Happy Leap Day

Once every four years, we get an extra day to help offset the rotation of the Earth and coordinate with the sun’s position. This is because a full rotation of the Earth actually takes 365 days and 6 hours, thus resulting in a Leap Year every 4 years once 24 hours has accumulated.

Texting by Touch on a Touchscreen

If you’re anything like me, scary movies can be absolutely paralyzing. One of the few rays of hope though in any hostage or terrorist scene is when the daring young character pulls out his or her cell phone and feels around on the buttons to call 911 or text for help. But, with the advent of touch screen phones, performing this feat becomes all but impossible. And, I have to admit that when I first got a touch screen phone, this thought was one of the first to cross my mind.

Students Exploring PR

This afternoon, I had the opportunity speak with students from the Florida PR Association (FPRA) Tallahassee Chapter as they visited Boston on a tour of various agencies, learning about the industry and what it’s like to work day-to-day as a PR exec. Similar to the tech PR panel I presented on for the BU PRSSA members, the undergraduates from Tallahassee had some great questions and seemed eager to learn about the wonderful world of public relations!

PR Humor

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had this exact conversation: “Nice to meet you, what do you do?” –  ”I do PR.” – “Oh, as in public relations? Cool… but what do you do?” I usually respond with something along the lines of describing how I work with the media and analyst communities to boost my clients’ exposure and recognition among target audiences and market participants while developing content and promoting them through events and award submissions. BUT… I may end up just showing them one of the following two illustrations instead. Enjoy!

Online Newsrooms – Maximizing Media Opportunities

In PR, some of the most strategic campaigns are launched around news or product announcements. But, these involve a lot more than just issuing a press release. It often takes months of preparation to establish relationships with members of the media community and get them interested in your client’s business and solutions. This ensures that when the big announcement comes along, they already have some familiarity with the company and interest in its future developments or direction.

Overcoming To-Do List Angst

Recently, I came across Daniel Markovitz’s article, To-Do Lists Don’t Work, and was immediately floored by the title. To-do lists don’t work? How could this be?! As someone who has been making lists since I was 10 years old (surprise, surprise), I was obviously shocked to learn that to-do lists could actually be a recipe for failure. Markovitz outlines five problems with to-do lists, some of which I agree may be detrimental to overall productivity – namely the paradox of choice and having varied priorities. But, I believe that with each disadvantage comes a solution that will keep to-do lists alive!

Jump Starting Your PR Career

With approximately 1,706,000 students at the bachelor’s degree level projected to graduate in 2012, there are a plethora of young professionals who are about to begin their job search and enter the workforce. But, with lingering economic woes from the 2008 financial crisis and heightened unemployment rates, many will be looking for creative ways to jump start their career. Using your college’s alumni network is a great place to start, and, as Boston College alumnus, I’m always willing to share advice with up and coming Eagles as they embark on their career paths.

Timehop – One Year Ago Today, I Was…

So much can change in a year, but it’s often hard to remember exactly what I was doing one year ago today. If only there was a way to travel back in time to see what I was working on, what I was interested in, who I was talking to, or even where I was going. Well, thanks to Timehop, I can now retrace my steps from one year ago, using my digital, social media footprint.

Public Relations; Balancing Stress with Success

Like many things in life, maintaining a career as a PR executive is a balancing act. Learning how to cope with the fast-paced atmosphere and tight deadlines while saving time to revel in  the success of a campaign is something we all strive to achieve. PR professionals are notorious multitaskers; and while juggling multiple clients, deadlines and launches simultaneously may seem to be just another part of the job, there’s no denying that it can get extremely stressful at times. At the end of the day though, it’s all worth it!

Social Media; Where Do You Turn for News?

It’s obvious that social media has become a pervasive way to gather news and information on trending topics, current events and interesting subject matter, but has it become the top source people turn to, or is it merely a supplement for more traditional news sources? Recently, TEKGROUP issued their 2011 Social Media News Survey report, which helps answer that very question.