A Day in the Life of a PR Intern

​By: Emily King

At the end of the 2022 school year, I was on the hunt for a good part-time job to allow me to save for college. That did not happen this summer, instead, I was given the opportunity to work two internships. One is with a local real estate company in my hometown, RE/MAX Allegiance, the other is with a country music social media company, Whiskey Riff. 

RE/MAX Allegiance is a real estate company that is owned by a family in my small town. I was not sure how working for a real estate agency was going to go due to the fact I knew nothing about the industry. I did research beforehand about how marketing for real estate works. The whole real estate world depends on marketing to sell houses. I was excited to be a part of the team and help bring new ideas with my knowledge about marketing and public relations 

Whiskey Riff is a Country Music Media Company that sells apparel, creates playlists, produces weekly podcasts, and writes stories. This is just a short list of what this company does. Whiskey Riff is, “The unfiltered voice of real country fans.” I have always been an interactive follower of the company. One day close to the end of the 2022 spring semester, I saw a job post on their LinkedIn for ‘Social Media Intern.’ I had a dream of working for this company down the road and I knew this would give me a kickstart. I soon saw that there were almost 500 applicants for this position and my heart dropped, I didn’t think I would get the spot. A long week later I got the email for a follow-up interview.

Shortly after I started working for both companies, I got a routine down. Here is what a normal Monday looks like for me.  

Schedules
WHISKEY RIFF 
7 AM - *Wake up and Go through DM’s, Comments, & Tagged Photos

8:30 AM - Post Monday Puppy Picture (Instagram & Twitter) 
8:30 AM - *Post Article and Shop Picture to Accounts (Done every Hour or 2)

12 PM - *Check Comments & feed 

1 PM - Go over anything new for the week & updates 

2 PM - Schedule out Shop Tweets (7 tweets a day)
2 PM - Create 1-3 Tik Tok’s

3 PM - Create & Post Song Of The Week Graphic (Instagram, Twitter, & TikTok)

4 PM - Post to Instagram  

6 PM - Posting to Stories & Check Comments 

8 PM - Posting to Stories & Check Comments
10 PM - Posting to Stories & Check Comments 

* = Daily Tasks 

RE/MAX ALLEGIANCE: 
7:30 AM - Wake up & get ready 

9 AM - *Arrive & check the to-do list 

9:15 AM - *Comment, Like, and Follow ~10 Accounts 

9:45 AM - Make 3 Content Pieces for 2 Realtors 

10:30 AM - Research & Implement new Marketing Ideas 

11:45 AM - Check new listings and complete the checklist 

12:30 PM - Head Home


What I Have Learned

Throughout these internships, I have put myself in the shoes of the careers I'm interested in pursuing. I got to see for myself how social media management and marketing jobs work. 

My Whiskey Riff internship is a fully remote job. I had to adapt and learn time management very quickly. Luckily, I learned how to do this with the help of online classes during Covid times. Some platforms, like TweetDeck, were made to help plan and schedule tweets instead of tweeting them right at that time. These helped me a lot, I would plan the tweets for a couple of days out at the beginning of each week. I’m also spending my time scrolling on TikTok and Twitter. Most days I’m scrolling on TikTok for 30 minutes to find content to recreate to match the brand. It might be easy to find a meme that is going viral but be able to tweak it so that it connects with the voice of the brand.

For RE/MAX, I had to do a lot of research-type work. I looked at what other real estate brokerages are doing and what's working and not working for them. With the recent market and the prices of homes, people have been more scared to purchase a home. I had to learn to relate to them so that the posts would keep them interested. Another aspect of social media is keeping relationships with other similar accounts and people. I would find realtors in the same region and or that worked for RE/MAX and connect with them. I would follow them and give them a few likes and comments. By doing this they would do the same and other accounts would see our comments and go to our account. 

What I did not list in my schedule is that I am constantly checking these accounts. I'm periodically scanning over comments and tagged photos. Other parts of the job include checking direct messages and helping people with questions and feedback. Checking DM’s and comments is not the most fun but it is important to social media. 

I have learned a lot while working for these two companies. Social media is a much more complex job than most people think. It’s a fast-moving world, whether it is staying on trends or keeping the voice the same throughout posts. I think social media is an unrespected job that few people fully understand. I got to see what real businesses do every day and I will forever respect companies who have a great social media presence because it’s one tricky world. 
I’m blessed to stay with Whiskey Riff during the school year doing the same social media work. I’m excited to see what this year holds for me!