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My first blog is about my first internship experience, so ironic isn't it?
It feels like yesterday I walked into the interview door and its been 24 weeks into my first internship.
I was keen on gaining industry experience during the course of my Masters degree. So I applied to EnginE Digital Marketing internship via University's recruitment services portal. EnginE project, funded by European Union is one of the several projects Lancaster University Management School is working on for the development of SME's across UK. Definitely my career managers were so patient with the numerous careers meeting and they supported me throughout the process.
Though I was prepared, it was my first ever interview, I was super scared. Andreea Vasile, EnginE internship officer and David Moore, Development Engineer at Alan Dick Engineering Ltd., were scheduled to conduct my interview. Now when I look back I had felt something like somebody is going to eat me. I am glad that I was able to quickly come back to my senses and confidently approach my interview. The very next day I got a call from Andreea, revealing the big news that I got selected and specifically mentioned that David liked my 'energy and enthusiasm'. I was so happy and started jumping around like a happy puppy, and yeah 60 seconds later got back to reality and started thinking about the next steps.
Nearing to my starting date, COVID-19 pandemic happened and it put everybody inside four walls. Though I liked technology I was not sure how practical it will be to have an entire internship virtual. To up-skill myself and to get used to working online, I took up and successfully completed a 12 in 1 digital marketing online course form Udemy.
"Im so proud to say that Aparna is our MSc Management student who in the midst of this pandemic secured a job with an ambitious local company and also completed an additional online marketing course! I feel humbled and inspired by this young talent" - Radka Newton
To have an office like feel, I set up a small place in my room which had weekly schedules and a lot of motivational quotes. Shoutout to this amazing note taking app called Notion, it helped me organise module notes and references, research, internship contents and many more.
I started my internship with reviewing ADE's new website. In the process of reviewing their website, I learnt different SEO tools such as Keywords Everywhere Chrome Extension, SEMrush and Moz. From the concepts I learnt, I developed on-page SEO strategies for the website. An initial couple of weeks into my internship, I invested in learning about the company, their services and competitors. I developed social media strategies along with David, specifically for LinkedIn, Twitter and Google My Business.
It was challenging when the company did not have a sole designer. I knew how to create posters with Canva or Snapseed, but I took up this opportunity to learn a pro design tool, Figma. Initially, it was difficult to process the basics, but after many iterations and amateur posts, I am getting familiar with it. I am grateful that ADE was open to all of the ideas I was bringing in, and David was very encouraging with his feedback on my amateur designs. For the first post I published, it got 50% more reach than their previous poster. This was such a boost so, I tried creating GIF posters as well. Some of the posts I published for ADE are below:
HERE IS A FUN FACT: Before this internship, the only relationship I had with engineering and machines was with laptops, mobile phones and my kitchen blender. 1000% I learnt quite a lot about various sectors ADE currently work, like Civil Nuclear, Power Generation, Utilities, Offshore and many more.
Having an internship entirely virtual is not as scary as I thought it would be. If you have a proper schedule, strategy and excellent support from the employer, everything will be fine. I am happy that ADE liked my work and extended my internship for 6 more weeks. I am all set to start working on developing a marketing and sales strategy for their construction projects.
Wish me luck 😇
Tools I used:
- Google My Business
- Google Analytics
- SEMrush
- Moz
- Keywords Everywhere Chrome Extension
- SimilarWeb
- Figma
