Account Executive

Zeno Group is the fiercely independent and global, integrated communications agency, born from PR. We bring together the boldest and brightest talent to help clients across industries and sectors unleash the power of strategic communications. Guided by our "Fearless Pursuit of the Unexpected," we push the boundaries to achieve real business value and societal impact for clients. Winner of the industry’s most coveted awards including the 2024 PRWeek U.S. Outstanding Large Agency of the Year, 2023 PRWeek Purpose Agency of the Year, 2022 PRWeek Global Agency of the Year, 2022 PRovoke Best Large Agency to Work For in North America and a three-time winner of PRWeek’s Best Places to Work. Zeno has also been previously recognized by the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity. Zeno is a DJE Holdings Company.

Job Description:

ACCOUNT EXECUTIVE

Team: Corporate Reputation

Reports to: Account Director

Location: City of London

Salary band: £30,000 - £32,000

This is a junior position in the growing Corporate Reputation team. We are looking for someone early in their career who is keen to gain experience working with global brands including Amazon, Proctor & Gamble and The Coca-Cola Company as well as supporting the growth of the Corporate Reputation team in London. You will be responsible for helping to keep teams organised, maintaining high levels of attention to detail across a portfolio of accounts, building a little black book of media contacts and beginning to develop a relationship with our clients.

You will be expected to demonstrate proven basic public relations skills, notably writing and media relations for a named portfolio of clients. You will have at least a year of relevant PR work experience.

ABOUT YOU

Day-to-day tasks

You will be expected to take ownership of tasks and projects, working with your Account Manager to manage your time and ensure all client deadlines are met.

A typical week might include:

• Preparing agendas and action notes for internal and client meetings,

• Drafting written content including press releases, media pitches, bylined articles and social media copy,

• News monitoring including flagging relevant industry stories for proactive comment or potential bubbling issues,

• Supporting with media outreach including building media lists and outreach to media, providing a point of view on media strategy and approach,

• Collection, collation and distributing media coverage on a regular basis (including online monitoring), developing activity reports to share with clients,

• Participate in and contribute to brainstorms and planning for clients,

• Online research using social media tools and techniques,

• Maintaining client files, ensuring that files and records are kept in good order, e.g. ensuring the unnecessary drafts are deleted from the system,

• Organising and researching forward feature calendars / speaker opportunities including sourcing and qualification of opportunities and status maintenance.

Workload Management

• Time management – organising workload and setting / meeting deadlines ensuring time for consultation, discussion and feedback.

• Supervising junior staff, including delegating tasks to JAEs and managing their time, setting clear expectations and deadlines.

• Participate in wider agency teams e.g. DE&I, Culture, Social, Influencer.

Team Building

• Working with team – ensuring team involvement and communication at all times.

• Motivation – demonstrating energy and enthusiasm to on-going workload and projects.

• Communicating with supervisors to ensure they are updated on work in progress and briefed when having difficulty achieving required results.

PR Skills

• Writing – an AE is expected to demonstrate public relations writing skills in a variety of formats, including releases, opinion pieces, blogs etc. It will be important to understand different formats and how to write for different audiences.

• Media Knowledge – it’s important to have in-depth knowledge of the media, for your specific clients and in general. This should include national, trade and online. You must be proficient in using basic media tools to research and develop insight on journalists and client competition.

• Media liaison – dealing with day-to-day enquiries; acting professionally when meeting the press; establishing and building relationships with journalists; selling in stories / articles/ features over the phone; ensuring copy is prepared, approved and submitted in line with deadlines, researching and writing copy for features; writing and following up photo-call notices; closing the loop with all press opportunities.

• Quality standards – producing a high standard of work at all times, paying attention to detail and removing the possibility of careless errors. The AE will also work to maintain all company quality standards continually looking for areas of improvement.

Great to Haves

• Understanding of a changing media landscape and appetite to build knowledge of multi-channel media strategies (including paid and owned).

• Interest in food and drink sector and in sustainability.

• Analysis and assimilation of current affairs – taking an active interest in business and current affairs, subscribing to news groups to keep updated on political affairs that affect the client.

• Interest in leadership communications including building a profile in earned media and on owned channels like LinkedIn.