In September of 2022, I had the opportunity to work as a copy-writing intern at Studyportals in Eindhoven, the Netherlands. This internship provided opportunities for myself to grow, not only as a writer, but as a communication professional as a whole. I was able to explore other aspects of communication such as public relations, event management, and project management so that I could have a better understanding of the type of communications professional I want to be.
Here are some of the wonderful projects I worked on:
Articles For Clients
One of my main tasks was creating articles that would benefit clients and highlight how Studyportals could help assist them in the future. Every article contained information relating to trending topics or projects being completed within Studyportals as well as a call to action encouraging clients to interact. Here are some examples of such articles.
Recruiting undergraduate students
Predicting the impact of new student trends
Social Media Copies
A weekly task for myself during my internship period was coming up with social media copies. We had weekly meetings to discuss what was on the calendar for our content and we would work in tandem to create the posts. I would work with my fellow intern to create copies and visuals. (She was the visual creator and I would assist with any writing.) With a post being shared everyday, there were many copies that were written. Here are a few examples of the types of posts we would work on:
General Projects
During my internship, I had the opportunity to work on many different projects with varying team members and also individually. These projects helped me realize that one of the aspects in communication that I enjoy is project management, and even led to me applying for an external course in the subject. Here are some of the projects that I worked on during my internship period:
Advent calendars for clients: To celebrate the upcoming Christmas season, I was tasked with creating an advent calendar for clients in the UK region. For this, I created a project plan and coordinated efforts between University Marketing and the UKI team. The end result was 100 custom designed advent calendars shipped to these clients, each fitted with a note wishing them a happy holiday season from Studyportals and their matching account owner.
Christmas socks for client gift: For this project, a client gift needed to be created to show our appreciation of our clients at the end of the year. Ideas needed to be brainstormed and a final product created. As a team, we decided on a pocket guide with fun facts and a pair of custom Studyportals socks. I took the lead on the socks creation and made it my main project. For this, I had to research where we could find custom socks within our budget range, work with our team designer on a design for the socks and the label, come up with a copy for the label, and coordinate with the company (Sokkies) to ensure that the product came on time and was in good condition. The socks took quite some time but resulted in beautiful socks that clients and the company loved! This end of year gift project concluded with a highly coordinated packing week in which we separated clients by country, collected individualized messages, and packed the gift sets to be shipped out before the end of the year.
Country pocket guide for client gift: For this project, a client gift needed to be created to show our appreciation of our clients at the end of the year. Ideas needed to be brainstormed and a final product created. As a team, we decided on a pocket guide with fun facts and a pair of custom Studyportals socks.For the pocket guide, I assisted in collecting 2 facts per country for 195 countries. I then worked with the project leader and our designer to help decide how to design the pages and cover of the book. Finally, I coordinated with the editor to create copies for the back text, inside welcome text, and informational text for clients at the end of the book. This end of year gift project concluded with a highly coordinated packing week in which we separated clients by country, collected individualized messages, and packed the gift sets to be shipped out before the end of the year.
Enrollment Review Tool video creation: For our enrollment review tool, we wanted to create a video that would welcome clients to their space and give them a warm feeling about the difference they have made in students' lives. With the designer and our product marketing manager, we held several meetings to brainstorm the feelings we wanted the video to have and how we could write the script to fit that vision. As the native English speaker and copywriter, I brainstormed with this team various phrases and ideas and then combined all of our thoughts into a script. After the script was completed and a video was made with graphics to match, I worked with our designer to pick the perfect music and adjust the voice-over that had been created. (The original music was not as fitting as we had hoped, so I spent time procuring the right music. The voice over had parts that did not sound as inspiring as we wanted, and so I noted which versions could be mashed together to create the perfect voice-over.)
LinkedIn ads project: In order to generate more leads, ads need to be made. I was asked to assist by a team member who was working on creating several paid ads for Studyportals. I was brought in as a copywriter and native English speaker, and so my task was to interpret everyone's thoughts into content for the ads as well as generate different slogans and taglines. I was also tasked with creating articles that could also be shared via ads. This project is still ongoing as I am brought in to check things out every now and then to think of more ideas for content to be shared.
Upcoming Sub-disciplines for 2023 report: One of the larger reports I was able to work on was our Sub-discipline report for upcoming topics schools should be looking out for. To bring more authenticity to the report and show that Studyportals is hands on with students, I interviewed several students in the varying subjects to get their opinion on the increase of interest. These interviews were then utilized in the report and will be used again in the future for other projects.
Higher education conferences 2023 guide: For a last push of the year, we decided to create a guide that had a compact overview of the higher education conferences that are occurring in 2023 as well as what can be expected at each conference. They were sorted by date and organized in a PDF that could be downloaded. My task was researching the conferences, updating their info, and listing them within a document so that they could be inserted into a nicer PDF format. This guide was so well received over 150 downloads that we are going to be creating this again for 2024.
Australian International Education Conference (AIEC) - Coastal Connections: For the AIEC conference of 2022, Studyportals hosted (in partnership with The PIE and Pearson) a networking reception on the Gold Coast and I was tasked with creating visuals and a name for the event. I came up with the name "Coastal Connections" and the slogan "An evening of networking on the shores of the Gold Coast". The visuals were created for the digital welcome sign in front of the location and the main visual. I also compiled hero images from every organization that worked together and created a video to be played on screens during the event.
UPCEA MEMS Poster: UPCEA ( University Professional and Continuing Education Association) MEMS (Marketing Enrollment Management Student Success) event was hosted this year in New Orleans and Studyportals was in attendance. I was brought on to help create a poster for a sharing session discussing topics relevant to the theme of the conference as well as shining a light on how others can learn. For this, I worked with the editor as well as account managers to create a poster highlighting how the University of Florida was able to create a strong digital presence online. This was in accordance with several rules and layout required by the conference and was ultimately approved and presented in New Orleans. This was a more difficult project as language choice and subject matter had to be carefully controlled, however, I am proud of the results and was happy to hear that it was a success at the conference.
Video Editing: Throughout my internship I have been given the task of editing several video clips to be more concise and accessible for social media posts. This involves reviewing the videos and citing time stamps for the editors to take into account when clipping the videos. This was done several times for a few different videos and taught me a lot about being efficient and clear in instructions when working within a team
Global Student Satisfaction Awards (GSSA): One of the largest projects within Studyportals is GSSA. This event is a culmination of review collection, speaking to students, inviting speakers, bringing in sponsors, organizing locations, working with the data team to understand survey results, building brand awareness, and creating a positive event. There are many steps that need to be taken to complete this event, and during my internship my focus was primarily on creating invitations for speakers to join us, as well as putting together an information pack for our clients and staff. This was a nerve wracking task as I was creating invitations for large names and well known people and I did not want to disappoint Studyportals. Overall I think this project went well and I am looking forward to working further with Studyportals on it!
Create Your Own Website With Webador