February – Bateman Competition Gets Serious

And they’re off. The 2009 PRSSA Bateman Case Study Competition implementation period has begun today. The Bateman Competition allows students to compete against teams across the nation by putting together a public relations campaign. As an alumni to the Bateman Competition, here are some quick tips for this year’s groups:

• Always have a back up plan
• Have you thought about measurement? Do you know how you’re going to measure what you’re doing?
• Strategy comes before tactics
• Start strong and end strong
• Use your resources
• Spend more time working on your campaign than worrying about the other competing campaigns
• Save time to write, format and design the plan
• Be a team player
• If you can’t explain why you’re doing it, don’t do it.
• Don’t forget about social media
• Put aside plenty of this time month for the competition, it always takes way more time than you think
• Work hard on the project and your hard work will pay off
• Don’t miss your deadlines
• You’ll make mistakes, just be ready to move forward from them

 Julia Taylor,  my colleague and a fellow Bateman alumni advises:

• Stay on task.
• Make decisions quickly and act on them.
• Don’t wait too long and fall behind.

Once you’ve submitted your entry  to PRSSA headquarters, celebrate. You and your team did it! Not only do you have an awesome portfolio piece but real life experience to apply to job applications and interviews. All that hard work will pay off, I promise. You might even win some great prize money and national recognition. 

Any other advice you’d like to give to the 2009 Bateman competitors? 

[Photo credit: Kristian 08]