PR major I know what needs to be done and in what fashion so I do not mind taking it upon myself to get most of the work done. Her name is Emily Brown and her slogan is "Brown for the Crown". We also have used the UPS logo and said "What can BROWN do for YOU?" I have designed many of the flyers and posters she is using in her campaign as well as the Facebook group. Although this is stressful for me, Emily deserves to win and it is all worth it. I hope Saturday at the Basketball game when they announce the winner her name is called and all of our hard work will have been worth while. Good luck to all the candidates and let the best PR win!

Super Bowl XLIV took place Sunday, February 7th resulting in a win for the New Orleans Saints. Apart from the hype of the game, the Super Bowl advertisements are one of the most anticipated events of the year. People love to critique and evaluate the ads they saw, and some go as far as voting for their favorite. The number one advertisement for this Super Bowl was one for Mars Snickers. Of course from paying millions of dollars for your advertisement, the companies expect good returns and for Go Daddy.com this was exactly right. Go Daddy reached an all new record from their Super Bowl commercials this year although some of the ratings were very poor from their two commercials that aired. Go Daddy had some of the most internet traffic after their commercials were aired and reached their personal record of having the most new customers than any other Super Bowl Sunday. Go Daddy also was a trending topic on Twitter the night of the Super Bowl. It amazes me that although the commercials were not highly rated, they still generated interest and traffic to the website which is what Go Daddy was aiming for. These commercials are not just advertisements but also a form of PR because they are talked about for months after and generate constant traffic to your business. Although these placements are very expensive, if you advertisement is good, or in this case just interesting, you will get the results you want to see.

Twitter Challenge

My Public Relations Campaigns class has been assigned a "Twitter Challenge" for a week. From Wednesday to Wednesday we are to tweet at least 35 times which is a minimum of 5 times every day. This will be difficult in itself because most of us have only had Twitter for a semester and I just cant think of 5 things to say on Twitter in a day but I am trying very hard! In addition to the first challenge we also must follow at least 25 more practitioners of public relations and social media and try to engage in a conversation with them. I have tried to do the 5 tweets a day and right now I believe I am on track but it is so hard to keep up with! The second part of the challenge is even more difficult because not many PR Professionals want to follow me! I will try and add them and then I get no response. I currently have 84 followers and if you ask me, thats not to bad! I do believe Twitter is a great social media tool because there is so much you can do with it. I recently created a list for all of the Phi Mu's at GCSU, only one from my class is following it so far but hey, more might soon! I love to see local businesses and people I know join Twitter because I would much rather follow someone I know than a stranger in cyber space. Well wish us luck on this challenge, hopefully we will all pass with flying colors and don't end up "tweeted out"!

Haiti Earthquake Relief

Mobile giving for the Haiti Earthquake Relief has reached over $30 million in donations. This money has been donated from Americans and Canadians and it is very simple by the Mobile Giving Foundation. You can donate money by texting a keyword to a designated short code via a mobile phone, a micro-donation of $5 or $10 can be made to aid the millions of people affected by this tragedy. 100% of your donation goes to the recipient charity, and the donation appears as a charge on your carrier bill, standard rates may apply. Tweets such as "Text HAITI to 90999 to donate $10 to @RedCross relief" helped make others aware of ways to donate.

It is amazing to me that by simplifying the way people can donate money, numbers fly through the ceiling! Standing in front of a mall with a bucket asking for donations is no longer the way to go. People like for things to be short and sweet and the Mobile Giving Foundation has done just that. I really like this form of PR because it is actually benefiting people in need. This campaign has shown us that people are willing to give, you just must figure out a way that is convenient for them.

I felt most inclined to donate to and promote the Children's Miracle Network fund in Haiti. This special fund will directly benefit pediatric hospitals in the Children’s Miracle Network that are supporting the Haiti crisis relief efforts. Here are just a few examples of how Children’s Miracle Network hospitals are supporting Haiti relief and the type of care that will be supported by the Children’s Miracle Network Haiti fund:

-Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh accepted more than 50 Haitian orphans into the hospital; all are triage patients.

-The US Department of Health and Human Services has asked Le Bonheur Children’s in Memphis, Tenn. to provide two pediatric medical teams to assist in Haiti – a surgical critical care team and a critical care transport team. The hospital is also sending supplies and pharmaceuticals to Haiti.

-Hasbro Children’s Hospital in Providence, R.I. sent two craniofacial surgeons, one of which previously spent a year working in Haiti. Medical supplies - including surgical packs, gauze, scalpels, sutures, anesthesia, gowns, surgical drapes, and more - have also been provided to the area.As part of Orlando Health-Arnold Palmer Hospital for Children is collaborating with the US Department of Health and Human Services and other organizations to provide support and care to evacuees coming to Central Florida who need medical treatment.

Phi Mu's philanthropy is CMN so this is very close to my heart and I am very happy to see this up and thriving. You can donate $10 to the CMN Haiti Fund by texting "HAITICMN" to 85944.

When you Google search "Haiti Earthquake Relief" it actually scrolls through tweets of people talking about the Haiti Relief Fund. It is so cool that we not only have access to this type of technology such as Twitter, but you can actually see what people are talking about. This technology has been a huge help to the people of Haiti and I am so glad that so many people find the need to give.

PR in ACTION

Here is my example of public relations in action! I chose to film an ornament exchange my apartment hosted. We sent formal invitations to every guest household and asked that they bring one $10 ornament and a dessert. We also promoted the event on Facebook. We had 21 attendees! When the guest arrived we had Christmas music playing softly in the background while everyone mingled. From there people fixed plates of food and our apartment provided hot chocolate. After everyone found a seat we had numbers 1-21 and let everyone draw. We decided against "White Elephant" because we did not want anyone to get their feelings hurt. We went in numerical order and had everyone pick an ornament, everyone watched them unwrap it and we clapped at the end to applaud the one who bought the ornament and the one who gets to keep it. This was our second ornament exchange at our apartment and we have found that it is a good way to get together one last time before the holidays and hang out before finals set in. We originally sent out approximately 36 invitations and only 21 showed up; although this is a good number I believe more would have come if it were not during last test and finals studying. I believe this was the weakness of our event-the time we chose to have it. I believe our strength was that the invitations portrayed what we wanted to happen, everyone brought an ornament and dessert and it was a fun time had by all. You may think the singing was staged, which it was, but we would have sang with or without a camera so this is truly a natural setting. It was only Phi Mu girls so everyone was comfortable with each other and mingled nicely. I wish our apartment had been bigger to accommodate all of our guest but we did the best we could with our space given. We all had a lovely time and believe that this was a form of PR because we were strengthening the bond between those of us already in a group. We promoted this event nicely and had everyone aware of it. It was organized and flowed smoothly. The event lasted about an hour, which is what we planned for, and everyone came in and out in a timely fashion. Over all I believe this was a very successful event. Everyone who came had a great time and we plan to have it again next year :)