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Yesterday, I had the amazing opportunity to participate in the sixth-annual “PRofessional Connection,” hosted by the Drewry Chapter of the Public Relations Student Society of America (PRSSA), an award-winning student group at the University of Georgia. The chapter, which operates through the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication, is  unique in that it’s the largest chapter of any within PRSSA, a pre-professional public relations organization made up of more than than 285 chapters nationwide. The Drewry Chapter has not only recently won an award for “Student Organization of the Year” on the UGA campus, but has also been recognized for making strides in bringing diversity and top-notch programs to both the national PRSSA organization, as well as to the PR industry in general.

In case you’re unfamiliar with “PRofessional Connection,” I’ll get you up to speed on it, and tell you why you should go next year.)

What is "PRofessional Connection," in a nutshell? It's a great networking experience for both PR students and industry professionals. There ya go.

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PRofessional Connection is first and foremost a networking event that brings several dozen PR industry professionals to the UGA campus for the purpose of teaching students about the field and scouting for potential work opportunities. Companies are always looking for the brightest students as prospective interns and potential employees, and students from the Grady College of Journalism and Mass Communication are always on the lookout for internships. It’s practically a match made in heaven.

Each year, the pros take the lead on teaching valuable workshops and panel discussions on working as a professional in the field of PR, as students ask thoughtful questions and take notes. I had the awesome opportunity to serve as a panelist for a discussion about what a new college graduate should generally expect working in the industry the first six months after graduation. It was an engaging conversation between students and professionals.

This also was the first year that a career fair portion was introduced into the mix, and it turned out really well. As a representative of my company Terrapin Blue, I had the chance to meet dozens of brilliant and qualified students, many of which who’ll be competitive candidates for spring and summer PR internships. I fully expected to meet at least a few great students, but I had no clue that so many would be on their A-game. I was very definitely surprised to see that all of them had GPAs well above 3.5, along with relevant PR coursework and solid extracurricular activities. If that weren’t enough, many of them were only junior standing, but had already completed several (as in three or four!) public relations internships. Needless to say, I was quite impressed.

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Slick Use of New Media

Another thing that surprised me about “PRofessional Connnection” was the cool use of new media throughout the event. After following UGA PRSSA on Twitter a few days before, I noticed that they’d created a separate account for the event, and presented their followers with a hashtag that would be used to “live-tweet,” or stream posts in real-time, as it was the event was taking place. You only have to search for the #PRCONN hashtag to see how effective it was. This was a great idea, and truly helped create a “buzz” for “PRofessional Connection,” before, after and during the event!

It was funny to see people texting on their phones during my panel discussion, only for them to approach me later and assure me that they weren’t bored; they were actually taking notes and posting them on Twitter! I’d never realized that new media could be integrated so well into an event of this nature, but it was. Students and Professionals would meet at the career fair, exchange business cards and résumés, and a few minutes later, find each other on Linkedin, Twitter and Facebook. I know because I got a few requests myself throughout the day.

PRSSA provided students and professionals with breakfast refreshments and a full banquet luncheon. The food was delicious, and we were also treated to an engaging speech by Porter Novelli exec Brad MacAfee, who gave some poignant words of advice to all considering a career in public relations. (If you missed his amazing speech, check out students’ notes by searching for the PRCONN hashtag above.)

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Everything You Could Want in a PR Networking Event

“PRofessional Connection” was a carefully planned-out, A-quality affair. It was obvious from the first moment I stepped into Tate Grand Hall that countless hours of preparation had gone into organizing this conference. The event ran like a finely oiled engine, and in my opinion, was the pinnacle of what a young PR pro could want in a pre-professional networking event: access to PR execs, helpful workshops, résumé critiques, good food (yes that’s important too!), the list goes on… UGA PRSSA covered all bases.

I’d like to give a major shout out to Marah Lidey, current Vice President of the UGA PRSSA chapter and a personal friend of mine who invited me to participate in the event. She had one of the biggest hands in planning “PRofessional Connection.” I wanted to say thanks to Marah and all of the other PRSSA execs who made this event possible. I hope that I can continue to be part of it in the future.

(Click here to download a PDF of this year’s program.)

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PS: Students - Make sure to follow up with me on Twitter / Linkedin / Email, because my company (Terrapin Blue) is definitely looking for spring/summer interns, and we’d love to have you.

Did you attend “PR Conn”? Wish you could have gone? What did you think of the event? Share your thoughts in the comments below.

(Note: This post was written by Ryan Chaffin as 100% original content for PR & New Media Today.)

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“Social Media are the future of marketing, advertising and public relations.”

If you think this quote is true, you’re wrong; it’s false.  If you’re confused right now, think about it.  If you really think that’s true, you’re living in 2005 when most people thought that quote was wrong, and probably did not even understand what “social media” are, or would become.  So again, if you think that quote is true, you’re behind!  Let’s get you caught up!

If you are a regular here on the PR & New Media Today website, then you’ve probably noticed clickable “buttons” on the page with weird logos and designs on them accompanying every article.  What are these buttons?  Most of you probably already know exactly what they are.  But in case you do not; they are buttons for sharing that article on other social media platforms.

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So what is a social media platform?  And which ones should you be using?  I want to take a few minutes to answer these questions:

Question #1: “What is a social media platform?”

A social media platform (for the most part) is a website that allows you to quickly and easily share information with a network of people.  Whether it is your personal network, or a network consisting of thousands, or even millions, of users depends on the platform and how you use it.

Question #2: “Which social media platforms should I be using?”

You have all heard of Facebook and Twitter by now, and hopefully StumbleUpon, Digg, and Delicious.  These are all “social media platforms” available for your use.  If you are not already using Facebook and Twitter, get with it!  There are plenty of guides explaining those on the web (in fact, now that I think about it, I have one on my site you are more than welcome to see, titled “Twitter 101: How To Use Twitter”).  The best way to get to know these platforms is to use them!  Go to their sites, sign up, and start playing around with them!

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Before I let you go, I want to quickly focus on a social media platform I have grown very fond of, and am beginning to absolutely love.  I recommend you all use it, and I’ll tell you why in just a few seconds.  The platform is StumbleUpon.  It can be a bit difficult to figure out at first, and hard to get comfortable with.  In fact, I still struggle with it a bit.  But that is beside the point.  In fact, I do not really care if you even use the site to discover cool articles (even though it is really cool!), but use it to promote your articles and own website!

I wrote an article and posted it on my website, and some loyal reader came a long and loved the article (which made me very happy)!  It had not even crossed my mind to submit my article to StumbleUpon, but that reader of mine did.  Within a few hours of my article being “stumbled” that article received 17 unique page visits via its link on StumbleUpon.   Think about it.  That’s easy, effortless traffic to your site.  You never know how many new visitors and (hopefully loyal readers) will come to your site from StumbleUpon.  It’s easy to submit your article.  Do it!

What is your favorite social media platform and why? Let us know in the comments!

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About the Author

Ryan Chaffin is currently a college student majoring in Business Marketing. He loves anything technology, Internet, and social media related along with sports and health & wellness. Ryan currently specializes in search engine optimization (SEO), blogging, and social media and believes in achieving your fullest potential on and off the web. You can also find Ryan on Twitter (@ryanchaffin).

(Note: I’ve included a lot of hyperlinks in this post to add some context. Make sure to read them.)

There's a turf war brewing in the social media scene, and the 'mobile throne' is up for grabs.

Perhaps you’ve heard of Foursquare, the explosively popular social gaming platform based on  check-ins and badges? But did you know that Twitter, Google, Gowalla, Facebook and countless others are all fighting for the same territory? It’s true. What do these contenders have in common?

They all offer some form of geo-location-based service, which have been gaining popularity for some time now in the social media world. At a glance, it appears that each of these titans wants a shot at wearing the ‘mobile crown’.

And what about social media Q&A platforms– social sites built upon community question-and-answers, such as Formspring, Quora, Aardvark, and many more? They’re going mobile too. Aardvard and Quora have had cell-phone friendly versions for a while, and Formspring just released their mobile site a few weeks ago.

It’s clear: both geo and Q&A have been gaining steam recently in the mobile trend, and are important to the future of social media.

Why?

As the social media power players are duking it out, geo-location and community Q&A is getting bigger. Social sites and applications based on “check-ins” are quickly gaining in popularity with consumers, and it’s only naturally that businesses and advertisers are in turn responding. Social media going mobile means that ‘consumers’ are creating new opportunities for retailers and advertisers to make money. As Business Week explains about Q&A, for example:

“The attraction to business of this new flavor of search is that as users pose and answer questions, they’ll reveal more data about themselves and create discussion threads against which ever more targeted advertising can be sold.”

While I think it’s a bit early to know for sure who’ll win the mobile ‘turf war’, I’m confident about one thing: the words “cell phone” and “shopping” are about to become as synonymous as “peanut butter” and jelly.” You can bet on that.

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Geo-Shopping and Q&A are Trending Topics in the Social Media World

Consumers are snapping up Smartphones at a record clip, and there are no signs of slowing down. Smartphone sales are rapidly increasing, and predictions indicate that this trend will continue. In short: people really want their Androids, iPhones and Blackberries. And the power players in the social media industry have no problem keeping up with Smartphone technology; iPhone apps like Bakodo and Stickybits are giving all parties just what they want.

Smartphone apps like Bakodo are just the beginning of geo-shopping.

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For the last few years, industry experts have been claiming that web browsing (and by extension, social media) will go mobile on a large scale in the next few years. The limitations of currently available technology, however, challenged these predictions, as most cell phones web browsers were notoriously slow and clunky. With recent technological advances, things are changing, and according to research by International Data Corporation, for example (in addition to many more studies) there will likely be more than one billion mobile devices accessing the Internet by 2013. And IDC isn’t the only one predicting that mobile is expanding.

Mashable recently posted a list detailing their picks for the five biggest social media trends, and as expected, each of them are integrally related to geo-shopping and community Q&A. I’ve posted it below, for ease of reference (Make sure to read the original article here too):

1) Social Scanning

2) Q&A and Intelligent Information Discovery

3) Group Buying

4) Mobile Meets Loyalty

5) Checking-in to Entertainment

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So what does all of this mean for field of public relations?

Quite a bit. Here are just a few implications that these trends have for the field of PR:

• New Technology to Learn
  

At the end of the day, whether you like Foursquare, Facebook Places, Gowalla, or any of the other location-based social incarnations is totally irrelevant: you’d better know how to use them, if you want to work in PR. Your clients will want to know exactly how Foursquare can make money or win press for a company. Guess who’ll be setting up an account and teaching them?

• Increased Immediacy

Social media’s immense popularity over the course of the last decade has already forever changed the way we consume news information. But as the social/mobile web grow, people demand information sooner and sooner. In terms of business, customer support are changing the way they operate to better accomodate consumers’ needs.  Smartphone-based scanning and intelligent information discovery, as Mashable notes, will only further drive the need for immediacy, even from PR people.

• Increased Transparency

It’s clear that community Q&A sites like Formspring, Quora, and Aarvark are seeing popularity like never before. Right now, only a few major brands are truly taking advantage of this opportunity to connect with their customers by providing answers to their questions, but if Mashable’s list is any indication, it’s only a matter of time. As more social sites go “Q&A”-style, the more chance they can make money from their users. PR people need to know that this trend will be linked directly to geo-location. If brands and their advocates (read: us) expect to keep customers, then we’ll have to be honest like never before.

While it’s no surprise that all of these trends are mobile-based, it’s important for that they each have the potential to take advantage of geo-location technology and community crowd-sourcing. The reality is, both of these features present major implications for the future of commercialism, and therefore public relations.

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Takeaway Points for PR pros

The main thing to understand here is this: the Web’s is not just coming to our Smartphones.

Smartphones are changing the Web as we know it — through features like geo-location and Q&A.

This means that we can’t ignore them; we must change along with the web — companies, consumers, advertisers, and even us, public relations professionals. Just as we adjusted our press releases for social media, we’ll soon have to do the same for a mobile format. We must be prepared to interact with clients, consumers and the media in countless new ways.

Here’s the question: Will you be prepared?

- Robert A. Burns, II

What do you think? Agree? Disagree? Join the discussion and share your thoughts below.