As burgeoning PR professionals, we need to stay updated with relevant industry information. Reading, listening to podcasts and keeping track of best practices can go a long way in setting your knowledge apart from the crowd. Here’s a list of 5 resources to help build and maintain industry expertise.
Hootsuite is a great resource for managing social media, and its website is also host to a world of information. The blog is full of social media strategy, news, experiments, templates & guides.
Strategy: What Is the Line App? Everything Brands Need to Know in 2021, 10 TikTok Tricks You Need to Know (Beginners Start Here!)
Experiments: Does Saying “Link in Bio” Affect Your Instagram Post Performance? (Experiment), Experiment: Do Tweets with Links Get Less Engagement and Less Reach?
News: The Case for Letting Your Social Media Managers Get Weird, Good Social Marketers Just Prove Their Success. Great Ones Do This.
Templates & Guides: Instagram Followers Checklist, Social Media Strategy Template
2. “Made to Stick” by Chip Heath and Dan Heath
While this book may have started as an assignment for class, I quickly realized how much it would teach me going into the public relations profession. What makes an idea stick in the minds of consumers? It’s an age-old question and one that we as PR professionals are always seeking to answer. This book breaks that idea down into attainable characteristics and gives you tips that will take you far into your career.
Spin Sucks is seeking to try and integrate the work of public relations with the greater media industry as a whole. As the line between marketing, advertising, and digital media continues to blur, we want to find a way to stand out. Offering an episode a week, showrunner Gini Dietrich offers insights and knowledge from her own career to enhance professional development.
Stay up-to-date with the latest social media, social marketing, digital strategy and content marketing trends. This space also allows for networking in the PR and digital marketing realm and even allows for tip submissions. With social media constantly changing, understanding the current environment is extremely important in creating content and building strong relationships. When subscribing to Social Media Today you will receive the latest social media news as well as trends and tips in the industry.
5. Follow PR Pros on Social media
Connecting with PR experts is easier than ever before thanks to social media. Twitter and LinkedIn are great ways to quickly gain more insight into the industry. Valerie Simon is an experienced marketing executive at a large healthcare consulting firm. She also started the hashtag #PRStudChat, which answers questions asked by people studying PR. This is a great resource for students who have quick questions related to the field. Steve Farnsworth is the CMO of cPacket Networks, a tech security company in the bay area. He was also named one of Forbes’s top 50 marketing influencers. He posts regularly about news and updates within the PR industry, as well as things you can do to step up your PR game.