Holiday gift guide for PR pros

Over the last few months I’ve had a lot of fun pitching gift ideas to daily news media on behalf of our friends at Help Lesotho. Now that Ottawa is covered in a blanket of fresh snow, I can’t help but feel festive. In the spirit of the fast-approaching holiday season, I’ve decided to pull together a gift guide to help anyone who has a public relations professional to buy for this holiday season.

Students studying PR, young PR professionals and veterans alike should always have a style guide on hand. Some of our favourites include The Canadian Press Caps and Spelling, Eats Shoots and Leaves and Globe and Mail Style Book. If the PR professional in your life doesn’t have one of these or similar titles, you should be able to cross them off your list by visiting a well-stocked local bookstore. Books about grammar fundamentals may not be very exciting but they certainly are useful. Dictionaries are also great to have on hand. For the terminology-saturated person working in technology PR, try Chambers Dictionary of Science and Technology. If you think flipping pages is too low-tech, a subscription to the online edition of the Chicago Manual of Style may do the trick.

For PR pros who frequently travel, there are a wealth of gadgets you can buy to help them stay plugged in. While an iPhone or iTouch may be a bit pricey, consider springing for a country-specific SIM card or a gift certificate to a phone-unlocking specialist like Warlox Wireless. After reading about the positive experience Francis had with his unlocked GSM smart phone loaded with a pay-as-you-go SIM, I don’t think you can go wrong. Skype credits aren’t a bad idea either. For the earth-conscious gadget lover on your list, Amazon Kindle, a souped-up e-book reader that allows for wireless e-book downloads, would make a great gift.

For social media-savvy PR folks, a bottle of Stormhoek’s Blue Monster is guaranteed to win smiles. Thanks to Hugh Mcleod, this wine is well known amongst those who frequent geek dinners. Other great gift ideas include flickr pro accounts, tickets to popular conferences like SXSW or cool t-shirts from the likes of Threadless. Grammar gurus are bound to appreciate the They’re, Their, There shirt.

That’s our list. Feel free to share your ideas in the comment section. You can also check out Chris’s gift guide for marketers, which Seth’s Blog pointed me to.

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