Any beauty/fashion PR peeps out there? Career advice for DD wanted.

[lashingsofbingeinghere]

DD is 22, has always loved fashion and beauty and has now decided she wants to work in that world in a PR or marketing role. She's an economics graduate (2012) and over the past 3 years has managed to gain about 9 months of work experience and interning at various high-end fashion, fragrance and beauty companies.

DD is now busy applying for every paid position she can find and is going to sign up with some specialist recruitment agencies. She is coming to the end of a four month internship and is desperate to find some paid work.

Any kind people out there with experience who could offer some advice on her next move? Would it be worth undertaking a marketing qualification? And how much is too much interning? DD is fed up of working for no pay, but I think the market now expects it of new graduates, unfair as it seems. Thanks.

Just send out CV and covering letter, maybe even a creative mailer, to all the PR agencies that look after consumer accounts in the beauty and fashion world, you could go to the local/regional and look for a book that PR Week produce (insdutry magazine) which lists all agencies under their specialities. Also bigger libraries have copies of trade magazines like Maketing, Marketing Week and Campaign that she should go in and read on a weekly basis to keep up to date with all the news.

Creative mailer, could be a postcard, pics of her in action, moving boxes, on the phone, photocopying, smiling - showing her hard work ethic and realisation that it's not all glamour but hard work crap jobs too!

Does she have a twitter account? She should follow all the agencies and fashion houses she is interested in as they often tweet out job vacancies, she should follow this religeously every day.

The whole PR industry is much smaller than it used to be and with smaller budgets and less opportunity. So she just has to keep at it all day, every day and not get demoralised as it is highly competative and only those with the grit and willpower get somewhere.

With regards to a creative mailer, she could set up her own website with examples of her work and her experience, you can do one on Mr Site from £20.00.

She also needs to look at this www.diarydirectory.com/ where they have jobs and fashion news. There is a job on there now she could apply for, the first one, Neville McCarthy Associates, expiry date tomorrow so get cracking!

I worked in fashion and consumer PR for over 20 years so have some idea of how it all works, if you want any further advice or help, please PM me.

I don't work in PR so can't advise on an approach but work in beauty/fashion so know where to access PR companies in this field. If she can get to a large reference library (might be worth calling a few rather than traipsing there on the off chance), some of them carry industry directories. The best ones to try and get hold of are called Le Book and Fashion Monitor. They are both very expensive so I wouldn't advise trying to buy them! Also, the fashion industry magazine called Draper's Record may have jobs in the back. I think you can find that in larger newsagents (probably in bigger cities) and places like Selfridges.

A lot of beauty brands have their PR in house. For example L'Oreal have various PR Departments for Lancome, Giorgio Armani, Kheils, Shu Uemura, YSL. Estee Lauder have their own PR dept too, I think. They do EL, Clinique, MAC, Jo Malone, Aveda.

Linkedin is also a good place to look for ideas of people to contact - but best to look them up on there and then contact them on their work email or postal address.

Your DD probably already knows that the competition for PR and Marketing roles is very stiff especially at the junior level. If she is serious about the industry, I would advise her to play the long game. She is an Economics graduates so I would counsel her to go into the business end either looking after the P&L of a product or in finance. That way she will have an understanding of how the business runs and makes money. This will eventually give her an edge when going into more senior PR roles. I work in a different industry but my knowledge of the business has proved invaluable when speaking to specialist journalists. She can do CIM or CIPR exams if she really wants to increase her knowledge of either Marketing or PR, they are fun to do, but not essential in my experience.

She really should be leveraging her network so if she has already done Internships keep in contact with people, something may come up in the future, or they may move on and need to build a team. Find a mentor, perhaps a contact at one of the companies she has already worked for, who can use their network too.

I used to get lots of speculative CVs from graduates and honestly didn't do anything with them. Recruitment agencies are a volume game - but they do get roles at all levels.

In summary, I'd tell her not to restrict herself too much. Look at other opportunities that can get her to where she needs to be and network network network.

Good luck

Thank you everyone. I will show this thread to DD as soon as she comes home. Lots of good concrete advice, much appreciated!

grants 1000 - thank you. I will pass on your kind offer to DD if that is ok?

Not worth doing a marketing qualification. Does she blog? if not, she should find an angle of fashion/beauty that really excites her and get started.