Phoebe reflects on what she has learnt over the course of her internship at Seven…

Lessons I’ve Learnt as a PR Intern

I have been working at Seven Consultancy for two months. During my time so far, I have enjoyed working across the variety of Seven’s accounts as I begin to navigate my way around the world of PR. This means my mornings might be spent researching initiatives aimed at combatting plastic pollution in Africa, whilst my afternoons are spent looking into the latest fintech innovations.

So what?!

I have been lucky enough to have completed a ‘PR 101’ session hosted by Seven Senior PR Manager Andrew which covered some of the basics for anyone starting in the industry. My main take-away from this experience was to always question the relevance of what you are writing about by asking ‘so what?’. This ensures you are relating news-worthy information about a client to publications that will want to write about that topic.

Media Lists

To land coverage that will reach the relevant audiences it is essential to get your media lists right. Curating lists of the most suitable journalists and publications for any given client ensures that long lists of names aren’t spammed by news that isn’t applicable to them. In the long run, this can enhance the credibility of the PR agency in the eyes of the press and facilitate the building of relationships with journalists.

Coverage logging

For PR agencies, coverage logging is a way of demonstrating the value of investing in reputation management and communications to a client.

Getting to grips with the intricacies of these logs was challenging at first, but now I enjoy ensuring the client-facing coverage books are kept updated daily and are always looking their best!

Spokespeople

Before I started working for Seven, I wasn’t aware of how many hours went into ensuring an individual is ready for an interview with the media. I naively thought that most people who I saw on the news were fabulously eloquent speakers. However, I now understand the hours of media training, studying briefing notes, Q&A preparation, and key message planning that goes into ensuring a chosen spokesperson gets their message across in the little time they have.

Social media

Getting the right influencers and ambassadors to promote campaigns or products enables businesses to target specific consumer markets and enhance engagement on a global scale at the click of a button. This lesson tied into understanding the value of Search Engine Optimisation (SEO) that ensures the most active people or sites are receiving the greatest visibility for their content.