The little things in life.
At my current internship at Philly Magazine I’ve gotten the opportunity to meet a lot of great people (see my last blog about networking) and learn a ton of tools that will help me in the future. Because it is a magazine, I’ve learned about making media kits, tracking down leads, maintaining advertising clients with recap books, etc. You know, magazine ad sales stuff. But I’ve also learned some little things that I know I will always carry with me.
For example, I can proudly say that I now know how to Fed Ex and UPS a package via their online website with no problem at all (you may think that’s lame, but hey, I didn’t know how to do it before). I’ve gotten much more comfortable at calling businesses and clients on the phone and speaking to them like a professional employee. Sometimes I get the task of cold calling leads and seeing if they are interested in advertising with our magazine and I have no problem talking with them and answering any questions that they have. I’ve also learned a handful of new computer software that I didn’t even know existed before I began my internship. One of my favorites is “Snag It”. This program allows you to take screen shots per say. It’s really useful when trying to capture an entire website page or e-mail because it automatically scrolls to the end of the page. I’ve also become much more comfortable with Microsoft excel. I know how important excel is in many aspects of “real world careers”, but I was never any good at. My supervisor, Danielle has shown me a ton of new tricks on excel that I am extremely grateful for. I really like that my internship has given me the opportunity to see the process of magazine advertising. For example, at Philly Mag an ad goes through three levels of individuals to “fact check” it and make sure all of the information on the advertisement is correct (Yes, that is one of my many assigned tasks).
I know sometimes at offices, interns get tedious little tasks but I honestly feel that everyone should learn from all that you do at your internship because you never know how it may help you in the future.
-Christie Porter
