Guest blog post by language grad, Marie

Visit Marie's blog at
Grad and Looking

Today's post has been written by Marie, a French and Cultural Studies graduate whose career goal is to work in advertising. She writes spiritedly about the intense competition faced by those of us chasing our dreams in this popular industry, and highlights the main challenges and, even more helpfully, how we can face them.

Her story, of how she was inspired to carry out an internship in China in order to get that little bit closer to her dream job, emphasises just how much of a challenge today's job market can be. As she rightly points out, an internship abroad is not a viable option for all of us, but it just goes to show how important it is to make the most of the opportunities we are presented with. And, as I pointed out in my TARGETjobs blog post last week, the extra hurdles that we have to jump will just make us that much stronger candidates than if we had only to walk to the finish line.

Graduated and looking…

Hey everyone! My name’s Marie and like Jos (and many of you reading this) I am trying to break into the increasingly difficult marcoms industry – more specifically advertising.  A recent French and Cultural Studies graduate from the University of Sussex I know that there are two main things that advertising agencies think twice about when I apply:

1) I don’t come from a business/marketing/advertising background

2) My lack of agency experience (particularly because when I was first applying for grad schemes this time last year, I’d only had a couple of weeks of experience at an independent B2B agency in London)

So what to do you when any one of those two things are held against you? Well determination and pro-activeness play a huge part.  During my final year last year I applied for virtually nearly every advertising grad scheme that was out there that appealed to me, from AMV BBDO, to Iris, to Ogilvy, balancing uni deadlines with application deadlines, which always seemed to coincide. Unfortunately, despite all the hard work, out of the fifteen or so applications I sent I only received one invitation to interview (and as you can see from this blog entry, I didn’t get through to that agency’s assessment day that year). What had I done wrong? I had worked so hard and spent so much time on every single application. Couldn’t they see my extreme passion for the industry and eagerness to learn? I knew that my lack of experience was my main hindrance and that I needed to go out and get some, but I also knew that if I didn’t focus on the one important matter of gaining a good degree, my chances of working within the industry could be taken away from me completely. So for the last few months of my degree, I knuckled down and the hard work of a 4-year course finally paid off! But as graduation approached, reality dawned on me. Whenever bumping into relatives and family friends the same old questions and exclamations kept resurfacing, “What will you do now you’ve finished?”, “What, you haven’t got a job!?”, “There are lots of sales and recruitment roles out there, why don’t you pursue those options instead?”, “How about teaching? Lots of language students go into teaching…”.  The questions were never-ending, and whilst annoying, I knew that they all had my best interest at heart. But I didn’t want to go into sales, or recruitment, or teaching despite the constant competition and rejection I knew I was putting myself up for. There were simply industries that I wasn’t passionate about.  As the questions kept flooding in I started to do some research and finally found my solution: I was going to do an internship… in Shanghai.

Yes, that’s right Shanghai, China. I took the extreme option of moving halfway across the world for several months in order for me to get some of that integral work experience under my belt. And what an experience it was! It was undoubtedly worth every single penny that I had scrimped and saved up for during the summer at my part-time job. But why China of all places? Well three reasons really. Firstly, I’ve always had a soft spot for China, having grown up in Hong Kong until the age of 11, and I knew that I always wanted to go back. Secondly, being a language geek, I knew sometime after uni I wanted to start learning Mandarin, so what better excuse than to go and learn the language whilst being immersed by it! And finally, and maybe most importantly, the fact that China is an emerging market, that has not only become the second largest global ad market but that it is expected to surpass the UK and become the biggest consumer market in the next 10-15 years. As a result of this huge expansion, I know that employers, no matter what industry you want to go into, will start to look for potential employees who have had experience and understand the subtle differences between China and the West. It was easy for me. I didn’t need much persuading as I have never been one to be afraid of a challenge, particularly one that involved travelling and living abroad, having already spent a year living in France in my 3^rd year.

So last October, after 4 months of saving, I said goodbye to my family and friends, got on a plane and joined 30 other interns from around the world to take part in a two-month internship organised by CRCC Asia Ltd. I was working as a marketing and events intern for a small independent local advertising agency whose main channel is a website dedicated to helping expats moving to and living in Shanghai (I wont go into great detail about my internship but if you want to know more about what I did there feel free to visit my blog www.gradandlooking.blogspot.com). Whilst it wasn’t specifically an advertising internship that I had initially asked for when applying for the programme, I threw myself into it and as I was working for an SME, I learnt an extensive amount about event marketing, event management and social media marketing, and was given a huge amount of responsibility from negotiating with sponsors to devising and planning the agency’s biggest event of the year! I also learnt about Chinese business culture, including the importance of networking and guan’xi, and keeping ones face (mian’xi) and more importantly I learnt so much about myself as a person. Despite the never-ending cultural shocks that I faced in a city that is in a continuous state of change and growth, I never felt lost.  Even though frustration became a frequent sentiment in my day-to-day life as a graduate on my very own journey to the East, I learnt and improved upon many skills that were unbeknown to me! Whether it was my acting abilities during my first weekend when trying to look for coat hangers and struggling to find the word in my phrasebook (I am proud to say that I am pretty good at charades now!), or my ability in hiding my true feelings towards some unknown Chinese delicacy that I had to eat out of politeness (there were many dishes whose ingredients were unrecognisable, and perhaps to my relief will continue to remain unknown), or successfully holding my own on the metro and reaching my desired metro stop without being shoved and pushed off the stop before, Shanghai showed me that I can adapt to any unfamiliar situation.

Now I’m back in the UK, my life in Shanghai seems like a blur and I miss China terribly – I know it’s a place I would love to return to in the future to live and work. So what am I doing now? Well unfortunately I missed out on the majority of advertising grad schemes whilst away, but I have managed to apply for the few schemes whose deadlines were after Christmas and consequently been invited to interviews and an assessment day. I am also applying to entry-level advertising account executive job vacancies that I have seen, but surprisingly I have seen that even with me having several months of experience, for most vacancies this isn’t enough – they want at least a year’s worth! We just can’t win. For that reason I feel that grad schemes are so important to aspiring ad execs like myself, and that more companies should have them, or at least have a few trainee vacancies as many of us cannot afford to work for free for a year, especially with our student debt looming above us! Without a doubt my two-months of overseas experience have been integral to the success of my grad scheme applications this year, and I now have so much more to talk about during those important competency based questions that we are all so familiar with! However despite the fact that there is a high possibility that I may have to undertake some more work experience whilst working part time, I do not regret any part of my expensive decision to go abroad. I am not saying that you all have to go to the same extreme lengths that I have (after all going all the way to China might not appeal to everyone’s tastes and pockets), but that the key to getting noticed in the marcoms industry is to definitely get as much work experience as you can whether it’s an independent local agency or one in the big cities like London, Manchester, Birmingham etc. It really annoys me when I see headlines and reports stating how lazy our generation are. If they call people who are working for free for months on end just to get a foot on the career ladder in order to start paying off our scarily high debts lazy, I don’t know what more they expect from us. We all just have to keep at it and maintain our sense of humour. Be determined, be pro-active, be patient, and hopefully someone somewhere will see how much we want that ever-important first job. Good luck to you all J!

Marie xox

(If you have any questions or comments please don’t hesitate to contact me by following me on Twitter @mklw20 or connecting with me on LinkedIn).

Guest blog post by marketing graduate, Cassie

 This week's post has been written by Cassie, an American who studied Marketing Communication. She has been determined in her job hunt following graduation and has managed to bag herself a great job in the SEO sector. However, Cassie shows us in her post that even if you have a relevant degree, getting a job is not all plain sailing. She has some great insights into the marketing field and the job market, as well as some crucial tips for succeeding in your graduate job hunt. I hope you enjoy her thoughtful and engaging post.

How to Start Your Career in Marketing - 6 Tips

I remember being eager to graduate from college and pursue my career. Six months before I was set to graduate, I started perfecting my resume, portfolio, and interviewing skills. After graduation, I attended countless interviews and career fairs. I particularly remember attending a two day, intensive business career fair at Purdue West Lafayette. After going through the rounds, I hadn’t gained any solid job prospects—or at least any good ones. As I drove home, Katy Perry’s song, “Firework” came on the radio. As I belted out the lyrics, tears began flowing down my cheeks. I had gone through so much stress preparing for this career fair and for all of the interviews, I finally broke down because I felt as though I wasn’t good enough, smart enough, or worthy enough for my dream job. There didn’t seem to be many options out there and I started questioning my collegiate decisions. Katy’s song spoke to me, “Do you ever feel like a plastic bag, drifting through the wind, ready to start again? Do you ever feel, feel so paper thin, like a house of cards, one blow from caving in?” I most certainly felt this way throughout my entire job hunt, which lasted about eleven months. However, there is hope. With much persistence and patience, you WILL succeed! “Cause baby you’re a firework. Come on show ‘em what you’re worth.”

A huge shift is occurring in how we apply for jobs. When my parents started in the work force, they looked for jobs in the local newspaper and mailed in a resume and cover letter. Now, there is an overabundance of online job application sites such as:  Career Builder, Monster, Indeed, and Simply Hired, just to name a few.  With this current recession and high competition for jobs, you must be very creative and relentless in your job hunt. That being said, here are my 6 tips in starting your career in marketing:

1. Take the right classes and internships

After I had received my bachelor’s degree in marketing communication, I realized many people working in marketing had master’s degrees—mostly because marketing is very broad and it’s easier to get a job if you are more specialized. I majored in marketing because I enjoyed business, writing, and I was creative. However, many employers are looking for more pin-pointed, technical degrees. In hindsight, I would’ve gotten a bachelor of science degree instead of a bachelor of arts degree because you can still attain a mathematical background and also take essential marketing electives. Then, I would’ve minored in marketing or advertising.

Think of what you want to do in marketing. Do you want to plan events and help companies get media coverage? Then maybe you want to specialize in public relations. Do you want to create graphics and logos? Then go into graphic design. If you want to complete budgets for marketing campaigns, having a finance or accounting background is very helpful. Tailor your internships to you degree and your interests. It’s always better to take a three month internship and learn you do or don’t enjoy doing something before you actually start your career. Internships definitely leverage you in your career hunt. If it wasn’t for my experience with SEO in my internship, I may not have my current job.

2. Network

Build your network! I can’t stress this enough. While in school, make many friends and keep their contact information. Join groups and organizations that tailor to your interests and career goals. This also will help you keep up with recent trends in marketing and advertising. Make an account on LinkedIn and start building your network before you graduate college. Perfect your LinkedIn page. If you are creative, build an online portfolio—sites like Coroflot.com let you do it for free. Make business cards with your contact information, LinkedIn, Twitter handle, portfolio, and/or website link to hand out to friends, professors, or anyone who may be interested in hiring you. Locate marketing companies, even if they aren’t hiring, see if you can meet up with an account manager or marketing representative for coffee and pick their brain on how they got into the business and maybe get some tips from them. Who knows? Maybe they will like you so much, they will eventually hire you or recommend you to someone they know. Companies like to hire people they know. So, help them get to know you. 

3. Perfect your resume and interviewing skills

I know this one seems like a no-brainer. I thought I had a perfect, colorful, and creative resume. When I had interviewed for my internship and previous jobs, everyone gloated how wonderful of an interviewee I was. I thought I didn’t need to practice anymore. Wrong! Have as many people go over your resume as possible. I suggest keeping your resume as concise as possible—keep it to one page. HR reps only glance at your resume since they review thousands a day, and most of the time they don’t even look at the second page. Also, stick to the basic fonts and little formatting. With larger companies, they put all submitted resumes through a computer filter. This filter doesn’t see your cool design on your resume, it only picks up formatting and vocabulary. Many colleges will help you with your resume and interview skills. I suggest making an appointment with them about three to six months before you graduate.

4. Research companies

In addition to extensively researching companies you interview with, research companies that you may like to work for. Follow them on Twitter, Facebook, and on LinkedIn. Sometimes companies post jobs on LinkedIn that they do not post on their website. If you are feeling really bold, contact the HR rep on LinkedIn. This is the person that actually posts the jobs on behalf of the company. This is precisely how I networked to get my current position. I did a lot of research online regarding SEO companies in Indiana. I found Slingshot SEO and began following their blog. I started following them on LinkedIn and contacted the HR rep after I had applied to a few jobs within their company and didn’t receive any feedback. From me reaching out to her in a respectful and enthusiastic manner, I was able to land an interview, which eventually led to me getting my dream job at a wonderful company!

5. Perfect your job hunt

There is an incredible number of career sites. You will have to decide for yourself which ones work best for you. For me, I used Indeed.com and Simplyhired.com. I stopped going to these sites every day, only to complete a lengthy, mundane search for jobs. Instead, I set email alerts. Then, Indeed or Simply Hired will send you a daily email digest of the job title you are looking for within your location parameters. Which, is much easier than searching manually every day. After you create your LinkedIn account, follow companies and search for jobs. You can also have a daily email digest from LinkedIn sent straight to your inbox every day. If your college has a career network, use that as well. You can also find career fairs at your school. Mark these career fairs on your calendar in advance and research the companies that are attending the fair.

6. Relax and have fun

Looking for a job and going through countless, dead-end interviews can really hurt your self-esteem and self-worth. Make sure you do fun activities to relieve your stress and distract your mind. You are obviously in marketing because you are a creative person—hone into that. Draw, paint, play an instrument—do anything that will get your mind off of trying to find a job. As long as you keep trying, your dream job will come. It is only a matter of time. You don’t want to keep getting down on yourself because you won’t be as enthusiastic and passionate in your interviews! And, an added project or hobby can always be something interesting to talk about during an interview. Don’t get discouraged; practice makes perfect. 

“À cœur vaillant rien d'impossible.”—Nothing is impossible for a willing heart.

Author Bio: Cassie is a Lead Generation Specialist at Slingshot SEO, located in Indianapolis, Indiana. She blogs about traveling at cassaleenietravels.blogspot.com. Apart from traveling and keeping up with SEO trends, she enjoys art, photography, and music. Follow her on Twitter @cassaleenie.

- Cassie

The virtues of being rejected

 So, I got rejected from the DAS Accelerate graduate scheme.

Had to get that out of the way first!

The programme is an excellent opportunity for graduates to gain a fully comprehensive introduction to and training in the industry of marketing communications, through joining one of four streams (Brand, Corporate, Healthcare and CRM), and carrying out placements in a number of agencies that are part of the Omnicom Group, one of the largest in the world. I was absolutely gutted that my application form was rejected. Especially since last year I reached the stage following the application form, which is an Open Day consisting of an introduction to the scheme through presentations, networking with Omnicom employees and previous grads, as well as an interview. 

The fact I got through last year and not this year is something I have been quite puzzled about. This year I applied with an equally strong, if not stronger, brand essay; and not only that but I had three more experiences in marketing under my belt, including one carried out in one of their own agencies. I guess there’s no hard and fast rule as to what gets you through, but having worked on my application for many months prior to the deadline with a much better knowledge of the industry and the actual job I was applying to, it made being rejected with no feedback all the more difficult to bear. But anyway, onwards and upwards I guess.

A little story about my science degree 

I have decided to recount my experience of last year’s Open Day because it is one of the most tangible examples I have of my degree impacting on my application in an unfavourable way.

This bear is sad because he has
graduated, but it turns out his degree
isn't doing him much good

 Sitting down for my interview, my interviewer introduced herself as an employee at a PR agency in the Healthcare section. She looked at me encouragingly, expecting me to take an avid interest in this and seemingly hoping that we might bond over our shared career interests. I was puzzled. I myself knew that my degree did not involve the study of any hardcore science subjects that might form the appropriate foundation for a career in healthcare communications. But I had not considered that the recruiters might have looked at my BSc degree and made the assumption that I was suited to and/or interested in this particular stream. 

 I cannot explain to you how quickly her potential fondness for me melted when I impulsively exclaimed “Oh! No, I know I do Human Sciences, but it’s not really about hardcore science and health all that much. I’m much more interested in the Brand stream”, nor can I explain the figurative drop in temperature that followed this proclamation. 

 

ERROR. 

That would have been us in my
interview.

Although this was the truth, I hadn’t considered that my degree might have caused the scheme organisers to believe they were creating a match made in heaven by assigning this particular lady to interview me. Consequently, the shock at finding myself being interviewed by someone who was expecting me to share an interest in what they do for a living meant that I lost all tact, and pretty much extinguished any hope of us ever bonding. Had I been prepared for such an occurrence, I would have definitely dedicated some time to discussing our (supposedly) mutual interest, before gently steering her towards my preference for the brand stream. 

On the day it was made clear that the healthcare stream was the hardest stream to recruit for. I’ve often wondered whether the reason I was let through last was because they saw my degree and let me through because they were short on applicants suited to or interested in the healthcare stream. This year I stipulated in my cover letter that I was interested in the brand stream, and as I’m sure it’s probably the most popular, perhaps this is why I was not put through. Though of course, you can never say for sure. 

What did I learn?

I do not mean to entirely blame DAS for my lack of success last year; I know that I was nowhere near good enough then, and of course it was my fault that my disinterest in healthcare had the impact it did on my interview. By sharing the story I wanted to highlight what I took away from the experience, which I hope might also be of some help to you. Leaving the interview, I felt that sinking feeling when you know things haven't gone well. I also couldn't help feeling frustrated that I had been pigeonholed into healthcare. I knew then that I had to use my work experience to move away from my degree and show my interests and capabilities in my preferred areas. 

It also emphasised to me how important it is that you look at yourself objectively, see yourself as the recruiter will see you, and use the perspective of how others see you to strengthen your application by making your interests and goals transparent. In my cover letter to DAS, I had dedicated a paragraph to talking about my degree. Reading this back now it is easier to see why the recruiters might have been persuaded of my desire to apply my BSc degree to my career. Whilst my original intention of including this paragraph - to demonstrate how my degree had benefited me - was a correct approach, I had emphasised the wrong aspects of it, such as content. Had I read it back objectively, I might have realised that this approach might mislead the recruiters into assuming a passion for science and healthcare. Then I might have been better able to write from a more relevant angle, such as how the inter-disciplinary nature of the degree makes me suited to the placement style of the scheme. And although I didn't get through this year, I can look back over my application with a certainty that I made my interests clear, and would have avoided any crossed wires at interview!

I can be a Lion! A Cannes Lion!

Been working away at applications to some grad schemes over the holidays. Whilst I really enjoy writing them, as anyone with an interest in the industry  would do, it can also become an experience tantamount to an interview or assessment day. For as I work I am also drawn to the websites and Facebook/Linkedin pages of the companies, which invariably leads me to a procrastination spiral of stalking staff and the current graduate trainees.

I try to be like this little guy
as I write and submit applications

Now I've been lucky enough to be invited to a few interviews for graduate schemes, and during my preparation prior to the event I work my butt off researching and pre-empting the questions I think may come my way. I also find a vital aspect of my preparation has to be a self-confidence boost, where I try to study my application objectively and concentrate on all that I've achieved. Great. But the procrastination spiral I mentioned above is the worst enemy of this exercise. I'm drawn to the Linkedin profiles of the graduates who have come before me, and am consistently met with the same thought process as I peruse them.

"Oh my gosh, yes! Someone with an academic degree! There's hope for folks like me! Wait...what's that? Oh, they spent their year abroad at JWT...Right. Well, maybe the next one..." *clicks through to another profile* "Ok..wow, they did molecular biology. How did they persuade the recruiters they don't want to go into healthcare PR?" ( - one of my most common problems) "Ah, it must have been those placements at DDB and Proximity in their summer holidays."

Suddenly I feel like I'm sitting in a room at a group interview alongside these amazing graduates, and all my effort into bolstering my self-esteem trickles away...

I know it's fairly unlikely that I'll make it onto a graduate scheme, so maybe I can put all this down to character building and learn from it. Apart from the enjoyment and understanding gleaned from working on application forms, interviews are always a worthwhile experience. It's great to be able to talk to the successful graduate trainees and see what they are up to in their incredible new jobs, and in particular to speak to the real industry experts interviewing me; I especially enjoy asking them the typical interview questions - why marketing, what's your favourite brand etc. - and seeing how they approach the answers. And if it all fails and I just end up crying in the interview (actually did happen in my last one), more often than not there's chocolate :D