Hello readers! This journey has been a wild ride. I have enjoyed what I have accomplished so far and I am so excited to continue on this journey of bringing this campaign to life. I do believe remaining transparent in anything I do is always a benefit. I’ve learned that especially this year with the current pandemic among us along with many of the other things surrounding us both personally and professionally.
This social media campaign project is a testament to my patience, acceptance, and vulnerability. I am writing to you all today to let you know I have yet again, fell short on my personal expectations. Without disclosing too much, I was pulled away from my scheduled goals this week due to another emergency brought on by the pandemic. Now a few weeks ago, I was also pulled away for another unfortunate circumstance and I remember beating myself up due to falling short. However, I am finally (took me awhile I suppose) realizing that these times are very different, and we are all human and the most I can do now is be thankful for what I have accomplished so far. I will continue to revise, be realistic, and push through with excitement to see this project through. As John Edwards from CIO at IDG Communications puts it, “Initial overly optimistic projections may have to be scaled back to reflect real world conditions.”
The High-Performance Mind Set in Low Times
My ultimate goal this week was to begin posting! Can you believe that? I was confident and excited to finally share my content! Now you all have seen bits and pieces along the way but this exact blog post was meant to share the link to the Instagram page, with at least 2-3 posts already on it. So what happened? Let’s keep it brief but let’s keep it honest. Life happened and in a very odd way, I can see a silver lining here. I am currently taking care of some personal matter outside of town. My head is heavy but my spirits are bright and although the times are a tad rough, I still have the confidence and I am still learning on this journey. What have I learned this week? Patience! George Pitagorsky, from PM Times, in his article; Patience, is it a virtue for Project Managers? states; “patience, or forbearance, is the ability to endure difficult circumstances and annoyances that typically come up during projects. ..Being patient implies having the ability to withstand the physical and psychological discomfort that comes with not getting your way or not getting what is expected.”
It was obtaining patience which helped me understand that I can still maintain a high-performance mind set even in the lowest of times. In fact, this set back actually helped me identify major details missing in this campaign. Details I need to iron out before rolling out the red carpet for Breaking Down PR! As I said above, it is odd but I am happy that I was able to take a step back, and ask myself what it is that I can actually control right now? What can I look over? What can I revise? How can I make this work? I began to go through it all and I was able to pin-point exactly what I can still accomplish to start posting. The excitement and determination is still here. While I have to push back the original date to post yet again, it is going to be okay. By keeping my mental and energetic levels high while remaining realistic during these times; I know this will be done accurately and with great pride! I haven’t come this far to not follow through.
The Reckoning
Last week I completed a list from week 1 to week 11 for the social media campaign. Each week consisted of 4-5 posts with exact criteria for each post. This week, it was my goal to then break that list down into tangible dates for posts. I started the detailed content calendar at the end of last week. I was about half way finished with it when I had to leave town again. I knew I had to finish this content calendar, especially since I now had to revise it anyway due to the circumstances. I also wanted to share with you, how happy I was to get it done! Inputting 11 weeks of content into a calendar form should be a work out of some kind if you ask me (my attempt at making you chuckle)!
While finishing the content calendar (click here for a complete view), I realized a key component to which I was missing for the campaign. Notice in the screenshot how each day has a post and a story. Now each post is held in what I like to call the content factory. It is basically one document on Canva with a series of images that are ready to be posted on Instagram. All are formatted properly and they are in the exact order which corresponds to this calendar. The issue? I completely forgot to create a content factory for stories. In the beginning of this journey, I created maybe 2-3 story images for promotional purposes, but at no point did it cross my mind to create a list of images for stories. With all that is going on, it completely slipped my mind.
I consider the next week or two to be crunch time for Breaking Down PR. A post must be made! I have to reach a point of what is important at this point and what is not. This story situation? I consider it to be pretty important. Its content for the campaign! So it must take priority as well. I decided to spend the time I had left for this week creating a series of images as well for the first few weeks of launch.
I was excited to get at least the first two weeks complete. I have more to still do of course but it does put me in a better place than nothing at all. Additionally, along with rolling out the social media page for Breaking Down PR, I plan on also delivering a more finish product for this project. Though it will be an evolving document, it is important that I share with you all as to how Breaking Down PR came to be in more depth. Later this week I will have a comprehensive report to share.
This set back allowed me to review my current work such as the target audience report, competitor analysis, style guide, and more. Now you all have seen snippets of everything so far but this will be on a grand scale. I will be putting my focus on all of this throughout the week and I am so excited to share it with you all. I believe the success of this launch is truly capable of happening due to the research and time put into these reports and I am looking forward to adding more sections to this report once Breaking Down PR gains a following and genuine engagement. Can’t wait to share more updates with you next week! Be sure to also check out this weeks production journal here.
Thanks for reading!
-Austin
The Media Relations Nomad 