PR Pros: Austin Rotter On The 5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career As A Public Relations Pro
Internal communications — internal communications have quickly become a major area of focus in PR. Employees can be a company’s biggest cheerleaders and fans or its toughest critics. Keep them happy, informed, and motivated is vital to the success of a brand and company. Developing ongoing programs to keep staff engaged and informed, whilst understanding their needs and concerns, is a challenge for companies and one which internal communications professionals are now playing a crucial role in assisting with.
Have you seen the show Flack? Ever think of pursuing a real-life career in PR? What does it take to succeed in PR? What are the different forms of Public Relations? Do you have to have a college degree in PR? How can you create a highly lucrative career in PR? In this interview series, called “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career As A Public Relations Pro” we are talking to successful publicists and Public Relations pros, who can share stories and insights from their experiences.
As a part of this series I had the distinct pleasure of interviewing Austin Rotter.
Austin Rotter is a strategic digital marketing and media relations strategist with over a decade of experience working with a number of clients ranging from Fortune 100 brands to hyper growth companies.
Thank you so much for your time! I know that you are a very busy person. Can you tell us a story about what brought you to this specific career path?
I’ve always had an interest in entertainment and technology from a young age which then influenced where I went to college and what major I wanted to learn more about.
In college, marketing and then finally a degree in PR brought in so many different aspects of business, media, communications, writing, and several other industries that really got me excited.
What really sealed the deal for me was reading Seth Godin’s Purple Cow. It is a must read for anyone in marketing or PR. After reading that, I knew right away, this was the career path I wanted to follow and explore.
What are some of the most interesting or exciting projects you are working on now?
If the pandemic has showed us anything from a marketing and PR perspective, is that the industry overall has changed in such a rapid way.
A lot of the projects in the Tech PR space specifically has totally evolved over the last two years in a very exciting way.
From disruptive HR software that is changing how people are working in this now remote world to innovative fintech startups shifting how consumers pay for good and services to how digital media platforms and agencies are helping CMOs negative our new normal, there has never been a more exciting time to be in Tech PR.
You are a successful leader. Which three character traits do you think were most instrumental to your success? Can you please share a story or example for each?
The first — determination. Work ethic is so important, even more so when you are first starting out in your career. Early on, you don’t have the experience or knowledge as someone more senior but being determined will always help you stand out. It shows how committed you are, that you are hungry and eager to learn. You might not know all of answers or have been in that situation before, but that’s okay too. Everyone must start somewhere.
In sports, I always love when teammates of LeBron James talk about how determined he is. He might be the greatest basketball player to ever live, and yet, after all the records and rings, he’s still one of the first ones at practice and one of the last to leave after a game.
The second — ambition. Everyone is afraid to fail or at times, try new things. That’s extremely normal. It’s human nature. In failure though, that’s where you can really grow and learn. Ambition helps push you out of your comfort zone and allows you the chance to jump into a new project, explore a new idea or strategy, etc.
Staying with the sports metaphors for ambition, Michael Jordan famously said: “I’ve missed more than 9,000 shots in my career. I’ve lost almost 300 games. Twenty-six times, I’ve been trusted to take the game-winning shot and missed. I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life. And that is why I succeed.”
The third — passion. At the end of the day, you have to love what you do. Passion is the ultimate motivator. It gets you excited in the morning when you first wake up and it helps you push through the challenging and difficult moments.
Life is way too short to not love what you do and have a passion for it.
Ok super. Thank you for all that. Let’s now shift to the main focus of our interview. For the benefit of our readers, can you help articulate what the different forms of PR are?
That’s the million-dollar question. There’s been countless books written on this exact question because there’s just so many different forms it takes.
I’ll highlight a few:
Media relations — this is where you’re really focus on mostly earned media campaigns and strategy for your given client — getting positive press about a company announcement or product launch as just two examples. Even within media relations, there’s hundreds of different sectors and verticals to focus on.
Public affairs — this is really all about building and managing an organization’s relationship with various stakeholders. It could be working with politicians, government bodies, local communities, unions, charities, etc. Public affairs is pretty interesting because it combines various aspects of government relations, media communications, issue management, corporate and social responsibility.
Internal communications — internal communications have quickly become a major area of focus in PR. Employees can be a company’s biggest cheerleaders and fans or its toughest critics. Keep them happy, informed, and motivated is vital to the success of a brand and company. Developing ongoing programs to keep staff engaged and informed, whilst understanding their needs and concerns, is a challenge for companies and one which internal communications professionals are now playing a crucial role in assisting with.
Where should a young person considering a career in PR start their education? Should they get a degree in communications? A degree in journalism? Can you explain what you mean?
That’s the beauty of PR and really the industry, everyone has such a different background and education. Of course, having a traditional degree in PR, communications, marketing, or journalism, certainly never hurt. It is not make or break though. I have met so many people in the industry that went to school for business, management, philosophy, and everything in between.
To me, internships are way more important (for a lot of reasons). To start, it lets you see if you actually like the industry and keep going down that path. Internships also gives you incredible first-hand, real-world experience that no degree could ever give.
You are known as a master networker. Can you share some tips on great networking?
A lot of the times, networking can be so forced and met with an agenda or motive before going in — people go right into sell mode when they think of networking.
That’s totally the wrong way to network and will limit so many future opportunities.
Think of networking like meeting a new friend or going on a date. It’s all about having an interesting conversation with someone you didn’t know before. Listening to them is key!
How can you help them? What problem are they looking to solve? What headache keeps them up at night about their business? These are all important things to keep notes of to see what intros you can make or solutions you might be able to provide.
At the end of the day, this builds long-term relations vs. just a business card you picked up at an event. You might not see results right away, but in the long term, it will be so impactful for everything else you do in your career and life.
Lead generation is one of the most important aspects of any business. Can you share some of the strategies you use to generate good, qualified leads?
Just like the above points on networking, I have the same mindset about lead generation. The less you’re trying to sell and the more you’re trying to actually help solve someone’s problem, the more positive results you’ll see.
It’s all about playing the long game. It’s certainly not easy and it takes a lot of time, as well as patience, but at the end of the day, no one wants to be sold at or looked at as a dollar sign.
Ok super. Here is the main question of our interview. Based on your opinion and experience, what are your “5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career As A Public Relations Pro” and why. (Please share a story or example for each.)
To start, the first three things you need are the character traits I talked about that I believe are
instrumental to success — determination, ambition, and passion.
Those are three core principles that I focus my career around.
The next thing you need is a purpose. Why are you doing what you’re doing? What is your greater calling? What motivates you? What makes you happy? Those are some very deep questions and ones you will likely ask yourself a million of times over in your life with the answer changing throughout the years.
The last and most important thing you need is joy and happiness. This is not just for your career, but in life. Joy and happiness are contagious — it breads new opportunities, new connections, new moments.
Because of the role you play, you are a person of great influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the most amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂
The movement of gratitude. It’s so easy to look at all the negative around us, especially the last two years on a lot of levels. Of course, things can always be better, but it could also always be way worse. Gratitude is so important to appreciate your journey — the good and unfortunately, the bad.
This was really meaningful! Thank you so much for your time.
PR Pros: Austin Rotter On The 5 Things You Need To Create A Highly Successful Career As A Public… was originally published in Authority Magazine on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.