KAY PETERS

My name's Kay and I'm currently studying for a degree in Advertising and Public Relations at the University of Lincoln. I've created this blog to showcase my work, talk about anything PR related, and most of all ... practice my writing skills!

[kayleypeters91]

Project Potential - Phase One

   Last year 18 per cent of Market Rasen’s high street was vacant. To decrease this rate a group of volunteers, now known as MR BIG (Market Rasen Big Improvement Group), joined forces to generate ideas for ways in which these empty high street shops could be utilised.

   Over the past eight months MR BIG has transformed the high street into a hive of activity hosting themed monthly markets and transforming two of the vacant shops, as well as, introducing an arts and crafts festival. But there’s more to be done.

    Project Potential – a series of events which aim to fill the vacant premises of Market Rasen; the idea being that someone, or something, pops up in one of the vacant shops for a duration of two days, recognises the business potential and chooses to permanently trade from that shop. It is hoped each event would have its own theme, such as music or theatre, attracting dynamic audiences and not only benefiting Market Rasen’s high street but also new and existing businesses; the predominant long-term benefit being that Market Rasen has the potential to achieve a 0 per cent vacancy rate.

    But in order for Project Potential to be successful ideas are needed! So, if you were given an empty space for the duration of two days what would you do? And remember, think BIG!

Tweet ideas to: - @Project_Po or @KayPx

Or email them to: - [email protected]

[kayleypeters91]

Press Release #1 for Portas Pilot

Recently, I had the opportunity to write a couple of press releases for the Portas Pilot project. The first focusing on promoting a Mother's Day event at the MR BIG Corner Shop. Since the event has already passed I thought I would showcase the work that I did. Any tips on how I could improve are welcomed.

  MR BIG CORNER SHOP HOLDS MOTHER’S DAY SHOPPING EVENT

MARKET RASEN, LINCOLNSHIRE, EAST MIDLANDS – 22ND FEBRUARY 2013 The Market Rasen BIG Improvement Group (Mr BIG) plans to hold a Mother’s Day shopping event at the Mr BIG corner shop on Thursday 7th March 2013 between 4pm and 7pm.

The Mr BIG corner shop will partner with Greens of Lincolnshire and be the ideal shopping event for young children in pursuit of purchasing that special something for their mother this upcoming Mother’s Day. The overarching theme of the event will be ‘it’s the thought that counts’ with the majority of products on sale being hand-made and of ‘pocket money prices’.

Products will range from cakes, chillies, jams and chutneys, courtesy of Greens of Lincolnshire, to hand-made gift cards and arts and crafts, courtesy of local arts and crafts makers.

                                                      ENDS

[kayleypeters91]

Portas Pilot - Market Rasen update!

    It’s been a while since I reported on the progress of the MR BIG corner shop; my last post on the subject stated that I, along with two other volunteers, was to manage the PR activities involved with its launch before the holiday period … It’s now February and a lot has changed: the two other volunteers have dropped out of the project and the corner shop opened without us knowing! But I was keen to stay involved as I believed working on the project to be an invaluable experience.

    So today I’ve travelled to Market Rasen to get an update on the progress of the Portas Pilot project in general which, so far, has involved: the launch of a grocery store, Greens of Lincolnshire; the launch of the MR BIG corner shop; a visit from the woman herself, Mary Portas; and the introduction of an arts and crafts festival, Plank 2013. With all this going on it’s hardly surprising that the levels of communication dropped over the Christmas period!

    Upon arrival at the MR BIG Corner Shop, which finally opened its doors on 2nd February, I was pleasantly surprised. What was once a cold and empty building now felt warm and friendly filled with locally hand-made products ranging from greetings cards and artwork to elegant cushions and scarfs; many of the products having exceptional attention to detail! I was quite fascinated by the dedication put into making one collection of woolly hats and scarfs; I was told that the lady who makes these products uses the wool from her own sheep!

    After a wander round the shop I sat down for more serious business with members of the Market Rasen BIG Improvement Group (MR BIG) to discuss ways in which to publicise the shop, as well as other upcoming events, as part of the Portas Pilot project. The list of things that need doing by Monday appears quite daunting, what with assignments and presentations to produce, as well as a dissertation to write ….. Best crack on!

[kayleypeters91]

Pilot town project - Market Rasen

Portas Pilot

    Portas Pilot is a project developed by customer service guru Mary Portas, which focuses on refurbishing high streets across the UK. In order for your high street to be a part of the Portas Pilot project an online bid was required (here’s the link to Market Rasen’s (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3VJxJAzs0Ro). With 371 towns bidding, only 12 places available and a staggering £1m up for grabs, there was tough competition but Market Rasen was able to outshine the competition and was granted Portas Pilot town status.

    The key aims of the bid focused on tidying up the high street; putting the ‘market’ back into Market Rasen; creating a sustainable shopping strategy via support from budding entrepreneurs and landlord engagement, and promoting offers to local, regional and national visitors (http://www.maryportas.com/portaspilots/market-rasen/page/2/). With the aims in mind, a trip to Market Rasen was in order to first, see the high street for myself and second, to get inspiration for the project.

Impressions of Market Rasen

    Market Rasen is a small town on the outskirts of Lincoln comprising of a small population of just 3,500 people. Walking along the high street it was clear that it is in need of some sprucing up as a number of vacant shops were visible. I found the people to be very friendly and they were willing to answer some questions; shop owners agreed that Market Rasen is a nice place to live and that customers are friendly and loyal, but the town is in need of something different.

MR BIG’s Progress

    So far the Market Rasen Business Improvement Group (MR BIG) has organised and carried out markets to be held on the first Saturday of every month (the November market, being held tomorrow, is to be a Halloween themed market named Monster Market with activities such as a pumpkin carving competition). There are to be approximately 45 stalls at the November market with the likelihood of increasing over the upcoming months.

    As well as the monthly market MR BIG intends to launch two shops this month: a greengrocers and a MR BIG corner shop; that’s where I come in.

My Involvement

    The MR BIG corner shop will be a variety of shops all in one shop. The aim is to get a number of traders to trade at this shop with the ambition that they could, depending on their success, move into retail and trade on Market Rasen’s high street.

    Along with two other volunteers, I am to manage the public relations (PR) activities involved with the launch; these include the writing of press releases; using social media; blog submissions and media relations.

    With the hope of launching the shop before Christmas, a lot of work is to be done and a lot of effort to be put in. We will be making something out of nothing and hopefully the transformation will be incredible!

http://www.maryportas.com/portaspilots/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Marketrasen

Twitter: @MarketRasen_BIG

Blog: http://marketrasenguide.co.uk/wordpress/market-rasen-mr-big-team/

[kayleypeters91]

Q&A session with the Bailgate Independent

    It’s that time of year again, University is well and truly underway; assignments, assignments, oh, and dissertation are all everyone seems to be talking about. But as much as I’d like to stress over such things I’ve been far too busy delving into a fantastic PR project (secrets to be revealed next time) and attending guest lectures – listening to what the experts have to say!

    My first post of the new academic year will focus on a Q&A session between the University of Lincoln’s Journalism and Public Relations students and Tony Copeland, founder of the Bailgate Independent, Lincoln’s premier free magazine.

    The Bailgate Independent initially began as the Bailgate News over ten years ago and covered only Lincoln’s uphill area. At this time just 1,000 copies were being distributed throughout the area and were printed in black and white. Questions asked by the students we largely based around social media, although Tony quite clearly expressed his dislike for Facebook early on in the session, advertising within the magazine, the target audience, and of course the content of the magazine (mainly business news in the local area).

    With regards to advertising within the magazine there was speculation that if it were to get any larger it could be in danger of being viewed as a directory of local businesses. Tony explained that the ratio of advertising to editorial content is 50:50 and that if a particular business has both an advertisement and an editorial running in the same issue they will never be seen next to each other; a good decision in my opinion. Inevitably the question of rate cards popped up; although some of the audience gave off the impression that how much it costs to advertise in a publication was some kind of secret (rate cards for most publications can be found on the BRAD database). At £495 for the front cover and £600 for the back cover (VAT not included) it is a pricey magazine to advertise in. But considering the target audience the companies that do advertise in the magazine are likely to be quite upmarket.

    Something I found particularly interesting was the way in which the magazines are distributed. With a target audience of ABC1 adults, aged 35 upwards, the Bailgate Independent only distributes door-to-door based the model of the car parked in the driveway; if a BMW is in the driveway, the people who live there must be ABC1 and within a certain age range. Whilst it is a very stereotypical approach, it appears to be a very effective one nonetheless. The magazine distributes approximately 8,000 copies door-to-door and the other 2,000 copies to upmarket stores M&S and Waitrose, as well as some hotels.

    An interesting question that arose during the session asked about the future of the Bailgate Independent. Tony stated that he would like to increase circulation of the magazine, however the climate has not been stable enough for this to happen as of yet, and have a better online presence. Although he did express his dislike for Facebook during the session, he did reach out to students who are willing to volunteer to help out.

    Today the Bailgate Independent is glowing, with local competition recently forced to resort to a weekly rather than daily newspaper and cut staff. It is currently distrubting10,000 copies weekly throughout the whole of Lincoln.     

    Finally, Tony’s words of advice to the students who attended the session: do something different and do it well.

[kayleypeters91]

The Pitch

    The day has finally come – it’s assessment day! The other group pitched their ideas in response to our brief first. The main focus of the brief we had set can be found in my post ‘The Brief.’ (http://kayleypeters.wordpress.com/2012/03/20/the-brief/). But to summarise, the main objective was to change the behaviour of 18-25 year olds in relation to sexual health.

    I really liked the other group’s ideas; they had thought of using well known characters ‘The Inbetweeners’: always ending up in awkward situations, often to do with sex. Many people would be likely to relate to some aspect of each of the characters and their different personalities. They would be travelling the UK in one of the characters well known yellow car communicating the message to the target audience. Using these particular characters would show a sense of humour but also get the message across effectively.

    Set in our brief was the objective “to remove some of the taboo element surrounding the subject”, the idea of an NHS telephone line was suggested. This was a more serious idea, which I thought would be extremely beneficial. It was to be anonymous and people who used the line would be able to ask questions and tell of their concerns to a relevant person who would then be able to provide help. The fact that it would be anonymous meant that people didn’t have to feel embarrassed or ashamed when revealing their concerns, which I thought met the objective.

    Along with good ideas came good presenting skills. I felt each of them spoke clearly and answered any questions very well. No-one used any notes, which to me, showed that they were confident in what they were talking about. The only minor issues that I found were that one group member in this group was often reading from the screen rather than keeping eye contact and talking directly to our group; and another at one point had hands in their pockets, which in my opinion, looks uncomfortable and unprofessional. One final point being that in our brief we stated that we wanted to see a visual presentation as well as a written document including all the main points, the latter they did not provide.

    When it came to pitching our ideas to Ministry of Print, I feel that our group did an excellent job. In order to present effectively Business Balls (2012) suggests that “good preparation is the key to confidence, which is the key to you being relaxed, and this settles the butterflies.” I very much agree with this suggestion; each of us in the group had studied our own individual parts for the presentation, and as a result I think we did feel more relaxed and confident when presenting. I think that if you have a clear understanding of the subject matter and a good idea which points need to be covered, you will feel much better about presenting to an audience.

    During our presentation we had considered feedback from previous presentations and tried not to make the same mistakes again. I felt that we worked well together as a team to provide an informative presentation that met the brief we were set. There was only one minor flaw; we had decided to create mood boards rather than rely solely on a Powerpoint presentation but one group member had forgotten to bring theirs with them. But we overcame this by explaining the idea in more detail. When it came to answering questions, each of us was able to answer or add something at least once, which meant we all had an equal opportunity; there was no allocated person specifically for questions. The only issue I found was that I had thought I may have been able to answer any questions that came up relating to the specific slides I had talked about. However, I did find that one member in our group was a slightly quicker thinker than myself so I didn’t always have chance to do this. But I was able to support their answers.

    Strengths of our group were the results of the Belbin test; with all members having some element of a ‘teamworker’ in their personality it was obvious no-one was going to put themselves forward as a ‘leader.’ There were no major constraints and although we were a very relaxed and casual group, work was always prepared and carried out on time and to a high standard. From working as part of this group, I have to say, I didn’t really notice any major weaknesses. Perhaps the only one being that sometimes we got distracted and a little carried away with the task in hand. 

[kayleypeters91]

Response to brief

    Following on from my previous post, (http://kayleypeters.wordpress.com/2012/03/20/the-brief/), we were lucky our presentation generated plenty of relevant discussion and the group responding to our brief appeared to understand what was required of them. In reference to the Shannon and Weaver Model of Communication (1949) the other group had decoded our message correctly, and I couldn’t wait to see what ideas they’d come up with.

    The brief presented to us was by a company named ‘Ministry of Print’; they produce and sell personalised merchandise at various festivals across the UK. They wanted help from a PR agency to achieve the objectives of;

Increasing awareness of their brand and website

Encouraging the purchase of products before attending the festivals

Branching out into other major festivals

    If I’m honest, the last objective “to branch out into other major festivals” didn’t strike me as something a PR agency would be able to help them with. First, surely it would be up to them to decide which festivals these ‘major’ festivals would be. Second, isn’t this all about the money you’ve got to buy your place at festivals? And finally, it wasn’t exactly the best SMART objective I’d ever heard. But we proceeded anyway.

    With a target audience of 18-25 year olds it was suggested that we take the social media route for this task. Ideas were flown around between the four of us and a few were selected to develop further. We decided we would focus on one idea for each of the objectives; an online viral video was the idea for the objective “to increase awareness of the brand and website” as well as celebrity endorsement, and a competition was thought up for the objective “to encourage purchases before attending the festival.”

    It was a group decision to go down a more creative route of using mood boards rather than relying solely on a Powerpoint presentation for these two ideas. The idea of the viral video was to show images of people enjoying themselves at festivals wearing personalised merchandise by Ministry of Print; it was also to include positive comments from existing customers and a link to the Ministry of Print website. The idea of celebrity endorsement was to send free samples of merchandise using direct mail, rather than standard post, to those who are popular with the 18-25 year old target audience such as radio presenters and reality stars.  We hoped they would then use Twitter to publicly say ‘thank you’ to @Ministryof Print, generating awareness. The idea of the competition was to use the hash tag ‘Mydreamfestival’ on Twitter and have people commenting what their dream festival would be. Then, everyone who comments would be entered into a competition to win a variety of prizes. As interesting as this may sound, a weakness from previous group meetings returned. Again thoughts began to stray from what we were actually supposed to be doing: rather than focusing on the objectives set in the brief, the focus became on the detail of the prizes. As a result it did take some time to finalise our ideas.

    Once our focus returned we were able to concentrate on allocating the rather minute budget of £3,500 we had been given. It will come as no surprise that the majority of the budget was spent on the prizes for the competition. But we were able to spend the entire budget appropriately considering the postage of the free samples as well as paying the professional we were to hire to create the viral video.

    Although sometimes we were distracted, I felt that overall we worked to a very good standard as a team. I felt we were more than prepared to pitch our ideas to the other team, and was actually looking forward to it!

References

Communication Theory., (2012) Shannon and Weaver Model of Communication [online]. Available from http://communicationtheory.org/shannon-and-weaver-model-of-communication/ (Accessed 25 March 2012)

[kayleypeters91]

The Brief

    Outlined in my previous post (http://kayleypeters.wordpress.com/2012/03/16/the-assessment-2/) was the task for the ‘Managing Public Relations’ module here at the University of Lincoln.

    We were to represent the local council, health service and university with concerns relating to the rise in sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) amongst 18-25 year olds throughout the UK. The primary objective was to develop advocates for change in behaviour amongst young people; more simply, we wanted to persuade young people to have safe sex to prevent them catching STDs, including Chlamydia. Labs Direct (2012) say Chlamydia is “the highest growing infection in theUK” with “over 160,000 cases in 2010.” 

    Given quite a mature topic, I wanted to continue with the task in that way: maturely. Unfortunately others didn’t really see it like that; there were a few giggles and looks of discomfort as STDs aren’t an everyday topic of discussion. Once the discomfort had been overcome ideas began to flow, but not in the right direction.

    The group became enthusiastic but thoughts began to steer away from the task in hand; proposed ideas began to focus on us planning the campaign instead of focusing on our objectives. As a result, a group meeting was to be held as soon as possible in order to clearly identify what the objectives of the campaign were and to begin developing our brief. We wanted the group receiving our brief to understand exactly what they were to do and to communicate with them as though they were already part of our team.

    Stone (1995: 11) suggests four principles to consider when communicating with staff:

Identify your primary audience – the group we were presenting our brief to.

Talk specifically and directly to each individual in your primary audience – when presenting our brief we planned to make as much eye contact as possible with each member of the audience; we didn’t want to focus all our attention on one or two specific people.

Make sure they know exactly what you want them to do – we tried to be as specific as possible in our brief in order for the other group to have an excellent understanding of us (the client) as well as what we wanted them to do.

Match the message to the media - wanting the other group to present their own ideas for the campaign we did not give them a specific media channel to use. Was this the best idea?

    Discussion out of the way we were able to focus and function effectively as a team. We used “individual skills to work towards the same goal” (Harrison, 2000:119), something I am very happy we were able to do as it showed commitment towards the task. We each carried out secondary research based on questions we had previously asked ourselves; mainly researching facts and figures relating to sexual health in the 18-25 year old age category. The team cooperated well when delegated tasks; one person wrote the brief, another converted the brief into a visual presentation, and another continued with research; the other was able to provide some excellent ideas and opinions. 

    I felt we were off to a flying start as we managed to get so much completed to what we considered, if I do say so myself, a pretty good standard. A lot of effort was being put into the task, communication was flowing and most importantly, all group members were turning up to meetings – something that doesn’t tend to happen with every group. Perhaps I was expecting too much, but this all came crashing down when we met to rehearse our presentation.

    Each choosing two slides to make notes on, we should have been ready to rehearse at the next meeting; it turns out some members of the group are quite indecisive. The time was spent doing the preparation that should have been done beforehand. Thinking ahead it was suggested to meet half an hour before our presentation to ensure it was of an adequate time length. Having a lecture at 9am before the presentation the response was ‘I’ll struggle to get out of bed.’ Not the attitude to expect from a group of people hoping to do well, although, we are students after all…..

  References

Harrison, S., (2000) Public Relations: An Introduction 2nd ed. Thomas Learning

Labs Direct, (2012) STI Statistics [online]. Available from: http://www.labsdirect.com/uk/sti-statistics.html (Accessed 19 March 2012)

Stone, N., (1995) The Management and Practice of Public Relations Macmillan Press Ltd: London

[kayleypeters91]

The Assessment

    So, today’s the day – the day the group assessment was officially set. At first glance the details slightly confused me as I was unsure what it was we were actually supposed to be doing. But Jane was able to remove this confusion by taking the seminar group step by step through the stages required. Once I’d eventually gotten my head around it, the tasks actually seemed like fun; I know what you’re thinking, an assessment being fun, really?!

    First, with the details provided, we were to create a brief explaining who we were, what we wanted the PR consultancy to do for us, and how we wanted them to do it. We were then to formally exchange briefs and respond to the brief given to us by the other group. This was to be done in the form of a pitch, which may have included presenting who we are as a PR consultancy, what our previous campaigns consisted of, and our ideas for their particular campaign. But before any of this could happen we were to split up into groups.

    That dreaded task of choosing group members had once again come back to bite. Not in a negative way however; the problem was that everyone in the seminar group really didn’t mind who they were to work with for the task. When an awkward silence began to exist, Jane thought of a creative, yet simple and fair way of putting us into our groups: the style of picking numbers out of a hat. I chose a scrap of paper with the number ‘two’ written on it and joined the others that had also done this.                        

    I was very pleased with the other three members of my group, if not feeling lucky, as there was one member of the seminar group I didn’t particularly wish to work with due to previous negative experiences of working with them. Three of the group members I was also working with for another module, so had a very good idea of what to expect from them. And as a result, my expectations were very high. I knew what they were capable of and expected them to put as much effort as they put into other tasks into this one. The final member I had not worked with before, but after completing the Belbin Test in a previous seminar, it was revealed that they were a Completer-Finisher, just like me. According to Belbin, characteristics of a Completer-Finisher include being “painstaking, orderly, conscientious, and anxious.” They are “invaluable where tasks demand close concentration and a high degree of accuracy.” Due to this I felt positive that this person would deliver some excellent ideas and also that our work for each task would be finished to perfection (or thereabouts!)  Other group members’ results from the test were Team Worker: “socially orientated, rather mild and sensitive” and Shaper: “highly strung, outgoing, and dynamic.”

    The group had a variety of skills and it was quite clear that certain people would be better at certain aspects of the tasks than others. We knew that our skills needed to be put into good use in order to do well in this task.     

   So … Let the work begin!          

[kayleypeters91]

Transported to Italy

So I thought I'd have a go at writing a restaurant review. It should probably be noted that I'm no food connoisseur, but here goes!

    Located in the heart of Chester's city centre sits Bella Italia, a small Italian restaurant with a picturesque entrance set with romantic lit up trees either side. The interior is quaint and warm; although petite, the restaurant wouldn't have the same atmosphere if it were any larger. The tables were relatively close together, but this added to the warmth and friendliness of the restaurant. I felt as though I had been transported from Chester to Italy within a heartbeat.

    The waiter who greets my boyfriend and I doesn't spoil the fantasy. Although not of Italian descent, he greets with a 'buono giorno' and guides us to a small, candlelit window table complete with pink heart shaped balloons and gorgeous white lilies. I was already enjoying myself.

    After taking some time to study the menu, we both decided on the Pollpettini to start: baked spiced meatballs in a rich tomato sauce, topped with mozzarella and served with toasted ciabatta. An excellent choice; the meatballs were divine and tasted even better smothered in more tomato sauce than necessary. My only criticisms of this dish are that there could have been slightly more mozzerella, and the toasted ciabatta a little less toasted than it was served. Although enjoying the meal so far, the service was slow. It was a Saturday night and the restaurant was full; a large group of people were celebrating a hen night, which may have been difficult for the staff to handle, but considering the petite size of the restaurant, the service could have been quicker between courses. Around 35 minutes after finishing our starters, the plates were eventually taken away and our mains delivered promptly by a friendly and smiley waitress.

    I had chosen the Carne Mista pizza: spicy Italian pepperoni, salami, smoked ham and smoked pancetta. After such a mouth watering starter, I felt a little let down by the Carne Mista. After all, it was just a regular meat feast pizza given a fancy Italian name. Thoughts on the main are that I did enjoy it but it was nothing special. There were also far too many herbs on top of it, supposedly to 'add to the flavour' but spoilt the taste. Again the service between courses was slower than necessary.

   Extremely full up from the previous two courses, my mouth still watered looking at the dessert menu. I wanted almost everything off of it. Although I decided to give dessert a miss this time round, I was drawn to the Cookie Dough Lava Cake: moist chocolate chip cookie cake with a melting chocolate middle, served warm with vanilla ice cream and caramel sauce, and the Cioccolato Diavola: sticky chocolate fudge cake with praline pieces and a melting chocolate top, with vanilla ice cream. I will definitely be returning to Bella Italia in the future, if not for its service on a busy Saturday night, for its divine and mouth watering food, as well as its beautiful picturesque decor, inside and out.

[kayleypeters91]

How to survive the PR industry, by Shooting Star PR

    Shooting Star PR, a Lincoln based PR agency set up only 5 years ago, took a trip to the University of Lincoln in December to talk briefly about the agency, as well as what it takes to become successful within the PR industry.

    Director of Shooting Star PR, Jez Ashberry, began the lecture by discussing who their clients are. The agency has an impressive 98 clients and is hoping to reach its 100th in the near future. Amongst these clients are the local University of Lincoln, Lincolnshire Events Centre and Lighthouse Properties. Shooting Star PR also has national clients including Autoclenz, the National College of School Leadership and Double Tree by Hilton, which had its opening event on December 21st 2011.

    Ashberry then went on to explain which skills are a must in order to survive within the PR industry. Firstly, writing skills are hugely important; press releases, articles and blogs all require excellent writing skills. Some knowledge about current affairs is also necessary; it was said that a popular interview question is often "which was your favourite news story from the past week?" Being able to answer the question, as well as give your opinion on the story, is likely to come across as quite impressive. Other skills mentioned as important were confidence, flexibility and attention to detail.

    A part of the lecture I found very interesting was the comparison between in-house PR and agency PR. The questions included 'is agency PR more demanding than in-house PR?' And, 'is in-house PR really easier than agency PR?' The answers were that whilst in-house PR lacks variety, agency PR expects everybody to be an expert in everything due to the range of clients; and whilst in-house PR may have better hours, for example 9am - 5pm, agency PR may involve juggling skills and working late into the evening a lot of the time in order to complete work. However, both types of PR will involve developing good client relationships.

    Finally, Ashberry was able to give advice regarding what should be done when applying for jobs in the future. The advice included to always attach a CV to emails and to consider the tone of voice when writing emails. Also, making use of social media such as Twitter and LinkedIn could be a good idea to talk to people from the industry and a portfolio including websites, blog posts and reviews would also be useful to demonstrate work that has been completed (maybe this blog post would come in handy).

[kayleypeters91]

A day in London with the MAPR society

    As part of the MAPR Society (Marketing, Advertising & Public Relations) at the University of Lincoln, I was able to take advantage of a trip to London last Wednesday. The trip included the chance to go shopping on Oxford Street, a visit to the Museum of Advertising and Branding, as well as the opportunity to attend the ASA (Advertising Standards Authority) offices for a talk about what they do, how they deal with complaints and a look at some of the most complained adverts of all time. All in all, a busy day was ahead, but how could I say no to such a valuable opportunity?

    Upon arrival in London, a small group of us headed to the Museum of Advertising and Branding in Notting Hill. I have to say, travelling on the tube was not as daunting as I'd remembered it to be. Although the museum was very small in comparison to other well known museums such as the Museum of Natural History, I was pleasantly surprised.

    Starting from the 1920's, it was shown how a large variety of brands have changed throughout the years. Although, I didn't recognise many brands up until around the 70's! It was interesting to see brands including Pepsi, Nestle, Kelloggs and Fairy Liquid, amongst others, from the past and present sitting next to each other. Whilst not much time was spent at the museum, I am hugely glad I chose to have a look around.

    Leaving the museum, we were to make our way to the ASA offices, not before a quick stop at the Museum of Natural History and Victoria & Albert Museum in Kensington.

    Arriving at the ASA offices, we were welcomed with light refreshments and an introduction of some of the staff, who were to lead the talk. The talk began with a brief history of the ASA and how it has developed to include new things such as marketing communications of company websites. During the talk it was revealed that in 2010 the ASA resolved 25,214 complaints about 13,000 different advertisements. 1,831 of these advertisements were altered or withdrawn as a result of complaints.

    An advertisement shown that I found to be quite surprising was the KFC advert from 2005. Shockingly, this is the most complained ad of all time with over 1,600 complaints. It showed people working in a call centre, eating a KFC and talking to each other. It is as though they enjoy KFC so much that they want to be enjoying it all the time. However, as a result of this, complaints referred to encouraging bad manners as the people in the ad were talking with their mouths’ full of food. And, that it mocked listening and speaking impediments as the words could not be understood very clearly. Although this is the most complained about ad of all time the ASA did not remove it.

    Another which I was shocked by was the YSL ad for their perfume Belle d'Opium. The ad showed a women moving around quite dramatically, she then points to her arm and continues with the strange dramatic movements, ending the ad with the line 'I am your addiction.' The whole ad is simulating drug use; the word opium, the pointing to the arm, the dramatic movements. I was surprised this ad even made it to air. But it was no surprise to learn that this ad was banned everywhere.

    The ASA then went on to explain how they deal with complaints and how much consideration goes into each and every complaint. I found the experience very interesting as my attention was kept throughout. It seems as though a career in customer service and investigation of advertisements appealed greatly to me.

[kayleypeters91]

Virgin Atlantic Comes to Lincoln

    During my time at the University of Lincoln, I've had the great experience of attending a guest lecture given by none other than the Sales & Marketing Director of Virgin Atlantic, Paul Dickinson. Being a student of this field I was very excited by almost everything he talked about (especially the bit about staff benefits including free flights). On a more serious note, he discussed the training process that all Virgin Atlantic employees must go through, their marketing strategy and the importance of measuring effectiveness. In particular I was impressed with their approach to targeting.

    Virgin Atlantic knows very clearly who its target audience is. They focus on making them think that Virgin Atlantic is everywhere, when in fact it is not. Virgin is able to break down the daily routine of its target audience and identify any media placement opportunities, which I thought was a rather clever way to go about it, as it avoids wasting money and guarantees their ad will reach at least some of their target audience. As a result of their target audience being high-flying business people, Virgin is in direct competition with British Airways. I was quite shocked, as well as impressed, when Dickinson revealed that Virgin had actually advertised at Terminal 5, where mainly BA flights take place.

   When the lecture was over a networking event took place in the Atrium, where there was the opportunity to indulge in conversation with businesses from the Advertising, Marketing and PR industry. As interesting as this may sound, I was very nervous as this was my very first networking event and didn't know who to talk to. No-one was wearing a name badge with their company name on, which made the process of starting a conversation much more difficult. After much deliberation and taking full advantage o9f the free food, a friend and I emerged into conversation with a man from a web design company, Develop & Promote, who had a lot of useful information to give, as well as a company named Lava PR who also delivered some excellent information and advice.

   Overall, my first experience of networking was an exciting but daunting one. Maybe next time a little more confidence will be unveiled.....