A student scrolls through her Facebook timeline, seeing the photo albums of all her friends, when something strikes her attention. Spire, a wearable technology, monitors breathing to tell when someone is calm, focused or tense and then coaches the consumer to maintain a positive mindset. Intrigued, the student clicks on the link and is taken to a Wall Street Journal article about the product. That night, she hears the co-founder of Spire speaking on a podcast about the new product. This is public relations.
Principal and cofounder of Flashpoint Public Relations Jennifer Colton came to PHS to share her experiences with public relations on Nov. 20 as part of the new career speakers program organized by the College and Career Center.
Colton spoke about her insights into what PR companies do and what role they play with other companies. Public relations is a highly misunderstood field, Colton said. Many people think it is the same as advertising.
“In many ways public relations is about storytelling and persuading the media that this is a compelling story,” Colton said.
Every client has different goals for what they are trying to receive but they all want to establish a good reputation in a competitive industry, Colton said.
“Our job is to help clients expand awareness for themselves, products and services,” Colton said.
Colton said she accidently stumbled into the field of public relations, but has loved it ever since.
“It teaches us to dig deeper, question assumptions, write effectively, create powerful arguments and think on our feet,” Colton said.
Colton also touched on how the growing involvement of the internet in our everyday lives has forced public relations to move a lot faster.
“The reporters which public relations firms work with are scrambling to break news and make headlines,” Colton said. “This has impacted public relations because it is on us to make sure the details are right and control erroneous stories that get out onto the internet.”
Colton said that for students who want to get involved in public relations it is important to understand how social and news media work because knowledge is always a tool.
Director of the College and Career Center Allison Bly created these lunchtime talks to open students’ eyes to the broad spectrum of job opportunities that they may not have thought about before.
“Because the speakers have first hand experience, they can give you a realistic idea of what that career is like,” Bly said.
Bly also attended the presentation and said that it was really intriguing to hear about the different scenarios that Colton encounters with her clients.
“Colton would potentially turn away some clients for ethical reasons, so there was an interesting take away of making decisions in a business and not just thinking about the financial piece,” Bly said.
The speakers can also tell you the pros, the cons, what education level you need and what experiences you need, Bly said.
Bly asked Colton to give a presentation because a lot of times public relations is not necessarily something that many students think about.
“It does, however, overlap with a lot of different subjects such as psychology, journalism, English and business,” Bly said.
Bly said that she is happy to get feedback from students about ideas for careers they want to have represented through these lunchtime talks.