So, three months flew by! I finish up my internship with Dig Communications this Friday. I am in the midst of following up several leads for jobs - I'll keep you posted!
Here are some of the things I've been up to lately with work.
1). Pitching, pitching, pitching! Last week I juggled sending out emails and press releases - and making follow-up phone calls - to reporters/editors/TV & radio news desks for three different stories. The ultimate goal of this quasi-stalking process is to get publications (the more top-tier, or relevant to your story's region, the better) to write about the information you have. For instance, this past Friday, Chicago Bear Tommie Harris hosted a charity event in Northbrook to benefit Prevent Child Abuse America (my client) and the Tommie Harris Foundation. We got the story covered in Crain's Chicago Business (under "10 things to do this weekend"), the Chicago Sun-Times, and the event calendars for CBS, 97.1 FM and 90.9FM, to name a few. I also ALMOST got ESPNChicago to come cover the actual event (but they needed confirmed Bears' interviews in order to show up - boo. Ah well). Pretty fun!
MillerCoors also offered free, all-day bus service during the Valparaiso Popcorn Festival yesterday, as a safe alternative to drunk-driving. It's actually a pretty interesting program - they offer it during major celebrations (St. Patrick's Day, 4th of July, Halloween, Kentucky Derby Eve, etc.) in major cities. Valparaiso is a much smaller news market (than, for instance, Chicago with the Tommie Harris event), so we considered it a success when I got the Times of Northwest Indiana to write an article about this story (with the press release I wrote!).
2). Researching! This is the part that I still find interesting, but where most people start to tune out with glazed over eyes until I resume talking about the celebrity encounters experienced by other staff in my office. Everyday, I do a quick news-summary on the cellulosic ethanol industry. If you ever care to know anything (and I mean anything - from U.S. biofuel policies, to the different types of biomass used as feedstock, to which international countries represent our biofuel-competition) about this industry, you let me know. I'm leaving Dig a veritable biofuel-guru. I also do a weekly news-summary on the B-to-B (business-to-business) payment card fulfillment industry. Again, I know way too much about gift cards, open and closed loop cards, the credit and debit industries - care to be enlightened? Just let me know. For a third client, I also keep tabs on what's happening with global alcohol policy (Did you know it's illegal to make moonshine in Latvian apartment buildings? That beer sales increased substantially in China during the World Cup? Both true.). Finally, I get random research projects all the time, putting together information on everything from China's major oil companies, to Chicago's Alderman Burke, to a bio on a Cincinnati Enquirer reporter. So, this industry is definitely a great way to keep learning after graduation, without forking over the money (just yet) for grad school. That's possibly one of my favorite things about this field so far!
In other news...I got the new iPhone (Michelle's birthday present to Michelle), I'm about to start reading Hotel World (my friend from high school and I are going to make a quasi-book club effort out of this one if you'd like to join in!) and I'm only going to survive the next 9 months (after True Blood's finale tonight) with help from Glee, Dexter and (if it's as good as it looks) Boardwalk Empire.
Stay tuned for post-internship updates!
Here are some of the things I've been up to lately with work.
1). Pitching, pitching, pitching! Last week I juggled sending out emails and press releases - and making follow-up phone calls - to reporters/editors/TV & radio news desks for three different stories. The ultimate goal of this quasi-stalking process is to get publications (the more top-tier, or relevant to your story's region, the better) to write about the information you have. For instance, this past Friday, Chicago Bear Tommie Harris hosted a charity event in Northbrook to benefit Prevent Child Abuse America (my client) and the Tommie Harris Foundation. We got the story covered in Crain's Chicago Business (under "10 things to do this weekend"), the Chicago Sun-Times, and the event calendars for CBS, 97.1 FM and 90.9FM, to name a few. I also ALMOST got ESPNChicago to come cover the actual event (but they needed confirmed Bears' interviews in order to show up - boo. Ah well). Pretty fun!
MillerCoors also offered free, all-day bus service during the Valparaiso Popcorn Festival yesterday, as a safe alternative to drunk-driving. It's actually a pretty interesting program - they offer it during major celebrations (St. Patrick's Day, 4th of July, Halloween, Kentucky Derby Eve, etc.) in major cities. Valparaiso is a much smaller news market (than, for instance, Chicago with the Tommie Harris event), so we considered it a success when I got the Times of Northwest Indiana to write an article about this story (with the press release I wrote!).
2). Researching! This is the part that I still find interesting, but where most people start to tune out with glazed over eyes until I resume talking about the celebrity encounters experienced by other staff in my office. Everyday, I do a quick news-summary on the cellulosic ethanol industry. If you ever care to know anything (and I mean anything - from U.S. biofuel policies, to the different types of biomass used as feedstock, to which international countries represent our biofuel-competition) about this industry, you let me know. I'm leaving Dig a veritable biofuel-guru. I also do a weekly news-summary on the B-to-B (business-to-business) payment card fulfillment industry. Again, I know way too much about gift cards, open and closed loop cards, the credit and debit industries - care to be enlightened? Just let me know. For a third client, I also keep tabs on what's happening with global alcohol policy (Did you know it's illegal to make moonshine in Latvian apartment buildings? That beer sales increased substantially in China during the World Cup? Both true.). Finally, I get random research projects all the time, putting together information on everything from China's major oil companies, to Chicago's Alderman Burke, to a bio on a Cincinnati Enquirer reporter. So, this industry is definitely a great way to keep learning after graduation, without forking over the money (just yet) for grad school. That's possibly one of my favorite things about this field so far!
In other news...I got the new iPhone (Michelle's birthday present to Michelle), I'm about to start reading Hotel World (my friend from high school and I are going to make a quasi-book club effort out of this one if you'd like to join in!) and I'm only going to survive the next 9 months (after True Blood's finale tonight) with help from Glee, Dexter and (if it's as good as it looks) Boardwalk Empire.
Stay tuned for post-internship updates!
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