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Reflecting on Public Relations Final

I feel a bit like Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz as we finish off the last week of our Master’s degree. The last 12 months have brought along many different challenges and lessons, a few new friends, and it was an adventure I’ll certainly never forget. I cannot wait to turn in our final assignments & walk the stage at graduation with my fellow classmates, but it will also be a bittersweet moment knowing that this part of our journey together is over.

When we started the program, we went through each class and wrote about what we thought we’d learn in every class. This is what I thought I would learn in our Public Relations Final:

I will create a Capstone Project with a public relations plan demonstrating my understanding of my course work. 

I will also prepare a website that includes different media assets across different channels again demonstrating the knowledge I’ve gained throughout my course work. 

I will also write a thesis on my public relations plan presenting an examination of the plan and key topics. 

After going through this last month, I have definitely learned what I expected & have accomplished the things I thought I would, like putting together the final version of my Capstone Project. I also learned a few skills that I didn’t expect, but ones that will be helpful in my current & future career. Since I am currently a Marketing Manager for an MiLB baseball team, I will be putting everything we’ve learned over the last twelve months to use every day. It’s been a huge help to me learning and developing these skills as I’ve progressed in my current career path. 

As our journey comes to an end at Full Sail, I just want to say thank you to all of the professors that have helped us along the way & to all of my classmates for their insight and help throughout this course. It’s been an amazing ride, now it’s time for graduation!

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Check out my article on #Storify about making it into the business of #SportsJournalism! 

I wrote this as part of my Capstone Project for my Master’s degree at Full Sail University. 

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Reflecting on Online Media Room

I feel like I need to pinch myself, am I really 4 weeks away from getting my Master’s degree?

*Pinch* Ouch! Ok it’s for real. (Why did I do that?)

It honestly seems like yesterday that I started this journey through my Master’s program and now I’m four weeks away from graduating. I chose to get my Master’s mainly because at the time, I had yet to find the job I was looking for in sports. Little did I know, that job would eventually pop-up in January. I can now proudly say I’m a Marketing Manager for an MiLB Baseball Team here in Florida. Needless to say, since January things have been a bit crazy but I’ve made it through. I couldn’t be more happy or proud to finally be at the end of this journey. 

Back in month one of our journey, we had to go through each class & guess what it is we’d learn of every class with just a course description to go on. Some classes I’ve been spot on & others I was unfortunately way off, but that’s just how it goes. When looking at this class, this is what I thought I’d learn:

This class will help me better understand how to apply the normal public relations practices of a pressroom to the online platforms used by my organization. 

I will also learn how to use third-party platforms to help strengthen my efforts. 

I will also learn how to properly manage my content assets to encourage participation from throughout my organization.

After four weeks in the Online Media Room, I have definitely learned all of that & so much more. I’ve really enjoyed this class & the things I’ve learned from it. I think the things we learned in this class will be very helpful in my career, but they will also come in handy for my own personal PR use. Just because I have a career now, doesn’t mean it will be there forever, so it will be helpful for me to have the skills I’ve learned for in the future.

I’m extremely thankful for the things I’ve learned in the past few months, but also for some of the teachers I’ve had along the way…especially Ms. Lee. She’s not only a great teacher, but also a great mentor & a friend. Thank you for everything Ms. Lee!

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About last night.

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Reflecting on Reputation Management Studies

Another month in our journey has come to an end, leaving us only two more to go. Unfortunately, I’m leaving this class feeling as though I did not get what I had hoped for out of it. Going into this class, I thought I would learn things like how to respond to different crises that may happen to an organization and what the best ways would be to handle them or we might get some knowledge of how to use analytics to better understand our audience during a crisis. I feel like I may have learned a little part of those things, but not in the way I hoped for.

I can’t say that I had a favorite assignment over the four weeks I spent in this class, I honestly did not enjoy any of them. To me, our assignments should be general enough that we can easily tailor them to the type of clients we have chosen for our Capstone Project. This month I did not feel like that was the case. I found it very hard to apply some of the things I was asked to do to my type of client and felt as though I was struggling to make things work.

Out of the topics covered this month, the only one I found to be interesting and possibly helpful to me was how SEO applies to your company during a crisis. This is a topic I honestly never even thought about when thinking of how to handle a crisis. I never that this would be something to even consider at a time of crisis, but I now realize it is very important to your organization during that time.

I realize that there are things I can take away from this class that may help me in working with other public relations professionals, but I still feel left craving more knowledge and understanding. I guess the one thing I can really say that I will use in my public relations career is creating a good relationship with the media that I may be working with. I now realize just how important the relationship you build with your media contacts is. If you don’t build a strong relationship throughout your time working with the media, it could hurt you and your company when a crisis does arise.

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Reflecting on Event Marketing & Production

“3 more outs, just 3 more…it’s all you need to win the game.”

I think this is what every pitcher & fan is saying to themselves at the end of a baseball game when they’re up in the 9th, or at least I do. Now that this month’s class, Event Marketing & Production, is over, that’s all I have left till graduation. It’s seriously crazy how fast these past nine months have gone, but now that I’ve started my new career I’m more excited than ever to finish up. It’s a struggle to manage a marketing department & get through all my classwork, but it will be worth it in the end.

Now that Event Marketing & Production has come to an end; I want to take a look back at what I thought I’d learn & see if I was right. In month one we took a guess at what we’d get out of every class, here is what I thought I would learn:

This class will teach me how to use events for marketing and supporting my public relations campaigns. I will gain a better understanding of how to plan and execute these events so that we can bring the proper audience to our campaign. 

I will also learn how to use different media platforms, apps, and other     incentives to enhance the event and create real-world interactions. 

I definitely feel like I learned all that & so much more. This class was very helpful for me to understand how to plan events on a much larger scale. It also helped for having a better understand on how to use and follow a budget. I feel like I now have a better understanding for how to use social platforms for this purpose as well.

I thoroughly enjoyed this month & it has given me lots of inspiration that I will put to use in my new career as a marketing manager. I also think this will help in future classes in planning other types of projects. Just 3 more classes…

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Reflecting on Media Relations

Eight classes down & four to go! It is seriously crazy just how fast these months have flown by & how much we’ve learned in that time. It sometimes feels like we’re Marty McFly traveling to the future or maybe even back in time from month to month. All I know is I’m more than ready to put all this information to use in the sports career I’ve been dreaming of. Who knows, maybe Doc can alter the future for me so I can work for my favorite sports team. It kind of worked for the Cubs & the whole World Series thing, right?

Anyways, let’s travel back in time for a moment & look at what I thought I was going to learn in this Media Relations class. When I wrote this, all I had to go off was the course syllabus, so let’s see if I was close or not. Here is what I thought I’d learn:

·      This class will teach me more about how journalism & public relations work together to create a cohesive environment to share their subject matter to their desired audience.

·      This class will also teach me how to leverage my audience’s subject matter to represent my mission with authority.

After four weeks in Media Relations, I’d say I was spot on with this prediction. We’ve learned how to create and leverage relationships with journalists while working in public relations. This has also shown us how to properly pitch our stories or announcements to journalists. Which in turn taught us how to make sure we are putting out the most relevant information we can for our audiences.

I feel like I learned a lot from this class that I will be able to use once I am working within the Marketing & Public Relations field. I now understand just how important the media is a Public Relations professional, it will be very important to create relationships with the media once I am working within the field. I can also use the tactics we learned to help further my own personal ventures to help promote myself and my work.

Now let’s get in that DeLorean & head to our May graduation!

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Reflecting on Market & Consumer Research Analysis

It’s the 7th inning stretch, time to stand up and sing “Take Me Out to the Ballgame” or “Sweet Caroline” if you’re a fellow Red Sox fan. These last seven months sure have flown by, unlike how seven innings in a baseball game might go.

We’ve taken in a lot of information over the last few months and this month we dove a little deeper into the research side of PR and marketing. Some may not enjoy this part of the job, but I love it because I’m a statistics nerd. It’s interesting for me to research and learn about what makes up the dynamics of all the people out there who we as PR and marketing professionals are trying to target. The information you find isn’t exactly stats in its truest form, but they are still stats none the less. Just like a Big League manager you’ll need to look at the stats of your team to see how you can create an advantage over the competition.

Back in Month 1 of our PR Master’s Journey we wrote down what we thought we’d learn from each class throughout our program. This was my guess:

·  This class will teach me how to properly identify my market, competition and consumer.

·  I will also learn how to properly target my public relations campaigns to attract the desired client.

·  I will learn how to use demographics and other industry data to analyze my campaign so that I can select the appropriate medium for presenting my campaign to an audience. 

She swings and she’s hits it over the Green Monster, HOMERUN! I was spot on. We learned all of this and so much more. I think this will all be a huge asset in both my professional career and for my own personal promotion. It’s definitely something I will use a lot when running campaigns in order to know who my market is, what they’re looking for and how to most successfully deliver my message to them.  

 Alright, song’s over. Time to get back to the game! Or, um, I mean class. 

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Reflecting on Social Media Metrics & ROI

We’re half way over the rainbow, six classes down & six to go! I have to say this has felt like a very quick six months, but I’m sure it won’t fly by so quickly now that we’re starting our Capstone Projects. This month we continued down the yellow brick road of social media taking, Social Media Metrics & ROI. Which some might feel is the Wicked Witch part of the social media story.

As with every class, I’m going to take a look at what I thought I would learn in this class and see if I was on target or not. Back in month one of the program this is what I thought I’d learn:

·  This class will teach me how to properly use the different forms of metrics that describe the

audience behavior and attitudes that I will experience while using digital media for Public Relations.

·  I will also learn how to apply these metrics to my every day campaigns to create reports.

I’d say I was pretty spot on with this prediction, because I learned all of that plus a ton of other helpful insights and analytics. I have obviously taken other social media classes in both my undergrad & graduate program but this class went much deeper into the metrics and ROI side of things than I have ever gone before. I didn’t realize in some cases, that there were so many analytics available to measure your social media performance.

I feel like I definitely learned a lot from this class that I can use for both personal and professional use. For personal use this will help me have a better understanding on how to promote my own brand and see what my audience is responding to. The things I learned in this class will also be a huge benefit to my professional career. Almost every company uses social media now, but they have a hard time of tracking it and showing how it helps or hurts the business. I will be able to help whatever organization I work to better understand their social media efforts and show them how to put it to use. This month was a little rough in trying to understand everything I was looking at, but I’m actually very glad we had this class and learned what we learned. 

Now let’s continue our travel down the yellow brick road together and see what lies ahead in Market and Consumer Research Analysis.

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October 18, 2004

After 5 hours, 49 minutes, and 471 pitches, the Red Sox outlast the Yankees, 5-4, in Game 5 of the league championship. Boston’s DH David Ortiz, who is the first player in baseball history to hit two walk-off home runs during the postseason, ends the longest game in ALCS history at 1:22 a.m. with a two-out single into center scoring Johnny Damon from second in the 14th inning at Fenway Park.

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Reflecting on Innovative Public Relations Tools & Resources

Another month is in the books for my Master’s Journey through Public Relations. I have to say though; this month was quite different than I had expected. At the beginning of our program we went through and wrote about what we thought we’d learn in each class. This is what I predicted I would learn in Innovative Public Relations Tools & Resources, just by going off of the course description:

· This class will teach me different media techniques & technologies I can use to solve different communication problems

· I will also learn about each platform separately, along with their strengths and pitfalls, & how to properly use them to my advantage

· This class will also give me a better understanding of the audiences I will be targeting my message to over these social platforms

Now that we’re at the end of this class, I don’t feel like I was even close. I honestly feel let down by the information provided to me and the lessons learned. I don’t really feel like I got anything I had expected to out of it.

I feel like I can walk away from this class with a better understanding of some public relations tools and resources that are meaningful and I can use in my future Public Relations career or for personal use. For example, I now get why video is so important in branding and advertising & why I should be using more of it. I also have a little better understanding of which platforms are better for different forms of reaching my audience during a campaign. Unfortunately, in the end, I’m still left with the feeling of wanting or maybe expecting to have gained more from this class than I did.

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I’m soooooo going to miss this guy! Red Sox baseball is never going to be the same without Big Papi. 

Papi’s got jokes.

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Flipboard App Review

When working in the Public Relations & Marketing world, you’re always on the go and you need your information to go with you. So your mobile devices and apps become your go to for news, information, and getting your own content out into the world. If you’re looking for an app that’s great for finding the latest information on any subject, my suggestion is to download Flipboard now. When researching the top PR apps, Flipboard came up almost every time and always with good reviews. 

What Is Flipboard Exactly

Flipboard is basically a social magazine with articles from every news outlet you can possibly think of ready for your consumption. Personally, I find the set-up and use of Flipboard extremely user friendly. The best bonus is that it is completely free, there’s no extra charges later on for add-ons. It’s a great outlet to help you quickly find information on the latest trending topics of your interest, as well as creating your own online magazine from your articles.

Super User Friendly

Once you’ve downloaded the app, you will select the different categories you’re interested in and wish to get news on. It’s as simple as scrolling through some words and clicking on the ones that interest you, as you can see in the first picture. You’ll also notice once you pick something like, let’s say sports, it will add suggestions like baseball and if you select baseball it will start giving you MLB teams and other baseball related topics. You can go back and add to these categories at any time too.

Now it’s time to get searching! You can go directly to any of the categories you chose or just randomly search throughout what’s trending in all of your categories. There’s also the handy search button if you’re looking for something specific. The search part is again, the easy part. When you’re searching, you can flip to the next article, like it, share it, or save it for later to one of your personal boards. The second picture shows just how easy it is to move to the next article once you’ve finished checking out the current one.

Creating Your Online Magazine

If you’re looking to share your news with the world, you only have to add a few small things and you’ll be ready to go. I know what you’re thinking, there isn’t an add-on cost to publish my own work to the app? Nope, it’s totally free. All you have to do to get started is create a magazine page for your brand in Flipboard. Then add the Flipboard social plugin to the sites in which you publish to so you and others can share your article on Flipboard. Be sure to add the “follow me” icon to your pages as well so users can easily find your personal page. Both are featured in the third picture, so you can see what it will look like on your site.

Thoughts On Flipboard 

I think Flipboard is a great app for finding the latest information on whatever it is you’re looking for. It’s definitely an app that I will be using a lot from here on out. As someone who is just starting out in the Public Relations & Marketing world, I think this app will be a big help to me in getting my articles out to a larger audience without any cost to me.

There’s really only one thing I found that was a downfall to Flipboard. It was kind of limited in the options to “share” your own posts or other posts that you with to share with everyone. It gave you the options of Facebook, Twitter, Google +, text message or email. In today’s media world that’s not much to pick from, where’s the option for LinkedIn or even Tumblr? 

Usability on My iPod

I tested Flipboard on both my iPod and my iPhone just to see if there was a difference, but being that they’re both Apple products there was no difference at all. It was totally user friendly regardless of the device. At the current moment I can’t really think of anything I would add to or change about Flipboard, it works pretty perfectly for my type of personal use.

My Wish App 

If I could create an app for use in Public Relations & Marketing it would be one that I could not only find information on, but also be able to post directly to it. More importantly, I would like the ability to be able to post to all of my social media sites within it as well. Something along the lines of combining an app like Hootsuite with Flipboard. When you’re an on the go professional doing most of your work from your mobile device, it would help if you didn’t need three or four apps to get your message online for the public.

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This Mobile App Can Help Bring Baseball & Softball to Communities Worldwide*

When reading about the “Digital Divide,” it made me realize just how much we all depend on the internet now. It actually made me feel like I grew up in the Stone Age because I definitely took the trip to the library to do research for school papers, had a set of encyclopedias in my home, & had good old dial-up internet when we finally did get it. I personally don’t believe the “Digital Divide” will ever truly go away. While companies and communities will work to make it more accessible for people to have good internet or internet at all, I don’t think we can fix this problem everywhere. However, it would be amazing to see the whole world connected.

The organization I chose to create an app for would be Pitch in for Baseball, it is a registered non-profit organization that helps bring baseball and softball to communities around the world that may not be able to support it themselves. They mainly do this through donations of new or used products & fundraisers from the public. I am a huge supporter of efforts like this organization makes because I think it is important for our children to be active & not all communities have the money to support things like little league.

I think an app would be a huge help to this organization since they really only have a website. An app would give the organization a quick and easy way for people to connect with them, find out where they can donate, or learn how they can help. It could also be set up to track your location to give you the donation areas that are closest to you. Since this is an organization that is supported by companies like Wilson Sporting Goods & the New York Yankees this app could also be linked to the MLB AtBat app where it could gain more attention. 

Once my app is set up, I would create a social media campaign entitled “Pitch in for Your Community.” I would promote this campaign across all social media platforms. We could also get an MLB player from each city to help with campaign as well, featuring them helping to grow awareness for the organization and its cause. We could also achieve awareness through print ads in local media outlets or in the MLB game programs bought by fans at games.

*Please note this is not a real app, this article is for a school assignment.

References:

Cowles, C. (2007). Charity gives kids gift of baseball. Retrieved September 14, 2016, from http://m.mlb.com/news/article/1970690//  

Pitch In For BaseBall – Welcome To Pitch In For Baseball. (n.d.). Retrieved September 14, 2016, from http://pifb.org/

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New England Patriots guard Joe Andruzzi joined his brothers, Jim and Bill (right), both New York City firefighters, in front of their family home on Staten Island on Sept. 16, 2001. (Michael J. LeBrecht II)

GALLERY: Remembering 9/11

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“Never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game.” – Babe Ruth

Hi! My name is Sarah Leo. Thank you for coming to learn a little more about me and my path through marketing & public relations.

I was born in a small town outside of Pittsburgh, PA. While I very much love my city, I moved to Florida in 2004. Who wouldn’t take this view over snow?

When I say I love sports it’s not just an expression. It’s actually more of an obsession. Baseball is my life, all day every day. 

So when I decided to further my education & get my Bachelors I knew it was time to follow my dreams of a job in sports. Hopefully, one day, being a General Manager.

My educational background starts at Full Sail University, where I got my Bachelors in Sports Marketing & Media. I’m now obtaining my Master’s degree in Public Relations to help further my career in communications. 

While at Full Sail I gained a ton of experience working for companies like the Central Florida Sports Commission, the NCAA, & WWE NXT. Since graduation I’ve worked for the Legacy Soccer Foundation, the South Bend Cubs & the Orlando Magic.

My work background included marketing, social media, public relations and media design. I used all of that prominently while I was with the South Bend Cubs in their Inaugural Season in 2015. I look to further my career by using all of this with your company. 

If you’re looking for a determined, self-driven, passionate person who truly loves what she does & can help your organization grow in marketing and public relations please contact me. I know I can knock it out of the park.

 Feel free to contact me through any of these sites: 

Twitter

Gmail

Tumblr

Wix

Facebook

LinkedIn