With the world now buzzing with constant social media and instant electronic mail, communications management is more important to businesses than ever. To learn more about it we spoke with Evelina Jankauskyte, Communications Manager of FiveSquid.
What is a typical day for you?
Every morning starts with a fifteen minute planning meeting. We outline the urgent tasks and go over progress for outstanding projects. After the team meeting I go over emails from the press inbox (freelance journalists tend to send requests after office hours) and prepare content for press. Once the urgent tasks are done, I regroup with the team and work on the content strategy for the blog, company newsletter and social media accounts. Having consistent communication across all channels is vital. I usually end the day with a few meetings with the directors or compiling performance reports for marketing campaigns.
What motivated you to get into the world of business?
It’s very fast-paced, especially if you work in a startup. What got me initially interested in a PR Executive job role was the diversity of responsibilities working in-house. Before joining a company, you should be able to look at the business and see where you could add value; would you change the design, website copy, product offering or? Once you know your work makes a difference to business growth, you become very results driven, which in turn is very rewarding.
Who inspires you?
Being responsible for communication output of a whole business can be tough. When in doubt, I always turn to the company’s customers. Whether it’s for feedback or just to get ideas for the type of things they want to see, I always get ideas I can work with.
What do you know now that you wish you could tell yourself when you were just starting out?
Being employed is not just about doing stuff for the company you work for, you have to step back and evaluate what you have learned, developed and need to develop. If you haven’t developed, you have to make sure you speak to your line manager and take on projects that will challenge your skill set. I used to be very bad at doing PowerPoint presentations, so every month I was put in charge of putting together PowerPoint slide decks to evaluate communication performance.
What are some of the challenges you face managing company-wide communications?
Tailoring communication for different demographics to ensure campaigns get maximum reach is difficult. One PR campaign can last six months, making sure that communication is consistent even when produced for different demographics requires careful planning. If we run a nationwide survey, we create content for the media, our customers, investors and social media, but the challenge is always to ensure key messaging stay the same.
How has social media altered your role in recently?
Working for a consumer technology brand means you have to be active online. In the last two months we’ve been working on developing a social media reputation strategy, which focuses on how the brand should communicate with its customers and public across different social media platforms. I personally love following journalists on twitter as it lets me keep on top of industry news and I can keep an eye on potential press opportunities.
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