I know it's been a while since I last uploaded a blog post and truth be told I didn't really know what to write about however today I thought I would make a post detailing a 2 week Marketing Internship / Work Experience that I carried out recently.
Now
you may not know that I study Fashion Journalism at university and my
course is very diverse with the possibility to undertake units in PR,
content writing, film and photography etc. However I also wanted to gain
some other experience whilst I was finished for the summer.
My
internship was based in Cardiff, so pretty accessible considering my
Welsh home address and is the head office for fashion brands - Peacocks,
Jane Norman, Jaeger - and the Holm Hotel, which is a hotel located in
the Penarth region.
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During
my time here I was based alongside the marketing team - particularly
those responsible for Jane Norman and Peacocks. Although I did do some
research for wedding brochures and restaurant comment cards and gave
suggestions so they can be implemented during the Holm Hotel's new
marketing techniques.
No
two days of mine were the same at the office and everyone on the
marketing team treated me as part of their group - allowing me to join
in on meetings to come up with new slogan for price posters in stores,
to carrying out competitor analysis reports (to see how the companies
faired in terms of sales / social media / websites and even store
layouts), choosing winners of social media competitions and even
creating spreadsheets detailing the marketing strategies to be
implemented over the coming year by local and regional stores (and let
me tell you, those things are planned so FAR in advance, and also I've
never seen a more complex spreadsheet consisting of dates / figures etc.
And it gave me major GCSE ICT flashbacks)
I
was even in charge of helping to construct some visual merchandising
displays for Peacocks / Jane Norman stores suitable for implementation
in stores in international regions like Cyprus -(this actually involved
me dressing and undressing some mannequins and let me tell you, clipping
an arm back onto a mannequin whilst trying to sort out the straps on a
tropical print dress at the same time is no easy task)
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My
favourite aspect of the role was working alongside Vicki who is
responsible for the marketing of Jane Norman. I was able to shadow Vicki
as she worked alongside the e-commerce team to create new email
newsletters and checked magazines/ blogs / social media / press for
brand featuring. Also I got to work independently and like most fashion
intern roles I was responsible for processing press return samples for
the JN brand that had been returned by the PR agency and also sat in on
meetings with the brands assistant buyers who showed off new stock
samples for the Autumn Winter range.
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Even more excitingly during my time
there I helped carry out trend research and pitch ideas for the JN
brand magazine that's distributed
through Peacocks stores and Jane Norman website (which ties into my
journalism degree) but i also got to help select stock/ New in-designs
for the AW17 images that will be displayed in store windows and web
content. Spending time
searching through the new stock and designs as well as being able to
give my input (which was taken on board and used!!!) was so exciting and
really made me feel involved in the team. Sadly I was not able to
attend the photo shoot itself (it was on location around 6 hours away!)
although I did get to see the final imagery and saw that my research /
styling boards for hair and makeup were taken into consideration and
also the outfit choices I helped make were used in the imagery (how
bloody cool)
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On my last day there I was also responsible in helping with the marketing supplies for Peacocks' Autumn Winter 17 Press Day which including loading branded USB drives with content, files and images for press, PRs and bloggers. Just a few days later, I saw some bloggers I know sharing images from the day on their social medias - instagram stories in particular - and found it kind of surreal how things I had helped with ended up in the hands of those I admire and follow online.
I
really do feel like I covered lots of areas of marketing and visual
merchandising and was able to gain an insight into the running of the fashion brands and also the marketing of different brands (and how they differ depending on their audience) and I can utilise the skills I've learnt here on my next internship (which starts near the end of August, yikes!), at university and in my future career.
I
obviously haven't detailed every aspect of the role here and haven't
included (all of) the stores' final images due to them not being officially
released yet but I hope it has given you an insight into my marketing
internship experience!
Kisses,
Chlo
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