JTC 351 Public Relations Practices
Assignment #6

Feature Story and Photo Captions for the Hyatt Regency Orlando International Airport

Your assignment is to write:

a) A two-page feature story about the hotel and its services for business and convention guests. This type of feature might be offered on an exclusive basis to a regional business publication, such as Southern Meetings Management, a publication read by the professional meeting planners who work for associations, societies and companies. These readers typically are responsible for recommending sites and booking conventions and meetings into a hotel.

Tips:
• Throughly review the hotel's web site, especially the section about Meetings and Events (see link on first page). This section includes a useful hotel fact sheet, floor plans, and a list of seating capacitities for meeting rooms.
• Remember: Your focus is on meeting planners, not general consumers or individual business travelers. What would be an informative and useful feature angle?
• Major hotels at hub airports (such as Chicago's O'Hare) are convenient (in-and-out) locations for many conferences and meetings.
• Room rates for guests attending meetings are priced separately from rates for business or vacation travelers (and that are listed if you were to make an online reservation). You may assume that guest room rates for people attending meetings are about 85% of the published rates.
• You also might wish to research information on the Web sites for other hotels, Hyatt Hotels, or Orlando area destinations.

• Select three shots (the best, of course) from the hotel's Web site. Then, write an appropriate caption for each image. Note: You can take a video Virtual Tour of the hotel and view 13 images from the hotel using the links in the bottom right-hand corner of the large photo on the main page. Note: These images don't feature people, but would be appropriate for a magazine for meeting planners because these readers are interested in seeing the hotel's meeting facilities.
• Select one publicity photo from any other Web site promoting Orlando tourism or attractions. Choose a shot you think would be helpful to illustrate your business feature. Select from any of the nearby Points of Interest listed on the hotel's fact sheet. Assume you and the publication can obtain permission from the copyright owner to publish the photo. The caption you write for this shot should relate the attraction you pick to the hotel.

  Propose two other photos featuring people in the hotel:

• One photo should feature the manager (fictitious name: James Jensen), who you could quote in your story. For this photo, write a brief description of the situation you envision where you might photograph Mr. Jensen in the hotel. Then write an appropriate caption.
• The final photo can be any situation you create. Be imaginative. Briefly describe a scene you think would make a good photograph to accompany your business feature and (very brief) rationale. Remember, a good publicity should feature people and illustrate a key message. Write an appropriate caption.

Your final work product will consist of about four pages:

• your two-page feature and
• two-three pages listing your photos with the accompanying caption for each. Show the text as it would be submitted to the publication.

  Some helpful pointers:

  • Please list your photos and captions in the order given in the assignment.
  • You may include a simple label or insert a thumbnail image for each of the four photos you choose from the Web. If you choose to provide thumbnails, horizontal images need to be only about 2 inches wide. (To download a image, right click on the image, save it, and then insert it into your assignment document.) If you choose this option, you may print your assignment in black-and-white; color printouts are not required.
  • For the two proposed photos (manager and other people shot), be sure you adequately describe the situation. Three or four sentences might be required in your summary. Then, simply insert your caption below your description.
  • Review the class discussion about captions: An overline is optional. Captions should be 1-2 sentences (about 4 typewritten lines). Use active voice. The first sentence should be written in present tense (you've frozen the action) and describe the who, what and where. For "evergreen stories," the when can be omitted. Publicity captions should always mention the client's name and underscore a key message or theme (often the why or how). When multiple photos are used together, vary the content, phrasing and key messages, as appropriate.
  • Please staple your assignment together, with the feature story on top. Thanks.