The month of December is a lot like November. In November the company’s campaign deals with “Black Friday” deals and sales, but in December the company’s campaign deals with “Holideals” deals and sales (instead of Holidays). With November’s campaign, social media posts went out every week, but for December’s “Holideals” social media posts will go out once everyday for 12 days. On each day, a social media post will highlight a deal or sale on select items and/or surgical equipment. These posts may also be turned into flyers or emails and sent to certain customers. Because The end of November and the Start of December are in the middle of the week, the first “holideals’ social media post will go out at the start of the first full week of December, with a social media post that will be posted the week prior and will introduce and promote December’s campaign. The workflow for this task was very similar to the workflow for November’s promotion. I was given all of the information at once and worked on creating content for each of the days in the order that they were prioritized. For example, a social media post for December 8th would need to at least be created and posted before December 9th and the 9th before the 10th, etc.

Unlike creating content for other tasks and promotions, it has been nearly impossible to find myself struggling with designs and layouts because all of the daily posts will follow the same design layout but with different wording for each day. Following this promotion, the rest of my task will consist of creating social media posts for the upcoming holidays and completing my usual weekly/daily responsibilities.

For the month of November the company promotes their “early Black Friday” and “Black Friday” deals and offers for their customers. These promotions are sent out and posted once a week via Facebook. The company’s goal is to post a new promotion once a week that highlights either a new set of equipment or instruments that are offered at a discounted price, or deals a customer could get on trading-in or repairing older/used equipment and instruments. A portion of these posts will also be sent directly to certain customers via email (my supervisor takes the content I create, revises it, and sends these emails to the intended customers herself). The last week of October is when I scheduled and posted the first promotion post that introduces the “early black Friday” sales and offers. From there, I spent the remainder of that week and the first half of the following week working on and completing the upcoming promotion posts for the month of November. All of the information for these promotions were posted onto a task board (Asana) by my supervisor, and were to be completed by me in the order in which they were prioritized. For example, the promotion post for November 7th would have priority over the promotion post for November 14th and needed to be completed by its date, because the 7th is sooner than the 14th. This pattern will recur until the last Promotion post is scheduled and posted to the company’s Facebook page (November 28). 

The company also did this promotion last year, and oftentimes I’ve learned that they recycle their own ideas and content. However, this year my supervisor wanted this promotion to have a newer and more modern design, especially since it would be posted on social media (Facebook). While working on this task, I initially felt overwhelmed by the amount of specific information that was required to be put together, all while needing to fit into a new layout and design. But as my supervisor gave me feedback on my sketches and ideas, I was quickly able to work more comfortably and efficiently on these tasks.

October is breast cancer awareness month. Every October the company promotes their “pink” campaign. This is when they have a sale and deals on a selection of their surgical equipment, with a portion of the profit they make being donated to breast cancer research. For this, my responsibilities have consisted of coming up with a new design and layout for this promotion with flyers that will be sent out to certain customers and for Facebook posts. This was the first task I’ve worked on that had multiple parts, so at first I constantly found myself a bit delayed with coming up with new layouts mainly because it felt like I either didn’t have enough space on the page to work with, or because my vision and ideas started to become somewhat repetitive. My weekly meetings/sit downs with my supervisor were really helpful in these instances. We are able to collaborate and go back and forth with ideas to get original and creative results.

I only had to create enough content for a handful of posts for this task(s). For the Facebook posts, there were about 4 in total  with one being posted at the end of September (this post introduced breast cancer awareness sales and donations). The company’s official colors mainly consist of white and different shades of blue, so I found it interesting getting away from the original “theme” and colors by using the color pink for all of the content. I had to incorporate pictures of different equipment and products for some of the posts (some of which I may have taken in my previous photography internship position). Overall, this is what I consistently worked on throughout the month of October, with smaller tasks and assignments in between.

Some of my weekly/daily tasks and responsibilities include creating content for campaigns/promotions, holidays, flyers, customers and social media. Most of the time, a lot of this content is created and scheduled quite a bit of time before it’s actually put out or posted for viewing. Often times, information is given to my supervisor and then some of that information is given to me to be turned into content meant for social media or the company’s website. Right now, I have scheduled social media posts all the way up into early next year (January-February 2023). Specifically, some of the things I am given to work on and complete on daily and weekly basis involve, taking customer reviews and testimonials  and putting them on social media and/or the company’s website, creating ads/flyers/social media posts for the company’s mobile on-site repair service (Instrument Surgeon), creating content for campaigns and promotions that will be posted on social media and be sent out to customers and lastly, organizing all of my work within the content creation programs and desk top, and from there, checking off all my task for completion once I finish and have them approved. 

What I have found most challenging and what I have asked for most assistance on so far, is coming up with and creating different layouts and designs for social media posts. Fortunately, these layouts and designs don’t all have to be completely different, however none of them should be the exactly the same, especially those that contain similar information. Sometimes I am able to mess around with the content creation programs (Canva) and eventually come up with something fresh that is different from other layouts and designs, and is cohesive for the viewer(s). Other times I schedule times to meet with my supervisor to receive feedback and brainstorm ideas. I find these meetings to be very productive because of this.

Starting the digital/social marketing internship at Surgical Direct this fall was not very unfamiliar. I worked as an intern for this company over this past summer but in a different intern position (photography intern). Yes, these responsibilities are quite different from the last intern position, but the staff, with the addition of a few new members, and the areas where I work in the building are overall the same. On the first day of my internship (Sep. 6) my supervisor gave me a variety of login information to the different programs and methods of communication we use. I was given an intern email account (outlook), an intern canvas account to work and create content under, an intern Asana account to review my tasks and lastly, access to the company’s social media accounts so that as I create content, I can schedule and post it. My responsibilities as a digital marketing intern for Surgical Direct are developing content ideas and launching new campaigns, creating social media posts and content for the calendar year, designing flyers of good quality and developing strategies for growth on social media platforms (Facebook, LinkedIn).  I work directly with my supervisor (Director of Marketing), so it is very uncommon for there to be any barriers with communication and/or asking questions. We meet one to two times a week to go over my completed task and to talk about future tasks, goals and deadlines.

 What I think I have appreciated most so far during this internship with Surgical Direct (and even the last intern position) is that I don’t feel micromanaged and oftentimes I’m able to solve problems myself. I quickly realized a lot of “problems” can be resolved quickly or with a simple trick, when I pause and think back to my training and to the tools given to me. Sure, there are times where I seek help if it is something out of my control or something that I don’t know how to do/fix, which in those cases, I resolve those issues alongside my supervisor.