PFF Position Becomes Front-Page News

Last year, our client, the Pulmonary Fibrosis Foundation (PFF), issued a position statement warning patients and providers against the dangers of unregulated stem cell therapies that often promise miraculous results but come with significant health risks. We pitched the statement to national media, and were happy to connect PFF’s Chief Medical Officer, Dr. Gregory Cosgrove, with a Washington Post reporter investigating the topic. Several months and conversations later, a front-page Washington Post article ran to educate readers of the hazards of unproven stem cell therapies, alongside an investigation into one organization offering these dangerous treatments.

While some stem cell treatments have been approved for other disease states, we hope this high-profile placement will drive awareness of the potential dangers of stem cell therapies for PF that are not part of regulated clinical trials.

First Alert Assists Departments in Community Risk Reduction Efforts

Community risk reduction (CRR) is an important part of fire safety education from the fire service. The inaugural Community Risk Reduction Week, occurring January 20-26, 2020, allows departments across the country to improve their community’s safety.

In honor of this event, First Alert and LCWA held a week-long alarm giveaway for departments participating in these efforts. As a result of industry relationships, LCWA received nearly 800 entries from across the country. Out of the hundreds who entered, five lucky fire departments were randomly chosen to each receive 50 carbon monoxide alarms.

The winning fire departments represent a wide array of entries from both career and volunteer departments across the country:

• Elmwood Park Fire Department (Elmwood Park, Ill.)
• Fillmore Fire Department (Fillmore, Wis.)
• Flint Fire Department (Flint, Mich.)
• New Boston Volunteer Fire Department (New Boston, Texas)
• Plympton Fire Department (Plympton, Mass.)

First Alert’s support to improve carbon monoxide safety comes at a crucial time. The risk for CO poisoning significantly increases during the winter months, and according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 50,000 emergency room visits and over 430 deaths are attributed to CO poisoning in the U.S. each year, making it the leading cause of accidental poisoning deaths in the country.

To learn more about CO safety and how to keep your loved ones safe, visit FirstAlert.com.

Bold and Beautiful: The Right Celebrity Cache Can Catapult Your Story

Celebrities are the ultimate influencers and can play an impactful role in a brand’s marketing strategy, elevating messages and reaching new audiences. But like Cinderella’s glass slipper, the right celebrity fit is vital to the story and there are many considerations as you develop the partnership:

• Time and Placement. First, outline all the potential services you’d like to use the celebrity for and how you’d like to amplify them. Do you want to shoot a video or six? Host an event? Turn a production day into multiple videos and images to be used across your broadcast and digital marketing plan.
• Multiple Personalities: Celebrities take on the personas of their characters, so make sure to vet the storyline of their character(s), as well as their personal behavior to avoid any embarrassing controversies.
• Script Permissions. As far in advance as possible, map out even basic key messages, location and scripting. This will come in handy during negotiations and will highlight any content that may need to be approved in advance by their studio. 
• Amplify. Amplify. Amplify. Celebrities are pricey, so incorporate as much amplification as possible in order to get the most out of your budget.

From crafting DIY content for Trex with Kate Campbell to delivering fire safety messages for First Alert with Taylor Kinney, our focus is on maximizing the potential of these influencers to tell the best brand story to as many people as possible.

AASM Highlights Prevalence of Drowsy Driving

Drowsy driving is a serious public health concern. Each year in the U.S., drowsy driving causes an average of 328,000 motor vehicle accidents, including 6,400 fatal crashes, according to the AAA Foundation for Traffic Safety.

The American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) conducted a consumer survey to determine the prevalence of drowsy driving among adults. The new survey found that 45% of adults have struggled to stay awake while driving.

In light of the survey results, LCWA conducted media outreach highlight the prevalence of drowsy driving and sharing tips from the AASM on how to prevent it.

LCWA secured drowsy driving coverage with numerous outlets, including The Washington Post, Seattle Times, SFGate, WebMD, HealthDay and U.S. News & World Report. Overall, this outreach increased awareness of the dangers of drowsy driving among consumers nationwide and earned more than 32.9 million impressions.

North Riverside Park Mall Brings Holiday Cheer to Local Boys & Girls Club

The holiday season is a festive time for all, and LCWA’s client, North Riverside Park Mall, knows that there’s plenty of joy to spread around. That’s why they set out to make this holiday season the most memorable, and meaningful, yet by joining forces with a local community organization – the Little Village Boys & Girls Club. 

LCWA facilitated a new partnership with the Little Village Boys & Girls Club – not a far drive from North Riverside Park Mall – to help kids celebrate and fulfill Christmas lists this holiday season. North Riverside Park Mall hosted a special shopping event for 15 club members between the ages of eight and 13, providing each with a $200 Visa gift card to use at stores of their choosing throughout the mall. Most these children don’t often have the chance to pick out toys and gifts on their own, so this was a very special occasion for all involved.

In addition to shopping, the mall prepared a festive ornament-making craft, treats from local merchants and personalized photos with Santa! LCWA distributed a customized media alert and worked with Chicago’s ABC 7 to have the entire event captured and showcased as a Chicago Proud segment on the 10 p.m. nightly news.

Check out the Chicago Proud clip here. Happy Holidays!

AASM Sheds Light on Binge-Watching

A new survey from the American Academy of Sleep Medicine (AASM) found that U.S. adults rank sleep as their second most important priority, following family. However, data show that Americans are often limiting their opportunities to get enough healthy sleep. A primary culprit of sleep restriction? Binge-watching. In the AASM survey, a whopping 88% of U.S. adults admitted they had lost sleep due to staying up late to watch multiple episodes of a TV show or streaming series – and this number jumps to 95% when looking at 18-44-year-olds.

To drive awareness of this issue, we worked with AASM to craft and distribute a press release on the findings and conducted media outreach. Additionally, LCWA also coordinated distribution of a feature release to increase awareness in communities nationwide.

These findings on what binge-watching does to sleep secured coverage with several national outlets, including: Atlanta Journal Constitution, Philadelphia Inquirer, MSN, Southern Living, Medscape, New Hampshire Union Leader, Thrive Global, WebMD and Yahoo! Lifestyle. Conversation continued on local television and radio stations across the country, including: KMSP-TV (Minneapolis), KTVU-TV (San Francisco), KUSA-TV (Denver), KYKY-FM (St. Louis, Mo.), WLS-TV (Chicago) and KTHV-TV (Little Rock, Ark.). Overall, initiatives to highlight the impact binge-watching has on our sleep earned more than 372.3 million impressions.

How to Turn Your Internship into a Job

We were thrilled to welcome Abigail Cox as an assistant account executive to our team this fall, after she completed a very successful internship. Here are Abigail's tips for turning that internship opportunity into a full-time job.

Nothing can replace real world experience, especially in the world of public relations. In the workplace, projects and campaigns created for your clients will not be returned with an “A+” written in red on the front – it’s more of a pass or fail scenario. Creating a campaign for a pretend client in class is great practice, but doing it in a real job brings on a whole new set of expectations. An internship can help bridge those gaps between the work done in the class room and the work waiting for you in the real world. 

Beyond the value of real world experience an internship offers, it also has the potential to turn into your first real job. If you’re looking to turn your internship into a job, here are three tips to help you score your first job offer:

Take notes.

When I started my sixth internship, it was hard not to feel like I had the whole internship thing down pat. But I knew the reality was that I had so much to learn every single day. And that will still be true every day of my career. We all have room to grow and learn, and an internship is the optimal time to soak in the knowledge and experience of the people around you who have been in the game a lot longer and are eager to help you develop as a young professional.

Ask questions.

Asking questions shows that you are both engaged and invested in learning and developing your skills. It also gives you a chance to start conversations with your new coworkers or bosses. Through my own internship experience, I found that staying curious, being teachable and never being afraid to ask questions can go a long way.

Treat every day like a job interview.

This was some of the best advice I received from my father before starting my post-grad internship. If you are interning with the goal of one day being offered a job (which you should be), treat every day like a job interview because when you think about it – it is. Employers know that even if you can teach someone how to do a job – you can’t teach someone to be a hard worker and you can’t teach someone to care. See an internship as an opportunity not to prove that you know everything, but to prove that you are teachable, hardworking and passionate about the industry you’re in.

Turning your internship into a job might feel daunting, but keep in mind that everyone started their career from the same spot you’re in right now. Many of our team members at LCWA started as interns, including myself. Take these tips into consideration and we’re confident it’ll help you land that first full-time job in no time.