My First Internship at The Ranch

Hey Owls, I’m Natalie! I’m currently a sophomore advertising major, with a double concentration in media planning and account management.

This semester, I worked as a media intern at Red Tettemer O’Connell + Partners. Throughout the past few months, I’ve gained many new skills and grown as a student and a young professional. Hopefully, reading about my experience at RTO+P inspires you to break into the industry with your first internship!

Interning at RTO+P has been wonderful, and I couldn’t have hoped for a better first internship experience. As a full-service agency, RTO+P has given me the opportunity to develop a strong understanding of how projects move throughout each department from start to finish. It’s fascinating to see how each side of advertising comes together to create amazing work. While I spend most of my time in media, I have the opportunity to help out other departments, too. It’s important to stay busy throughout the day, especially when my time at the agency is limited! To make the most out of my few short months at RTO+P, I try to work on as many different projects as I can every day. These new experiences have only helped me to expand my skill set!

As a media intern, I get to help out the media department on a number of tasks each day. While some of my tasks vary throughout the week, I consistently manage Facebook, Instagram, and Pinterest ad campaigns for our clients. Additionally, here is a list of a few main tasks I work on throughout the week: social recommendation targeting, media authorizations, media plans & recommendations, performance reporting, and vendor & influencer research. Fortunately, I get to sit in on meetings with vendors, which has provided me with great insight into vendor-agency relationships. When I’m not working in media, I help out our social team. This can include tasks such as pulling metrics from our client’s social media accounts and researching influencers. Besides learning about media plans and Facebook Ads Manager, I have seriously improved my Excel skills and my understanding of media planning in general. RTO+P is fast-paced and exciting, which makes it easy to work hard and dive headfirst into assignments. In my experience, treating every little assignment with importance makes the more exciting projects even better.

Aside from gaining invaluable experience in media planning, I have grown as a student and person tremendously throughout my time at RTO+P. Working three days a week has cut out a big chunk of time that I was used to having for class, homework, and friends. This forced me to better manage and prioritize my time. Even though I have less free time throughout my week, I love being on a consistent schedule. Since RTO+P is located in Center City, I have become more comfortable with using SEPTA and being surrounded by people other than my peers. I love Temple and our campus, but I’m so glad this internship has led me to step outside my comfort zone more regularly.

Thanks to RTO+P, I am now even more passionate about my future career in advertising! This internship has taught me so much about the industry, and I’m moving forward with an incredible group of mentors to guide me in the future. Getting an internship is the best decision I’ve made so far at Temple. I hope this blog inspires you to seize all of the amazing opportunities Philly agencies have to offer!