We recently welcomed Melody Kroneraff on an internship in Crowd's Amsterdam studio. Here's what she had to say...
My university offered me the option to, instead of taking a 30 hour class, work on any skills that I would like to develop. I have been waiting for the moment that I could gain some actual work experience so I started exploring my options and sent agencies an email. Ever wondered how many companies actually want an intern for 30 hours? Well I know now; close to none.
Somehow I was very lucky, because one of the companies I really look up to offered me a spot. I was over the moon. Crowd is a world-class digital marketing agency which reach global audiences and I was going to part of that. I might have been incredibly excited.
Jet Weevers, Studio Director of the Amsterdam office, gave me a wonderful warm welcome and offered me multiple different projects to work on. It is amazing to work alongside such a driven and skilled professional who is always ready to answer any one of my questions and guide me whenever needed.
In my short time here I have worked on marketing and development but also learned about how a big company with locations all around the world functions and cooperates.
On my first day I started with designing some pop-ups for a current website and it was great to be able to put my skills to use and be part of an actual project. Then I was briefed on the current project I would work on, and started writing a research report.
I won’t sugarcoat it; working 9 to 6 is tiring. Still, at the end of the day I felt so accomplished that the next morning I woke up with new found energy and determination and I couldn’t wait to see what I would learn next.
‘Practice makes perfect.’ This is what my parents used to say, and they’re right. I’ve looked up countless Photoshop tutorials when I forgot how to do A or safe B and I studied for my exams on SEO and SEA (and passed), but I never really grasped it until it was time for me to work on an assignment. And honestly, I had fun doing it! Seeing something you’ve worked on come alive is unbelievably rewarding and working on something with others creates such a wholesome connection.
Today was my last day and I got to work on a design for the Crowd landing page. There was a wireframe attached to the document already, so all I had to do was to follow that as well as their already existing website and simply remake that. Easier said than done.
I have had a couple of web design classes before, but only the basics so armed with a tutorial (or three) I got to work.
The first hour was spent learning how to create the foundation and once I got the hang of it, it went pretty well! It was so fun to see something I put together slowly but surely come alive. I have to admit that I could not have done it without the help of Jet, who would correct me when I was wrong, advise me to proofread again and let me explore anything and everything I was interested in. It was really cool being able to work on different aspects of different projects.
