Written by: Megan Mathew, Agricultural Communication & Marketing Major I spent the summer after my junior year as the marketing and communications intern at Environmental Tillage Systems (ETS). ETS manufactures and sells the SoilWarrior, equipment that strip-tills land. They primarily sell in the Midwest, but also internationally. Since they are a small company, my internship covered many aspects of business. I created content for social media, traveled to trade-shows and events, planned events, and completed many other tasks. I was able to grow my customer relation skills by speaking to seasoned and potential customers at events and learning their perspective on agriculture and how they benefited from the SoilWarrior. I do not have a background in agriculture, so this internship forced me to dive head first into this industry. I had to learn the basics of farming and tillage, the culture and how people interact with each other, and how to market for this audience. This task was extremely daunting, but I took it slow. Day by day I would take notes on things I learned through my coworkers, twitter, and articles. This way I was able to build up my knowledge of the industry and could apply it to my work on social media and in customer relations. A challenge I faced in my learning involved the bad weather we had early summer. Because of the weather farmers were not running the SoilWarriors, so I could not see the machine that I was marketing run. Once the tradeshow and event season started in August, I had the opportunity to watch the SoilWarrior run twice a week in different states and on different kinds of farms. This allowed all the information I was accumulating to piece together and finally make sense. By the end of the summer I had a wealth of agriculture knowledge to apply to my classes and future career. Key learning experiences I had over my 14 week internship involved interacting with people in the industry. The marketing director and coordinator at ETS gave me plenty of guidance to allow me to excel in these experiences. Attending the National Strip-Till Conference educated me on different perspectives in agriculture. After talking to agronomists, business professionals, farmers, and families, I fully understood the audience I was marketing to. I also gained an appreciation for the hard work and dedication that goes into agriculture. Another part of my internship was sitting in on meetings. Although this may not seem very interesting, I learned the importance of networking and representing the company, because it could lead to beneficial partnerships. Being professional and running meetings efficiently is an acquired skill, and now I have the building blocks. Over the course of the summer I had many opportunities to learn the value of agriculture, and now I can use these skills in my future career in the agriculture industry.
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Written by: Cyrus Gottlieb, Agricultural Communication & Marketing Major My internship was at Rush River Scenic (RRS), a set building company based in western Wisconsin. The company has many big clients in Minneapolis including Best Buy and Target. My role at the company was to work on set at different photo studios around Minneapolis and help with marketing, especially with the company’s social media. It was interesting to work on marketing for a company that primarily sells business to business because individual consumers are unlikely to purchase a set themselves. One of the most difficult aspects of working in a creative field is that everything is not always set in stone. An art director may change their mind about a certain project and force you to start again from the beginning. Working with producers can also be difficult because everything on set must fit into their vision exactly. This can mean moving parts of heavy sets to different places in a room for hours until everything is just right, then tearing down the set so that they can set up for something else the next day.
Connecting with a lot of different professionals in the creative world was one of the most valuable parts of this internship. I met many set builders, photographers, producers, and even some executives. Building connections and figuring out how people work sets up a lot of potential advancement in the field you want to work in. I think that I may continue to work at RRS because it provides some amazing opportunities to work on sets across the country and expand connections. 12/13/2019 0 Comments internship spotlight: STGeneticsWritten by: Catherine Thompson, Agricultural Communication & Marketing Major As a junior in Agricultural Communications & Marketing, I interned with STgenetics in their call center in Middleton, Wisconsin. Throughout my time at ST, I was involved in distributing promotional materials, assisting the call center sales representatives, and preparing for events such as trade shows. I also achieved a more in-depth understanding of the dairy genetics industry. Going into my internship, I was hesitant about my stance on sales and a potential career in sales. My internship with STgenetics was very valuable in the sense that I grew to enjoy dairy sales, specifically the opportunity to assist farmers and their farm’s needs by selling ST’s products. A unique takeaway I gained from my internship at STgenetics was the opportunity sales has for growing personal relationships with their potential and current customers. I think it is important to build these relationships and understand the potential customer’s needs prior to selling a product because the product will essentially sell itself.
Another lesson I gained from my internship was the relationship and chemistry between marketing and sales. For a sale to occur, the customer must be familiarized with the product. It is then the job of the sales team to get the product to the customer. Marketing is also essential to sales because of their role and knowledge in consumer trends. Marketing utilizes analytics of consumer trends to most effectively reach their goal audience. Written by: Emelia Melson, Agricultural Communication & Marketing and Applied Economics Major This summer, I interned for Bayer Crop Science under the DEKALB Asgrow Brand in Michigan. As a U.S. Row Crop Sales Intern, I had a very independent internship that allowed me to explore what career path I want to take in the future. Our only directive for the summer was to complete projects that added value to the territory and the company as a whole. Although my title was in the sales division, all of my projects revolved around making marketing materials to enhance sales in the territory because not a lot of seed is sold in the summer. I truly believe that I could not have had a better internship to help guide my future career. The opportunity to step out of my comfort zone and move out of Minnesota truly helped me grow professionally and personally. Much like all Midwestern states, Michigan suffered from a very wet planting season that caused challenges for all farmers and everyone connected to the industry. Not only did I get to work with the very passionate and knowledgeable salespersons at DEKALB Asgrow Michigan, I also had the opportunity to explore other facets to the company such as Bayer Chemistry and Channel Seeds. Working with my mentor, I was able to structure projects that added territory value working with research promotion, dealer surveying, and videography.
I had many great learning experiences this summer. If you were to see me this summer at an event, there is a good chance you would have seen me behind a camera! I learned more about videography this summer than I ever thought I would. I also learned how to structure and give a sales pitch. Agronomy was a key focus for me this summer, learning how to identify weeds, diseases, and insect damage. On top of all of my key learning experiences, I learned about agriculture in Michigan everyday. It was very cool to be able to compare how Michigan agriculture and Minnesota agriculture are both different and similar. I am excited to be able to take my summer experience and bring it with me into my future career! |
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January 2020
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