November 2014

This Fall I have learned so much and gained so much experience from interning at the Chestnut Hill Business Association. Interning at CHBA was not a typical advertising internship, but I learned more about marketing an entire town of businesses and the challenges that come with that. Chestnut Hill is a charming town right outside of Philadelphia and the Business Association holds events continuously to draw customers to their strong retail strip of charming shops. My job over the past couple of months has basically been coordinating our marketing for the various events that we hold.

The end of summer was a struggle before the beginning of my final fall semester at Temple University. I began applying for internships a little late in the game and felt pressure from all angles to make a decision on where to work. I saw a post that Famehouse was looking for a graphic design intern, and being an advertising student I assumed I would not necessarily get the position because there are plenty of other people with more qualifications. I decided to apply nonetheless.

Way back in 2010 when I first started abandoning hopes of becoming an astronaut and started looking for a more tangible career I stumbled upon a documentary called Art&Copy. The film is a must-see (and probably part of the curriculum) for any advertising student, and made me consider —and choose— advertising as my major. However the film lacks to mention the larger world behind advertising: that of brand-focused initiatives that help make so many companies successful.

So, this semester I am a publicity and promotions intern for Allied Integrated Marketing. They have over 20 offices in the US and Canada. They primarily work in the entertainment industry, specifically for film studios. Before I started there, the intern coordinator contacted me and told me I would be working on the Warner Brothers and Focus Features accounts with Jesse, the director of the office. Since Jesse is the director, he is super busy, but that’s good for me because it means that I am never bored. Jesse likes to joke that he “has time for everything except the actual accounts he is in charge of.” Luckily, he has me and two junior publicists to help him out.

I’ve been shy my entire life. I tend to avoid situations where I have to talk to people I don’t know. Being anything but quiet and reserved is a struggle. This also affected my desire to show things I create to the world. My discomfort with talking to people manifested in a fear of not just me, but also my art, from being seen.

I think one of my favorite concepts in the world is free food; you have to eat to live, right? Well as an Account Services intern at Tag Strategies this semester, every Wednesday for the past 2-3 weeks I’ve been getting just that, but with an added bonus…I get to learn while I eat! This is what Tag Strategies calls an Intern Learning lunch. Participants include myself, the creative intern, as well as an employee in a particular capability in the agency. So far, I’ve gotten the opportunity to hear from, and ask questions to employees in Business Operations, Creative, Account Services, and New Business.

This fall I had the opportunity to have my first internship at LevLane Advertising. Although I am a copywriter, I took an internship in the traffic department. At first, I was skeptical because I did not know much about the department or how it operated and I thought that maybe I was not qualified. But so far, it has turned out to be a great decision. I have learned so much more about agency life and have gained a ton of real world experience. Traffic was something I never thought I would be interested in before, but after the past couple of months it is definitely something I would strongly consider.

When I used to picture working at a “real job” I didn’t imagine people would be dressed as casually as in the classroom.  But at the two PR/marketing agencies I’ve now interned for, that has mostly been the case.  It’s interesting that a casual environment has become the norm in a lot of agency-type places, particularly when you look at pictures from agencies just a few decades ago where the offices and dress code were noticeably more conservative.

As an intern at LevLane, one of the coolest and most rewarding experiences I have had thus far is being able to work on a brand new client. Agencies are constantly looking for new business, and we just so happened to land a cardiology group after several months of negotiating as soon as I came back to LevLane for my second semester.

This semester I achieved one of my goals that I set way back at the beginning of high school, which feels weird to think about! For a while, I knew that I wanted to work at WXPN in some way, and I feel very lucky to have the opportunity this semester to be their graphic design intern. WXPN is a non-commercial public radio station broadcast from the University of Pennsylvania. Non-commercial means that WXPN doesn’t have the typical ad spots that you’d hear on Radio 104.5 and instead the station gets funding from other sources, like memberships and sponsors. It might seem like a non-traditional place for an Advertising major to hold an internship, but as an Art Direction student with an interest in graphic design, I can say that it’s giving me lots of useful experience with applications for any type of design position.

When first arriving to my media sales internship at Greater Media Philadelphia I was somewhat hesitant on what to expect. I have been there for about two and a half months now and I have already learned a lot about the media buying business, while getting an understanding about what I wanted to do for my career. Everyone was really friendly and helpful by allowing me to attend their creative and sales meetings. While attending these meetings, seeing what it was like in a “non-agency” company, I feel like I would rather work in an agency. This is not because I simply did not like the people there but for my career I wanted something that I could be passionate about. With that being said, this internship opened up my eyes to see what I really wanted to do in life and I am extremely grateful for the opportunity to work with a lot of cool people.

So, I hoped to come across an internship opportunity this school year and land one for the Spring semester. Internships are a STRESSFUL thought – getting the right one, finding one you like, one that would really make you stand out, and one you would actually gain valuable experience from. They say things never go as planned, as did my interning plans for the year. I came across an opportunity posted by the ad listerv emails, which seemed too good to pass up. It was a listing for Evoke Health, a healthcare advertising agency right in center city who was looking for an intern candidate to work in their three-part rotational cycle of account management, regulatory operations, as well as project management. Two out of the 3 sounded familiar, except what the heck is regulatory operations? Just like that, I was on a telephone interview and heard back later that day that I was the chosen one. The fall intern.

After working on a month-long research project for a new client at Chatterblast Media, I was given the opportunity to present my work to the client. This was a really great professional experience, not only because it was so heavily involved, but also because it gave me the confidence to own my work.