The Other Side of Advertising

For my internship, I am working for three local radio stations (99.9 The Hawk, 107.1 The Bone, & ESPN Lehigh Valley). I do not have one specific position; rather, I go where I am needed in order to experience everything that is involved with working in radio. Primarily, I work in the sales and the promotions departments. While working with sales, I am able to see how advertisements are handled once they are created and sent to a media outlet (in this case, radio). While I am studying the creative track of advertising, I find it extremely helpful to see the full process of ads from being created to the final production. Due to the fact that I am also in the creative track, my employers have given me many projects which involve creativity and making items which I can use in my portfolio. At the same time, these projects involve advertising research, such as using Arbitron, so I now have experience with that as well.

For the promotions department, I am involved with events which the stations hold. Being personable and having people skills is something which I believe is very important in the advertising field, and I am definitely evolving these skills through such promotional events. In addition, I am able to see how the planning and advertising which go into an event have a great effect on it. Before the end of the semester, I will be attending more events to represent the station. This, so far, has been my favorite part of the internship because I am able to see the audience of our stations. While creating ads, updating the website, or writing portions of our weekly email, having the audience in mind helps to make it relatable and specific to our audience.

This internship has also led me to more opportunities. There is a local advertising agency which I have been interested in for quite some time. After speaking with some of my co-workers, I learned that our stations actually work with this agency. Through my internship at the station, I will be introduced to some workers at the agency and will hopefully be able to complete an internship there next summer. Regardless, I already have many more items for my portfolio thanks to this experience. I enjoy working for this company very much and this experience so far has taught me that this is something I would love to do for the rest of my life.