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PORTFOLIO [email protected] Tel: 07885453597
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Cassie greaves portfolio

May 26, 2015

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CassieLorene86

A portfolio of my work.
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Page 1: Cassie greaves portfolio

PORTFOLIO

[email protected]: 07885453597

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Introduction – p.3

Skill Set Key – p.4

Curriculum Vitae – p.5

Wicked Campers – p.6 – 1About Wicked Camper – p.7Wicked Experience – p.8Sponsorship –p. 9 - 12Event Management p.13-15

Cumbria Tourism – p.16 – 21My role at Cumbria Tourism – p.17Copy Writing – p.18-21

Social Media – p. 22-24

UK Progress CtK – p.25 -29My Role – p.26Team Meetings – p.27Team Work – p.28Presentations – p.29

UK Progress Press Releases – p.30 - 32

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Name – Cassie Greaves

D.O.B – December 25, 1986

Degree – BA (hons) Public Relations – expected 2:1

I am a final year public relations undergraduate at the University of Central Lancashire. I started University in

2007 on a combined honours course, and studied public relations, journalism and creative writing. I was unsure of

what I wanted to do but I knew that I enjoyed writing, and that I wanted a career where I would be challenged and

no two days would be the same. After the first year I realised that PR was for me as it involves a variety of

activities including writing, event management and crisis management.

Throughout the course I have learned about both theoretical and practical aspects of public relations. I have also

gained experience of working in an agency style role through the UK Progress module; of working in a marketing

role through a work placement and of working in an in-house PR department through independently gained work

experience.

This portfolio will demonstrate how I developed a range of skills through work experience and through my time at

UCLan.

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Writing

Communication

Social media

IT

Organisation

Time management

Team Working

4Research

Presentation

Creativity

Strategic thinking

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Career Achievements

Cumbria Tourism PR Department

Work Experience – February 2011 –

present

• Writing press releases and distributing them

to the media. Resulting in publication.

•Writing web content for a partner website.

•Writing Twitter updates.

Wicked Campers

Marketing Assistant

• Organised events including a comedy night

and University Market Day’s.

• Market Research including online, surveys

and focus groups.

• Negotiating sponsorship deals and cross

promotional deals with individuals and

organisations.

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See appendix one for clearer view

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Marketing Assistant

July 2009 – March 2010

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Wicked Campers is an international budget camper-van hire company aimed at backpackers. Wicked is based in Australia but has depots all over the world including New Zealand, Europe, South Africa, North America and Canada.

Wicked Campers is famous for the unique graffiti designs on the camper-vans. It is very popular amongst young backpackers.

Wicked was founded by mechanic John Webb in 2001. He started with a handful of vans and now has over 900 in Australia and over 2000 worldwide.

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The Marketing Assistant position was a sandwich placement advertised through Futures. It offered the chance to work for an international organisation in Brisbane, Australia. To apply for the job I sent my CV to Wicked Campers and attended a group interview, this was conducted via video link. This was a new experience for me as the interviewer was not in the same room, I feel I did well in the interview and answered all the questions asked.

I was successful in getting the job and so moved to Australia for the duration. This took some adapting, as I went on my own and did not know anybody out there. This was a good opportunity to become independent and to learn to adapt to a new environment. I organised my own accommodation in Australia, I moved in with two other girls who I became close friends with.

My role at Wicked Campers was a ‘Wicked Evangelist’ or a Marketing Assistant. There wasn’t a structure within the department, all team members were equal and reported to the owner, John Webb. This was a good working environment as we worked together as a team to come up with ideas for campaigns to promote Wicked. We were often given free reign to try out our ideas and were responsible for judging whether they were successful or not. I developed team working skills and was able to work to my own initiative.

Some of the highlights of working for Wicked Campers included;

• Organising sponsorship deals• Planning a comedy event• Market research

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Wicked Campers receives many request for sponsorship deals and it is the marketing teams job to sift through them and present them to Founder and Director John Webb. John would then approve them and we would organise them.

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Communication Objectives: Anny Chih is a travel blogger who was also a top 50 finalist for the Best Job in the World. We sponsored her to travel up the East Coast and blog about her journey. In return Anny blogged about us and spread positive word of mouth. Objectives:-

• To utilise the Internet to spread positive word of mouth and promote the company.• To generate awareness of how Wicked Campers supports young travellers.

What I did: I was heavily involved with the sponsorship agreement and was able to develop my skills and learn new ones. My responsibilities included:

• Liaising with Anny over the terms of the sponsorship. • Liaising with the Wicked depot and mechanics to organise a van and with the artist to paint the van. • Monitoring Anny’s blog to ensure that she was meeting the requirements of the sponsorship arrangement. • I wrote some content regarding the sponsorship for Wicked’s website.

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Communication Objectives: Tiesto is a famous DJ who was performing one show in Brisbane. We painted two vans promoting the show and sent them off to tour the East Coast. We also featured a competition on Wicked’s website to win tickets to the show. Tiesto featured Wicked’s logo on his website, the cross promotion was good publicity for Wicked. Objectives:-

• To gain positive word of mouth by association with Tiesto.• To increase numbers to the website through the

competition.• To promote Wicked Campers through the logo on Tiesto’s

website.

What I did: I was given quite a lot of responsibility for this, this included:-

• Liaising with Tiesto’s manager to negotiate the sponsorship terms.• Liaising with the mechanics, depot staff and the sales team to

ensure the van was ready for rental and only rented on the East Coast.

• Liaising with the artist to get the van painted.11

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Communication Objectives: The Music Outback Foundation is a charitable organisation that educates indigenous children through music and the arts. Wicked Campers donated five vans to the organisation for the children to paint. The objectives of this were:

• To generate the awareness of the support that Wicked Campers gives to Australia.

• To promote positive word of mouth.• To help build a good relationship with the Aboriginal

community.

What I did: My responsibilities included:-

• Liaising with the foundation to ensure that health and safety issues with the paint were resolved.

• Liaising with our mechanics, the depot staff and the sales team to ensure the transportation of vans to Western Australia.

• I also wrote a press release about the partnership.

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See appendix two for a clearer view

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Communication Objective: Wicked Campers sponsored a local comedian on his tour and so he offered to put on a free show for us. We decided to invite agents and backpackers along and turn it into an event. Objectives:-

• Promote Wicked Campers to the agents so that they in turn would promote Wicked to customers.

• Promote Wicked Campers to travellers.• Increase morale amongst staff members.

What I did: I worked with fellow team member Sam to organise the event. My responsibilities included:-

• Location scouting – We decided on local backpacker bar, Birdee Num Nums as backpackers were likely to be there on the night.

• Negotiated price for food and drink with bar managers.

• I organised free accommodation for the comedian and his agent at a local hostel.

• On the night I carried out marketing for Wicked Campers.

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Communication Objectives: Brisbane was holding an event to welcome International Students. This was a market day where businesses have a stall promoting their services. As Wicked Campers is a company that likes to stand out we required a stall that stood out. We were able to secure having a van on site so that visitors could take a tour and see what was on offer. Objectives:-

• To promote Wicked Campers to international students and raise awareness of the student deals.

• To get email addresses for the mail out list via a competition.

What I did: I was given the lead on this project so it was a great opportunity to develop my skills. My responsibilities included:-

• Liaising with the depot to book a new van that had been painted by an Indigenous artist. This was to promote the fact that Wicked is truly Australian.

• Making sure that we had plenty of fun giveaways including bottle opener key rings and caps. • Setting up the stall and making it look appealing in order to attract visitors.• Talking to visitors and giving tours of the van.• Setting up a mail out list from all of the competition entries.• I asked a friend to assist me on the day as she speaks several languages. This was useful as she was able to

assist people more thoroughly who did not speak English.

The event was a success with over 1000 visitors to the stall.

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Work Experience

February 2011 - Present

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Cumbria Tourism is the tourism board for Cumbria and works in all aspects of tourism and destination management. I applied for work experience in the PR department as I felt this would be a great place to gain some experience in public relations and to see what it would be like to work in-house. To apply for work experience I sent a copy of my CV and a covering letter to the main email address. I was then contacted and invited for an interview with the PR Manager, Ellis Butcher, to discuss what I could offer them and what they could offer me.

I have been going in one day a week since February and have been given the opportunity to write press releases, web content, Twitter updates and to attend a meeting to discuss a PR stunt. I have also had one of my press releases published in a local paper.

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Communication Objective: Press release enable organisations to send news that they want published to the media. I was asked to write a press release to promote a range of training courses that were available for local food and drink businesses..

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See appendix 3 for a clearer view.

What I did: I researched into the training programmes and the wrote a press release about them. I then sent the release out to local newspapers and the local media. This was a great opportunity to develop my writing skills. The release was published by a local paper. It felt very rewarding to see my words published

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What I did: Writing a ‘top ten’ list involves quite a lot of research, this is usually done using the internet, brochures and by calling organisations directly and asking for information. The writing has to quite concise, I have to pull together the important points and the unique selling points to put into a small paragraph in order sell the event.

I also have to be quite creative as some events may not be that interesting and so I have to use my writing skills to make the event seem more appealing.

I often have to use my initiative too, as there may not be enough events to make up a ‘top ten’ list. When this is the case I research into activities that may fit the theme.

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See appendix 4 for a clearer view

Communication Objective: During my work experience I have been asked to write several ‘top ten lists’. These are written so that the press office is prepared for when a journalist calls up asking for information on upcoming events.

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On one of my days at Cumbria Tourism I was asked to help out the online team by proof reading and writing some content for a new website, www.lakedistricthistorichouses.co.uk.For the proof reading I had to make sure that I had a good attention to detail and look through the content thoroughly to check for any mistakes. To do this I had to refresh my memory on grammar and so used UCLan’s guide to apostrophes.

To write the content I had to research into the historic houses I was writing about, I did this by visiting their website and reading their brochures. One of the articles I wrote was about interesting stories relating to the houses, to do this I had to conduct some in-depth internet research using Google, Wikipedia and online forums.The actual writing had to be concise and hold all the interesting and important information in order to attract people to the houses.

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Communication Objective: Social media is used widely by organisations to promote events within the company. Cumbria Tourism uses Twitter to promote local events and businesses. They uses social oomph to write many tweets at once and schedule the updates throughout the week.

What I did: One of my responsibilities at Cumbria Tourism is to write enough tweets to last a few days. To do this I research into local events and ask members of the team if there is anything that they would like promoting. I also tweet about members of Cumbria Tourism. Tweeting took some getting used to as you only have 140 characters to play with. This means picking the most important and interesting bits of information and turning them into an interesting and easily understood sentence.

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What I did: I created a flyer (on the left) asking customers to blog, tweet, write about or record their experiences. In return we gave them 20% of their next booking.

This was an effective idea as we were able to put links to the positive tales on Wicked’s website and they acted as testimonials. They also helped with Google optimization as the blogs came up in search results when Wicked Campers was searched.

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Communication Objective: Whilst at Wicked Campers I came up with the idea of utilising social media in order to spread positive word of mouth.

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My role within the CtK PR team was the Account Manager. I was the communicator amongst the group. It was my responsibility to liaise with our contact at CtK, Nicola Chester to arrange meetings, update her with our progress and ensure that the work we carried out was in keeping with CtK’s organisation goal. I also had to keep the team informed about all communication between myself and Nicola, I usually did this via email.

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As the communicator in the team I took responsibility for contacting CtK’s feeder schools to organise group interviews for our research. I did this by phoning the schools and explaining the situation, I followed the conversation with an email so that they had it in writing.

I also called, emailed and visited local businesses to source prizes for the Christmas fair.

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Communication objective: As part of the UK Progress module we had several meetings. We had a weekly team meeting to discuss progress and plan what still needed to be done. This have us a chance to catch up and see where everybody was at.

What I did: I attended the majority of meetings and contributed ideas to the team.

Communication objective: We also had regular meetings with Nicola Chester to update her on our progress and discuss future assignments. This also reassured Nicola that we were working hard towards meetings our objectives.

What I did: I arranged and attended all of the meetings. I also contributed to the meetings.

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Communication Objective: For the UK Progress module we worked in teams to provide PR advice to a real client and come up with a campaign that helps meet the clients organisational goal.

What I did: I worked as the Account Manager in my team, together we came up with a campaign to try and help increase admissions into CtK. As a team we met up on regular occasions to brain storm over ideas on how to meet this goal. As a team member I listened to other people’s ideas and contributed my own. I came up with the idea of holding a Christmas fair and then worked with my team to put it together. This involved discussing ideas for stalls and working together to source prizes. We also had group projects to carry out, we often split the work up and then met to put it all together. I always made sure that my parts were done in plenty of time for the meeting so that I would not let any team members down.

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Throughout the course of the module we carried out three presentations.

Communication Objectives: Our first presentation was in front of people on our course, our lecturer Chris Shaw and CtK’s Head teacher Anthony Perry. The objective of this was to show our work so far and to present our objectives and goals.What I did: I helped create the PowerPoint presentation by creating the slides for the section that I would be discussing. I then helped to go through and put all of the slides together. I wrote the content for my section and helped others with theirs. I then presented my section to the audience.

Communication Objectives: Our second presentation was to discuss our research on prospectuses to the prospectus committee. This aim of this was to encourage the committee to design a new prospectus taking our ideas on board.

What I did: I helped to conduct the research and design the presentation.

The third presentation was relaying the first presentation to the board of governors of CtK. This was to show them what we had found in our research. This was a good experience as the presentation as they were really interested in our results, it also showed us that the school were happy with the work that we had done.

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We were asked to write a press release for Jobs4Grads website about our experiences in preparing for a career. I decided to write about how many employers require two years work experience from graduates, I have discovered this as I have been looking for work.

The second press releases focuses on good practice in UK Progress. I wrote about the Christmas fair we organised and how the local community got involved.

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See appendix 5

See appendix 6

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For the third press release I decided to write about something I have experience whilst writing my dissertation. This is the amount of students who use the internet to conduct research

The final press release is one that I wrote for my work experience at Cumbria Tourism. It is about how a farm in the Lake District has ‘twinned’ with a farm in Japan.

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See appendix 7

See appendix 8