1) Convince us why we should choose you to join our team of Goodstuffers

I am a highly motivated undergraduate student from the UK who has completed a 1-year internship, working as an Acquisition Go to Market support assistant at IBM in London. I study Business Management with Marketing at the University of Brighton, and will graduate by July, 2018. I see Goodstuff as the perfect place to start my career, it would be great if I could establish myself in one of the fastest growing UK media agencies, who have a proven track record working with a number of different clients across a variety of projects. Below I have summarised my key competencies that I feel would be of use to Goodstuff:

Analytical: On my placement year I oversaw the running a complex Excel report to communicate Acquisitions sales pipeline across all Europe. I had to analyse the report to effectively communicate key deals across Europe, before I produced the document I would often scan the report to assess if everything was correct and would be able to clarify further details to anyone who had queries.

Organised: I would class myself as being highly organised. Whilst on my placement year I worked as a project management assistant for the European Acquisition team. Our team were responsible for many different projects, which meant that I had to organise my time effectively. Whilst I was commuting to work I would write a to-do list of ‘must’ dos and ‘could’ dos, this allowed me to arrive at work and focus on the tasks that had to be done.

Drive: During my first year at university I was keen to secure a one-week placement, to see the practical side of business operations alongside the theory I had learnt at University. I acted upon my previous lack of practical experience and aimed to solve it by securing a one-week unpaid placement opportunity during my first year at University. The placement was a success and I was able to understand a business’ operations from a practical viewpoint, I could have relaxed during my Christmas holidays, but I saw this as a perfect time to gain more practical experience.

The competencies mentioned are just a few examples of the skills I have developed through work experience and my university studies. Upon research of Goodstuff, I understood that being good at table tennis would help you fit in, I would say that I am okay at Ping-Pong, however as the role starts in the summer of 2018 I will have plenty of time to practice 😊

2) What are the interesting trends in the way people consume media and content currently and how do you think they affect advertising plans?

Dynamic Content

It appears that brands are realising how important social media engagement is, in terms of creating meaningful and lasting relationships with consumers. Brands are looking at social media platforms to find ways to drive engagement, currently there appears to be a surge in dynamic content. Platforms such as Facebook Live, Instagram Story and Snapchat Live stories appear to increasingly popular with brands over the world. These platforms allow brands to tell stories to their customers and humanise the interaction between the brand and their consumers.

The picture above is an example of a company (GoPro) who use Instagram Stories effectively. They ‘humanise’ their brand by sharing ‘behind the scenes’ stories of employees who work at GoPro worldwide. This allows customers to understand the brand more and the ethos of the working environment. In terms of the effect of an advertising plan, dynamic content should ultimately be used by brands to ‘humanise’ the interaction between the brand and its consumers. Brands should actively involve the platforms that have been previously mentioned in their advertising plan, by using these platforms customers will understand the personality behind the brand, thus increasing engagement.

Chat Bots

A Chat Bot is a service that you interact with via a chat interface such as Facebook Messenger. Whilst on my placement year at IBM, I started to realise that Chat Bots are becoming an increasingly fashionable way to interact with customers. During my placement year, I took part in a group competition to develop a ‘Chat Bot’ idea which could be used at the Wimbledon Tennis Championships. Our groups idea was selected in the top 2 ideas and we had to pitch our idea to Wimbledon’s Head of Digital; Alexandra Willis. IBM set up the competition because The Wimbledon Championships were considering ways to interact with customers both at the grounds and virtually, Chat Bot’s were an effective way of doing this. In terms of the competition, our group won which was a huge success. The picture below shows our group at the Championships, and I would be happy to share the idea our group came up with.

Chat Bots are relatively new and somewhat unknown at this currently stage, however brands should look at the potential of involving them within their advertising plans. For example, a football or sports team should look at the possibilities of using Chat Bots to let fans find out the score, goal scorers, highlights and key moments to drive fan engagement.

3) If you were going to live on a desert island for the rest of your life and could only take three things, what would you take and why?

Presuming I can’t bring any people with me, here are the 3 things I would take on a desert island:

Item 1: World Class Internet Connectivity – by having internet connectivity I would be able to use ‘Item 2’ to keep up to date with news around the world, speak to friends and family and be aware of what is happening around the world.

Item 2: A tablet – on a tablet I would be able to use the key points highlighted within ‘Item 1’. The most important aspect of using a tablet with internet connectivity would be to speak to friends and family.

Item 3: A football – this may sound unusual; however, I have played football since I was 6 years old and football is a big part of my family. I play twice a week and it is something I would genuinely miss if I could no longer play. It would also be something I could do to keep my occupied and would keep me fit and active.