Internship Report, Essay Example

Introduction

This is my marketing internship report. The internship took place at a retail/ consignment store for marketing. During the internship, I was able to apply classroom knowledge into practice to learn new concepts of marketing and new marketing techniques that make an organization very competitive in the market place. I was the designer of flyers, product positioning, advertisement and all sorts of jobs related to marketing. Besides designing fliers and other marketing tools, I was able to interact with new friend and business professional that challenged my competence in marketing and inspired me to dig deep into marketing strategies that are current and up-to-date. I was able to incorporate with my knowledge to make one of the dangerous marketers around the market place during my internship.

Tasks I was assigned during internship program

When I arrived at the company, I was given warm welcome and I was introduced to different sections of the company which include; products the company deal with and general market strategy that makes the company competitive in the market place. I was prepared to begin internship practice with market analysis. Market analysis is one of the concepts that many organization put in front when designing strategic marketing plans and schedules. I did secondary market research about the company products and strategies appropriate to approaching the market and winning customers into our business products and brand. This was made possible because there are so many scholars who had made studies on customer markets. The only challenge that I encountered was to find relevant numbers for the organization and to satisfy the needs for the organizations capabilities and competition.

Another task that I was involved it doing included marketing mix, strategies and management programs. This section included formulating recommendations and providing personal views in the ways of building long-term customer relationship, a new homepage and certifications that are must haves in customer markets. The design of new company home page was my great hands on practice task which, I was assigned. This was because the one the company had had remained nonfunctional for almost 10 years. Creation of impressing home page required expertise because it was the core marketing tool for the company. This made me together with the management staff to create meetings to give ideas on what kind of massage should be placed on home to impress the customers and draw the attention of anybody who could have a glimpse of our organization. This project was successfully implemented.

Another section that I provided services and learnt a lot was, preparation and presentation of sales proposals. Because the target of the company is gradual growth, it was necessary to attract customers to support the growth. I prepared and arranged power point presentations at public places and strategic meeting points of people to explain the products and their benefits over the existing products. And it acted as a tool to communicate identity and quality of the company products. Additionally, I did tasks involving administration of, policy writing and organization of customer visits.

Analyzing marketing strategy

Analysis of the market entailed segmentation strategy. Segmentation involves the descriptions of target customers. For example, when we dealt with customers of other businesses, we provided them with information concerning our geographical location, type of industry, size of the company, and end product use.

Market mix

I was assigned the task of analyzing the market mix. It entailed analysis of particular elements of the mix. The elements included,

• product strategy

This involved analysis of:

• the category or categories offered
• product mix such as width, length, depth and consistency
• Branding policy which investigated whether the company uses family branding or individual branding technique. And showing of the company brand trademark (s).
• corporate image
• product innovation evidence

2) Pricing strategy

Entailed analysis of:

• Company position in the market. I realized that in the market was competitive due to similarity of the products in the market; introduction of discounts, upscale and price moderations makes the organization win many customers.
• Type of pricing; this involved analysis of the type of costs the organization is using, the type of cost-based, demand based, or competitor based. Knowledge of pricing strategy helped me to plan for the future marketing strategy for the business.

3) Communication strategy:

• This involved all the techniques that the company wanted to apply in winning competitiveness in the market. Advertisement techniques, messages and company reputation all formed part of this marketing mix. I was involved in designing and drafting information to be put in fliers, bill boards and what could be used in media for advertizing the organizations products and promotions. This strategy also touched on other advertisement tools such as print and broadcast media for advertisements and promotions of the company.
• Direct marketing: this kind of communication strategy required my expertise to directly send marketing mails to individual, cooperation and other organization about our products, telemarketing and internet marketing.
• Personal selling: this required that I learn strategies required in description of the company approach to personal marketing. It involved analysis of how sells representatives communicate with customers, either by phone, personally or electronically.
• Sales promotions: this involved description of the organizations sale programs. Promotions included tactics touching on consumed promotions and trade promotions such as trade allowances, push money and participation in trade.

4) Distributions: this marketing mix entailed description of the company product marketing channel. I was involved in drafting diagrams and charts showing the location of my organization in the channel and its position in the competitive business.

I was also involved in analyzing the environment in which my organization was operating. Analysis of the environment entailed different division of the environment into sub divisions which included;

1. Customer trends: this one involved discussions of the trends that may influence the performance of the company especially the behavior of the target customers.
2. Economic trends: economic trends entailed analysis of the income rate, inflation and interest rate.
3. Industry trends: it involved identification of new products in the market.
4. Competitive situation: this entailed extensive evaluation of the competition in the industry that our organization was operating.
5. Technological trends: I was involved in gathering data and information on technological trends. This was helpful to the organization in knowing current technology to embrace it.

SWOT analysis and recommendation for marketing strategy

It involved analyzing strengths, weakness, opportunities and treats to the organization market entry. It was one of the core tasks that our marketing team put into consideration to help the organization gain competitive advantage in the market. I was able to experience the weight SWOT analysis has in organizing marketing strategy for the organization. it helps the organization to discover its strengths and build on then, its weakness and device strategy to reduce them, its opportunities to pursue them, and its treats to strategize how to triumph over them.

Reflection

The internship was very helpful to me and I believe that both the company and I gained a lot during the 5 months period I was involved in the company. I left the organization with a detailed marketing strategy, managerial and marketing tools to help it in gaining competitive advantage in the market. We were able to gain more customers which ensured that the products were used to capacity. Most importantly, I was able to gain experience in business particularly in marketing and meeting important tasks. I gained new experience particularly in customer presentations and home page designs because I was able to link knowledge and real practice in marketing. Working with people from different departments of the organization gave me another phase of personal experience and an overview of the organization and processes. The internship gave me an opportunity to work with people of different cultures and I was able to learn how to deal with people’s diversity. My communication skills improved tremendously, and I could not like to miss any such an internship opportunity.

Conclusion

Generally the internship helped me a lot in achieving practical exposure on what marketing means in the real ground. I was able to put into practice marketing strategies and witness the reality of their working. This made me to appreciate classroom knowledge and also give credit to marketing strategies meant for competitive advantage gaining.