Where You Can Work
Publicity work is wide-ranging. So you can work in the book publishing field -- book publishing houses have teams of publicists that work to promote individual books -- or in various other industries. You can work for a corporation, promoting the company itself (and its image), or on its specific products. There is also a need for publicists in the movie industry to promote a studio's films.
Skills & Education:
There’s no set degree needed for a job in publicity. But, as a job which requires writing, it’s good to be proficient and comfortable in this area. Beyond education, attitude is important. A publicist’s job is to make the product they’re working on, whatever it is, sound interesting and good. If you don’t like the idea of talking up things you might not be interested in, or passionate about, this isn’t the job for you.
Pros:
Jobs in publicity are often easier to get, and higher-paying, than those in the editorial area. Publicity is also a wide field, meaning you work for virtually any kind of company. Non-profits, Movie studios, book publishers, Fortune 500 companies: they all have publicists, which means there’s plenty of job opportunity in all sorts of fields. A combination of creative and corporate work, publicity can be ideal for those who have a flair for writing but might not want to put up with the low salaries and fierce competition typical for journalism jobs.