Please forgive the awful Wallace and Gromit themed-title...
Frequent readers (if there are any!) of this blog will have read about my recent invitation to a graduate recruitment day in a top PR agency in London. If you didn’t, then that particular blog entry is here.
At the time I didn’t think it was appropriate to reveal what agency it was (in case it jeopardised my chances etc) but now seems a good time to write about my experience. I was invited for a position of Account Assistant at Eulogy!, which is a great PR agency in West London.
9.30 – The day begins with an introduction to some of the team, plus a brief overview of what the day will entail. Everyone was really nice, which I was surprised about; I had built up this preconception of everyone being really cut-throat and competitive (although maybe that’s what happens when you watch too much of The Apprentice!)
9.45 – We were 'gently introduced' to the day with a quiz. I do enjoy a pub quiz, but this was really hard, and covered various topics including Politics, Sport and scandal, Entertainment (amongst others). Here’s a sample of some of the questions (that I could remember)..
Q1. Emma Watson has recently replaced Kate Winslet as the face of which make-up company?
Q2. Which Channel 4 show followed the daily lives of people in the Notting Hill area of London?
Q3. Who has politician Ed Miliband recently become engaged with?
Q4. Which hashtag has Lady Gaga used to describe her followers on Twitter?
Q5. Adele’s new album recently set a record for sales. What is it called?
Answers at the bottom of the post, no cheating!
10:30 - The 12 of us are split into 3 groups of 4 to work on a client pitch / presentation for a real life client that Eulogy! is currently working with. I am in a group with Omiros (whose name I struggled to pronounce – sorry!), Lucy and Terri. (links to their Twitter accounts).
We were given a tricky B2B brief about a company who take smart phone apps and makes them work on all the usual platforms (eg iPhone, Blackberry, Android, Symbian and Windows 7 Mobile) which saves around 75 percent on development costs.
The brief required us to think of a creative method to make the service seem desirable to the relevant target audiences (eg trade press, mobile influencers, CEO’s and buyers of companies who develop mobile apps) as well as considering a consumer market.
Doing client briefs isn’t a new experience (I’ve had to do quite a few as part of my PR course) but we were only given an hour to generate ideas for a 15-20 minute presentation, with a 10 minute Q&A session to follow. No pressure then!..
Our team worked well; and we generated some good ideas including a blogger event, a consumer focused campaign idea of using different ‘platforms’ (such as tube platforms, and Nelson’s Column) as well as features for trade press and a media pack (based upon a cube which comes apart to visually show a 75 percent reduction). I am chosen to write up the presentation onto flipchart paper, which gives me the chance to “show off” my scrawly handwriting and my questionable drawing skills. The rest of the group seem happy with the drawings, which is good!
The pitch / presentation goes well I think, and despite a bit of a grilling on the Q&A, the members of Eulogy! are seemingly happy with what we’ve come up with in such a short time. Phew!
12.45 - We are released from the building to find lunch. Our presentation team ambles off in search of food, eventually choosing a branch of Pret A Manger. I opt for a BLT sandwich, which was quite nice, but expectedly expensive. The weather is nice, and we sit in some park round the corner from the offices.
2.00 – After an extended lunch break we have the final part of the day. Still in our groups, we are rotated between a writing test, an interview and a chat with the Eulogy! team about what it’s like to work there.
First up is the 45 minute writing test, which is a press release about another live client; this time it’s a design website service which allows small businesses to have access to a library of 400,000 design templates and saves them loads of money on expensive designers. It’s also worth pointing out that we were only allowed to use Wordpad (which means no word count, nor any spelling and grammar checks!) and had no internet access to research this company (we were given a list of facts).
I think this part of the day was maybe my weakest feature; I couldn’t think of a really ‘jazzy’ title for the release; and when I read it back, it did seem a little dull. Still, not bad for 45 minutes effort.
3.30 – After a massive wait (in which I read most of the papers in reception from cover to cover) it’s interview time. When I think of interviews I am always drawn to the semi-finals of The Apprentice (where the candidates get grilled by Lord Sugar’s best friends) and am gearing myself up for my CV to be shredded into water size droplets and fired back into my face with a pressure washer.
Thankfully it was quite a laid back, chilled out sort of interview (they’re the best sort in my opinion) where I was asked about why I chose PR, what my favourite recent PR campaign is (I spoke about the Baby Gaga ice cream), and what relevance my course has had in relation to the recruitment day. Overall, I think that went well.
4.00 - We are given a short presentation by a couple of the Eulogy! team about the benefits of working with them. They speak at length about the legendary Christmas parties (of which I am hugely jealous!) and the general atmosphere, which from my experience of the day is quite fun and enjoyable.
4.30 – We are joined by most of the Eulogy! staff for drinks and nibbles, which is a good chance to network and say ‘hello’ to them all; even the CEO pops in for a cheeky bottle of Corona, which I think shows that everyone really does get on! I also use this chance to swap details with some the people also on the recruitment day (hi you guys!). I stay till about 5.30ish (trying carefully to be neither the first nor last to leave) and head off to catch up with some of my London-based friends for drinks.
I’ve just had an email back today saying that I unfortunately was unsuccessful for the position of Account Assistant. Eulogy! have offered me a 1-2 week work placement (an offer which I hope to take up) so although I haven’t got a job, I can still get something positive from the experience (more PR experience).
Anyway, I’ve gone over 1200 words for this blog (words that should be being typed into my dissertation), so here’s the answers to the earlier quiz..
1. Lancome
2. ‘Seven Days’
3. Justine Thornton
4. #monsters or #littlemonsters
5. ‘21’
Until next time (which will probably be after my dissertation is done),
Paul
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