Where do you work and what is your title?
I am the GM for Precision at Matter
Where can people connect with you on social media?
Briefly summarize your professional background/experience. What kind of industries/clients do you work with, etc.?
Most of my nearly 20-year career has been spent exclusively in PR, though I did spend a few years earlier on in advertising, social media and digital marketing. While in PR, the majority of my clients have been in the realm of B2B tech or consumer tech, with a few others stemming from the nonprofit, professional services, manufacturing, and consumer spaces.
Describe what you do for the PR Club.
I’m on the Membership committee.
Our goal is to ensure current members are taking advantage of all the educational and promotional benefits available to them, as well as to invite new agencies, in-house teams, universities, and independent practitioners to join our excellent organization.
What are your top 3 favorite things about working in PR?
- As infuriating as it can be at times, the constantly shifting PR landscape represents a puzzle that needs solving on a daily, monthly, and annual basis, and that’s always invigorating.
- You need to be hungry for information to succeed in PR, because you’ll be expected to think, speak, and write intelligently about subjects one day you’d never heard of the day before. Also, see the above point about the PR puzzle. So, the opportunities for learning are immense.
- When you get into a really great groove with your team, or your client, or your media contacts – all people with whom you need to work closely – it’s very, very rewarding.
What is the biggest misconception about PR from your perspective?
That its purpose is to drive sales. PR should absolutely support and reinforce sales/lead gen initiatives, but it is not the driver of these initiatives. And some brand leaders may now leap to the conclusion that PR is unnecessary, but that’s a mistake too, especially in the age of GEO, when media coverage and great content have become more essential than ever to brand visibility. Not to mention how essential crisis planning and internal comms have become to business stability. PR simply needs to be deployed at the right time during a business’s growth.
What’s your prediction for the future of public relations?
It feels silly to plant any kind of flag on this issue, given the speed with which everything is evolving, but I’ve been encouraged by the proliferation of niche media, independent journalists, podcasts, Substacks, etc. People consume information in such a wide variety of formats, and that presents some really interesting, creative opportunities for PR pros. For us to succeed, though, we have to continue to prioritize 1:1 relationships with journalists, celebrate real engagement over potential exposure, begin minoring in marketing, design and video production (multi-faceted pros for the win), and continue to seek out ways to measure the actual effectiveness of it all. It’ll take a lot of learning (us), and a lot of teaching (clients).
If you could instantly master any new skill, what would it be?
American Sign Language
What’s one of your favorite hobbies?
Making art (micron and/or watercolor).
What’s your guilty pleasure TV show or movie?
Frasier, and not guilty at all.
What’s your coffee order?
I shall judge all coffee shops by the quality of their mocha.