By: Autumn Riggenbach – Summer 2017 Marketsmith Inc. Intern
My name is Autumn, and I am a rising senior at Miami University studying Marketing and Business Analytics. While looking for internships for this summer, I knew I wanted to get experience working with a marketing agency since I had the opportunity to work in a corporate marketing atmosphere last summer. I stumbled upon Marketsmith through LinkedIn where I read a glowing review about the company. I learned that it was a full-service marketing agency specializing in analytics (matching perfectly with my studies in school). As I continued my research, I found amazing samples of Marketsmith’s creative work and read about their numerous awards and recognition’s. I quickly realized that this was an opportunity that I could not pass up. It was a hard decision to move from Ohio to New Jersey for the summer, but I couldn’t be happier that I did.
Over eleven weeks, I have experienced the life of a full-service integrated marketing agency. In my role working with the account team dedicated to servicing our PSEG Long Island, PSE&G New Jersey and Widex accounts, I was included in many internal and client meetings across multiple agency departments. Within these meetings, I documented the key takeaways to better my understanding of the meeting or project purpose. I also helped with marketing campaigns by sitting in on brainstorm sessions, reviewing creative with the team, and helping to recap program performance. I lead two ongoing efforts, researching competitors’ ads and finding vendors that offered services that would be beneficial for Marketsmith to consider for future opportunities. Outside of my everyday work, I wanted to share some of the highlights of my internship, which included attending the NJ Ad Club Awards, co-planning a shadow day for two high school girls, and traveling to Long Island for a Small Business campaign photo-shoot.
I had the honor of attending the NJ Ad Club Awards where I saw a variety of other agencies’ creative work (including Marketsmith’s 11 nominations), network with marketing professionals and bond with employees at Marketsmith who I work directly and indirectly with. As this was my first time working in a marketing agency, it was a great learning experience to see how different agencies approached their marketing campaigns through various marketing tactics and styles. My favorite part of the night was when NJ Ad Club began announcing the winners of the different categories. Marketsmith finished with seven First Place awards and two Best-in-Category awards for a variety of creative work across multiple accounts. It was a remarkable experience to watch the team be recognized for the amazing work they do for their various clients.
During my first few weeks, I attended a SuiteGirl panel session that Marketsmith hosted. This event highlighted four professionals who utilize marketing and technology in their everyday lives, one of whom was Marketsmith’s SVP of Client Services, Nicole Malino. SuiteGirl is an inspiring organization that motives high school girls to chase their dreams and work towards the “C-Suite.” Following this event, we had the opportunity to host a shadow day for two of the girls who attended. I thoroughly enjoyed co-planning this shadow day with fellow MSI interns: Molly, Lauren, and Kirstin. As part of our shadow program, we had the girls attend client meetings and gave them the opportunity to speak with Marketsmith executives who provided words of inspiration about going after the career path they want. It was a great bonding experience for our intern group when putting this day together, because we put a lot of work into making it a fun and engaging day for our visitors.
The last experience that I would like to share was one of the marketing campaigns that I had the opportunity to shadow from start to finish, which was PSEG Long Island’s Small Business Campaign. I was able to observe the campaign from the initial creative briefing to shooting the business owners to seeing the final print ad executions. During the process of developing the campaign, I had the chance to attend the photo-shoot of two Small Businesses in Long Island. It was eye-opening to observe all that goes into planning and executing a photo-shoot and fun being able to spend the day with the team outside of the office.
All-in-all, I came to Marketsmith with no expectations and little knowledge of what a full-service marketing agency was like. I am leaving Marketsmith with a great amount of experience that I will be able to utilize in my future career. Adjusting to living in a new state where I had no family or friends was harder than I expected, but Marketsmith did an amazing job at helping me adjust and make New Jersey feel like home (even if it was just for a few months). I truly believe that I wouldn’t have gotten these opportunities anywhere else and I would highly recommend interning at Marketsmith, especially if you have any interest in working within an agency after college.
