Question

Topic: Student Questions

Ideas For Marketing At My First Internship

Posted by Anonymous on 6/3/2005 at 2:13 PM ET 250 Points
Hi! I am a third year marketing student with minimal experience and I currently have an internship at my university's printing services as the marketing intern. We work on projects mainly with the faculty doing course materials and copies as well as with the admissions department on alumni and recruitment. Truly, I am the only person in the marketing department and being so in-experienced, I was hoping for some advice and ideas on how to make sure I walk away with an impacting experience from this job and how to make the company feel as though I am an asset, even though I am only an intern.

Thanks for your time,
Wheel136
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  • Posted by wnelson on 6/3/2005 at 10:44 PM Accepted
    I believe that the best source of direction would be your "boss" at the printing services. He or she must have had something in mind before requesting or agreeing to accept a marketing intern. You can also ask him about his strategy for the printing service. This may reveal a direction for the "marketing department."

    That being said, going to them with some ideas on what you might be able to do of value wouldn't be a bad thing.

    Unless I miss my guess, I believe the university print shop is a fairly captive enterprise and traditional business concerns - like market and competitors is of little interest to them. What I mean by this is that the printing services probably isn't concerned about growing sales or losing business. It's an "internal department" versus a viable firm. Profs go there because they can get copies without paying "real money," but instead, use "budget funds" that are probably loosely tracked. So these traditional aspects of marketing most likely will not be of value to the printing operation.

    So, an aspect which might be useful to the printing service and the internal customers is a "product definition" exercise. You could spend some time talking to professors, alumni, and recruitment group about the services offered, how satisfied they are, and what would make them more satisfied. Also ask them if there are any services they would feel the print service could offer that would help them.

    From this information, you could create an action plan for improving the services and expanding the offering to meet the newly identified needs. I'm sure that the more work you do in fleshing out the proposal with costs and benefits to the printing services operation, the more valuable the effort will be viewed. For instance, if there is a service that the customers want and another printing operation in town has it (like Kinkos), you could go there and explore how they offer the services, including equipment, staff and staff training needed, and even go a step further to find out the cost of the equipment used, if new equipment is needed.

    This is just an idea. Again, first step is to go to your boss and ask what he's expecting. If he is vague, you can lay this idea on him as a suggestion.

    Hope this is helpful to your efforts!

    Wayde
  • Posted by Chris Blackman on 6/4/2005 at 9:52 PM Member
    If the business is as wnelson surmises, and if the "boss" has no real directions for you, then you might consider researching the users (customers, internal clients) to see what they ideally want from a printing shop, and analyse the gaps between what they want, and what the shop currently provides.

    You could then analyse the cost of offering those services, do some price/competition analysis, and develop a plan to present to the "boss" proposing those changes.

    Chances are, nothing may happen, but it will still be a great project to widen your horizons!

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