As an associate, typically, I start my day on our media monitoring platform which gives me an overview of client coverage and from there I can log our recent wins in Coverage Book, where I gather every piece of earned coverage, across online, social, print and broadcast. After a look through emails, and a read through the newspapers, it’s time for the daily morning meeting, where we catch-up as a team and flag news stories of relevance to a client or the agency, with an obligation to flag dog-related content for the benefit of our resident pooch-lover, Nikki.

As an agency, we like to stay in regular contact with our clients, and ahead of our wider team and client calls, it’s my responsibility to ensure we’re going in prepared and have our results, current activities and next steps detailed in an agenda. Afterwards, I am on hand to debrief, ensuring we’re all aware of our next steps that are detailed in a contact report.

Once calls are complete, I set aside time to look through social media and monitor #JournoRequests, where I can identify media opportunities for clients and from there I will pull together pitches. Requests will vary from staycation destinations and restaurant recommendations to cocktail recipes and comments from drinks industry leaders and often have quick turn-arounds, so it’s really important we stay on top of this.

Liaising with journalists typically falls into my day in one way or another. Following a media release which is issued in the morning, I will spend a portion of my afternoon following up with key contacts, selling in, pitching interviews where necessary and securing as much quality coverage for the client as possible.

We’re lucky enough to have our Speyside HQ situated alongside beautiful woodland scenery and a one-mile walking route, which we like to take advantage of on our lunch breaks. Having a desk-based and computer-focused job, it’s really important we don’t fall into the trap of spending lunchtime inside and scrolling on our phones, and our office’s rural surroundings leave us with no excuse. Whether it’s a solo-walk catching up on a podcast or a team outing followed by lunch from one of the local café’s, we’re encouraged to be outdoors when we can and take time out from our screens.

Once back at my desk, and with summer hitting Speyside, I am dedicating a chunk of my time to organising media trips for our drinks and hospitality clients. Being a native to the area, this is a real highlight for me as I am able to put a spotlight on the wonderful location that I call home.

When I’m not organising media trips, pitching or in client calls, I will be on-site overseeing a photoshoot for one of our Speyside clients. Working closely with the photographer, it’s my responsibility to assist with set-up, ensure we’re meeting the brief requirements and ticking off the shot list, whilst keeping the team and client updated with progress.

Before the day comes to a close, I tend to go back through my list of priorities, tick-off what’s been completed and plan for the day ahead. With every day being different at SPEY, this is merely a snapshot of what I tend to get up to, and as we are expanding our client portfolio and adding to the team, I can’t wait to see the moves we’re going to make in the industry and the campaigns we’re yet to deliver.