Promoting a TV Show

Let's imagine that I just got hired as a PR in order to promote a new TV show that we will call The Show. The first step that I would take is to check what will be the target audience of The Show. The target audience will be those with the age ranging from mid 20's to 60's due to the hours that the program will be (9:30 pm); also the content of the show will have some jokes that teenagers aren't suppose to hear and that older people will understand.

The Show is similar to Modern Family, a big diverse family that find themselves in funny situations every episode. Then I would try to reach an agreement with some of the big broadcasting channels so the show can be aired in their PrimeTime.

Then I would create a Facebook page and a Twitter account in order to promote The Show. In those two pages many videos from the show's episodes will be released as teaser. Another move that I would make is to get someone famous to write good reviews about the program so that the public will want to watch the episode because of all the good things that were said about The Show. Of course ads will be running during the day so that people will watch it later.

Hopefully, word of mouth will increase and people will want to watch episode after episode. Also let the past episodes available on iTunes for people to download, if they could not watch it at the show's regular time. If everything goes right, the show will be a huge success and many seasons will be aired and the program will continue for many years.

Rio de Janeiro, December 4th, 1990

Stop the Slaughter of Children in Brazil by Kathy King Wouk

On December 4th, 1990, the day that my sister was born, Kathy King Wouk wrote an article on the NY Times showing one of the problems that Rio de Janeiro still faces 22 years later; the abduction of people is common on the "favelas". The authorities, sometimes, try to find the bodies only when there is a huge movement and protest of the population of the neighborhood where the body was abducted. In the article, Wouk expresses her wrath by stating impressive number of how many kids are living in the streets and how many are abducted. She also writes about the terrible experience that a mother of two sons lived when two, possibly, policemen went into her house and simply took her sons to the police station for "interrogation". The mother tried to contact the police chief in order to find her kids. However, the slowest police service of Brazil "act" and only after 24 hours one can report that someone is missing. It was too late for the mother, the "death squad" was faster than the police; and unfortunately the mother got the news that her kids were dead.

Four Models of Public Relations

The four models of PR was created by James E. Grunin, who identified four ways that professionals in the public relations area could use in order to give information to the public.

The first was is the Press Agentry/Publicity, it is a one-way type of communication where the main purpose is "to manipulate public opinion and behavior" (Media Now, 300), which means that the PR team will only give a certain information in order for the public to react in the way that they want to.

The second way is Public Information/Journalism, which is also an one-way type of communication; this way of communication has the characteristic of being the information that is spread out through different media channels with the responsibility of being general information that the public should know.

The third model is Two-Way Asymmetric; as the name already tells us, this is a two-way type of communication. The purpose of this model is to make the public's mind and know how they will react to the information that was given to them.

Finally, the last model is the Two-Way Symmetric, which is also a two-way communication type. This model seeks a win-win situation, where the PR team will research the target audience and send the information that is beneficial/important for them; this model also evaluate "how the public and the company see their relationship" (Media Now, 306), which is usually beneficial for both.

Key Elements of a Successful PR

Public Relations is all about communication. If the PR of a company does not know how to address correctly to the target audience, the company will suffer with bad publicity. In some cases, the PR team might say something that has a double meaning. In order to have a successful PR, a company must know its target audience, know what to tell the public (if they should "leak" and important information or not), know how to communicate with the targeted audience, and use tools such as, propaganda, podcasts, webcasts, and live blogs in order to "keep in touch" with the public. By doing so, a company will increase its value, and more investors will want to put their money in the company, once the public is happy by what they are doing.

The link below written by Arthur Catalanello gives us a few examples of good, bad and ugly PR made by some companies and people.
Recent Examples of PR – The Good, The Bad & The Ugly

Functions and Specialities of Public Relations

First of all, let me start by citing the book on what is public relations so we know what it is. PR "are organized activities intended to favorably influence the public" (Media Now, 282). This means that PR is used in order to show something that the viewer will like, meaning that they will be satisfied with the influence that the activity make with the public. A great example of PR is when the president goes into his stage and addresses to the people in order to announce a measure or cool down a hard situation. The number one function of the Public Relations department is to "advise and counsel the organization's management on communications questions affecting its public" (Media Now, 298).

It is normal to see in the business world, CEOs addressing to its investors when the company's stock price starts to drop or when there will be a major change in the company, such as change of directors or opening a new store. Some of the functions of PR are: publicity or media relations, promotion or selling, community relations, government relations, public information, special event, employee relations, issues management, reputation management, crisis communications, and lobbying.

Big companies are backed up by really good PR departments that can ease out a situation when a problem arises. For instance, BP ( the oil company) had a lot of problems when the spilling of oil happened in the Gulf of Mexico; after that happened, the PR team of the company made several statements acknowledging the mistake that the company made, but also stating that the company was spending a lot of time, money and effort in order to fix the problem as soon as possible.

Taiwan on May 23 1992

Taiwan Votes Patent Law

On the day that I was born, Taiwan passed an important law for its copyrights security. Before, Taiwan did not have any law preventing patents to be stolen or copied. However, on May 23 1992, the parliament passed the Patent Law, which prevents people and companies from copying the work that Taiwanese have done, and vice-versa. If anyone or any entity breaks this law, it could be facing a 7 years sentence, as well as an up to $18,000 fine. For the entity or person that was affect by the piracy, a damage security can be seek and up to $40,000 can be received. This law is very important because before Asian countries were known to not have any law against piracy, which many of the great ideas that Western companies were using could have been pirated from an Asian company or person. The law was passed due to the pressure that the U.S was making in order for Taiwan to prevent piracy.

21 years and 5 months ago in Rio de Janeiro

WHAT'S DOING IN; Rio de Janeiro by James Brooke

Christ the Redeemer 

One day after my birthdate, May 24 1992, James Brooke wrote and article about the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development

from June 3 to 14 in Rio de Janeiro, the city that I live. Brooke tells us that Rio was investing heavily on being a green city; constructing 20 miles of sidewalks along the beach from Copacabana to Barra da Tijuca. Also, Rio was investing on safety for its population and tourists, who were increasing every year. Brooke gives tips for the unwarned tourists that believe nothing will happen to them. Rio was a city where crime was in almost every cornet, from pickpockets to kidnaps. He continues the article by giving some tips on what to do while staying in Rio; many cultural and exciting things are available from people from every range of age. Hiking, museums, Botanical Garden, concerts are available in one of the most beautiful cities in the world. He continues by saying which hotels are good to stay and also which nightclubs are good for the young tourist that want some nightlife action after sightseeing the entire day.

UN Conference on Environment and Development June 1992

Conversation with Carlo Vittorini

Carlo Vittorini (Media Life Magazine)

Today in class we had a surprise visit from Carlo Vittorini. Mr. Vittorini worked for more than 50 years in the magazine business. Since his high-school years he had the dream of becoming an editor. He graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, and right after graduation he got his first job in which he learned the fundamentals of the magazine business.

Mr. Vittorini continued his conversation with the class by stating a life lesson that caught my attention. He stated, “Life is a learning thing, you must pay attention to the thing that will have an affect in your life”. Then he continued by saying that later in his early career he switched jobs and got hired as a copyrighter, which he enjoyed. Later in the conversation he shared with us more of his wisdom. He stated, “You can develop the ingenuity to solve problems in yourself”. He said this in order to open our minds that anyone can develop overtime the ability to any problem. Some people are born with that quality, but others have to learn and acquire it.

Later in his career, Mr. Vittorini was hired to work in the Parade magazine. When he entered the magazine the volume of circulation was about 19 million. Twenty years later, when he left the magazine, the volume of circulation had more than doubled. It all started when Mr. Newhouse invited him in 1977 to “build Parade from a tacky-looking insert” (Lindorff, Media Life Megazine).

After 20 years working for the magazine, Vittorini decided it was time for him to set back and relax. So he retired at the age of 70. I could notice how passionate he was when talking about his accomplishments and what he did to make Parade magazine famous. He end the conversation by saying, “”Be committed to what you are doing, things will not come overnight”.

Field Trip to Bloomberg TV

Last Tuesday, October 8, I attempted a field trip to Bloomberg TV. I was extremely excited to feel how a normal day is in one of the best news’ providers. Our tour guide was Joseph Valenti, a passionate for media and interesting person that taught us a lot of things. The field trip was one of my top 5 moments as a college student so far; to meet and see people that love what they do was breathtaking, which brought more confusion to my confused mind on which path to follow after graduation. Below I will list the top 10 moments of the field trip:

1.     Syndication Control Room – inside the control room is where the action behind the scenes happens. Producer, director and technical director control camera angle, commercial break, and lights so that every second of the show is perfect.

2.     Control Room –in the control room those that work there are working non stop while the show is on. They talk to each other in order to fix what might go wrong or make the good coverage even better. 

3.     Bloomberg’s Values – Mr. Valenti told us that the main goal of the company is to provide information to their audience as well as to the public in general

4.     No Google Research – one of the key factors for the success of the company is that the workers to not made their research relying on search engines. Bloomberg has many field reporters that provide information quickly. Also an enormous database stores all the information that Bloomberg has.

5.     Executive Producer of Charlie Rose’s Show – we had to chance to have a quick talk with the Executive Producer of Charlie Rose’s Show and she gave us an essential tip when entering into a job, find a mentor when you get into the field so that you can learn and meet people that can help you in the future.

6.     Meeting Drew Beebe – we also met Drew Beebe, a producer and shot editor. He gave us the 5 principles of shooting like an editor, which was very helpful for my new media major colleagues. Movement, duration (10 seconds), variety, use of tripod, and audio are the 5 principles that one must use in order to have the perfect shoot of a scene.

7.     Meeting Christine – later in our tour we met Christine, who is a free lancer meaning that she can do other things like going on a tour and when she gets back she will have her sit in the building. She gave us a few tips on editing for example, find the audio first so that it makes easier to make any changes.

8.     BusinessWeek Magazine – we could see how the editors of the BusinessWeek Magazine put the pages together. They put all the content in the wall and they start to move the pages around in order to make the perfect magazine for the week with the most important news of the business world.

9.     Informal Work Environment – I had the feeling that in Bloomberg the work environment is more informal. People were not all in suit and tie, they were more relax, business casual dressing style. There is an enjoyable food courts were the workers can take a break and have a quick talk with co-workers and relax a little bit.

10. Joseph Valenti Tips – throughout the tour Mr. Valenti was sharing with us his experience. He told us that if you do something you love, you would not stop doing it and do it with more pleasure. He also told us that in Bloomberg one could switch jobs, but first prove that he can do the work. He told us that in order to be successful one must know every platform for editing due to the rapid change of technology. For instance, you cannot avoid one platform because you think it is too difficult to work with.

Those were the top 10 moments of the tour we made to Bloomberg. However, there were many other things that were really interesting. For example, the layout of the website and the TV shows is made by the graphic design team that consists of many people working non-stop in order to improve the design. It was an amazing experience that I witness, I am happy that I went there; even though it brought more confusion to my head on what path I want to follow after graduation but it is a good confusion, it gave me more options.