"My biggest challenge in the beginning was building media relations from scratch, but also attracting clients."
After completing his undergraduate degree in Public Relations at VERN' University, our alumni Luka Šipić decided to start his own business and open a PR agency just six months after graduating. In a short interview, he revealed how he views his entrepreneurial journey today, after three years in business.
What inspired you to start your own PR agency?
Long before I founded my own PR agency, I knew I would one day become an entrepreneur. What attracted me most was the ability to manage my own time and be flexible, and to implement ideas that I might not have been able to implement elsewhere. I also wanted to push my own boundaries, to see how far I could go with persistence, dedication, and daily effort.
What makes Vrh komunikacija special on the market?
I wouldn't want to talk about what makes us special, because whatever I say, there's a high probability that one of my colleagues is thinking or doing something similar. 🙂 But I can talk about what we strive for and what our goal is, which is the pursuit of excellence. We pay great attention to small details that may seem unimportant at first, we do the jobs that move and motivate us and that make us feel fulfilled at the end of the day, no matter when our working hours end.
What is your biggest challenge in your job?
Since I opened an agency six months after graduating from college and didn't have a very developed network of acquaintances, the biggest challenge at the beginning was to build relationships with the media from scratch, but also to attract clients. Now, after three years, I can say that we have successfully mastered that part, and the current challenge is to maintain a high level of professionalism. To be excellent, to maintain the quality of business and relationships with clients, the media and everyone we work with. Because a good reputation is heard far and wide, and a bad reputation even further.
What was the most important knowledge you gained during your studies, and which helped you in your work?
What is certainly commendable is the wealth of practical experience that I gained at university, and then later transferred to my daily business. How and when to write a press release, how to build successful relationships with the media, how to communicate in a crisis, how to think, how to put seemingly unrelated things into the same context. I transfer a lot of what I learned into practice and I am sure that education in this profession is a great advantage when entering the job market.
What is your message to your colleagues, VERN' students?
My message is to respect the PR profession and those they work with, especially the media. Let them do everything in the interest of the profession so that it can develop in the future and strive for excellence. Regardless of whether they are employed by an agency or run their own.
