Blog Fall 2014

My time spent at Radius has been one of the best experiences of my life. As my first “corporate” job, my eyes were opened to the way the business world operates. I have made incredible relationships here that I know will last beyond this internship and the possibilities for my career have opened up in a huge way. For example, I am searching for my first job out of college currently. Before I had Radius on my resume, I was not having very much success and didn’t have much to talk about in interviews. Once I added Radius, it was like a day and night difference. Employers have recognized the skills that I have been able to learn here and have responded accordingly. I have been incredibly blessed by my time spent here and can’t thank Radius enough for the opportunity. To conclude my time as a online marketing intern here, here is one final picture of Taylor Swift:

Wow! I can’t believe the semester is actually over. I have to say, it has been the best and worst semester of my college career. I have had a lot of late nights and early mornings, but it has been worth it. While I’ve been working hard to manage two jobs and a full class load, Radius has been a place I can come to escape from the pressure of school. There have been multiple days where I would have much rather stayed at work and finish a project instead of going to class. My work at Radius was not just busy work, but work that helped me grow in the field I love. I have learned so much working on data analytics. In fact, my internship with Radius has inspired me to get a certificate in Business Analytics from Georgia Tech. I love being able to make predictions about the future based on key performance indicators and even help make decisions based on the past.

Being a Online Marketing Intern has not only taught me a lot about business, but it has also taught me some things about life too. The people I have worked with over the last few months are some of the nicest and most caring people I have ever met. They are always looking to help other people and do whatever it takes to make someone else’s life easier. My co-workers inspire me to continuously be looking for ways to help other people. Overall, I absolutely loved my internship at Radius and am excited to be coming back next semester as a part-time employee!! Always moving upward and onward!

Upon arriving at Radius as a Online Marketing Intern, I received a pretty quick reputation as a dude who loves Taylor Swift. I don’t regret this because, after all, it is incredibly true.  She is an incredible marketer and that is what drove her to sell 1.3 million albums in one week.  No one has done this since 2002. But what has led to a lot of publicity is the fact that she removed her music from Spotify.  How could she do this?! I want to listen to her music using my subscription fee, not actually purchasing the album! Clearly, it was a smart move as no other artist has been able to have that much success in recent history.

Everyday at Radius, I look at numbers.  Sometimes it gets overwhelming.  Sometimes I have no idea what I am looking at.  And most of the time I know exactly what I am looking at but don’t know how to look at it in a way that creates value for Radius.  However, when the moment comes where you finally realize what the numbers are telling you, the feeling is like nothing else.  It is like you found buried treasure or scored the winning touchdown in the Super Bowl (ok, maybe not that cool, but its pretty awesome). This is what I believe happened when Taylor and her people decided to remove their music from Spotify.

I believe they looked at their options, saw that they had the power to be able to continue selling music, not through the popular method of the time, and they made a tough decision.  They saw that Spotify isn’t going away, but their initial release of this album will be.  Had they unveiled it on Spotify they would have lost many sales from people who wouldn’t have purchased the album (myself included).  Payouts for an entire year from Spotify plays for an artist like Taylor Swift can reach up to $6 million dollars, according to Spotify (although, Taylor Swift’s CEO claims only $500,000).  That is a significant chunk of change.  However, by removing her album, she was able to reach that goal in one week.  One. Week.  And once the market for Taylor’s CD has played itself out in a month or two, I will bet that you can find her album right there on Spotify seeking that $6 million that she can now get on top of the sales she just generated from selling her album separately.  This is a group of people who looked at the numbers, saw that they were in a position to generate an incredible amount of value, made a tough decision, and succeeded in a big way.

Taylor Swift is an incredible artist who makes great music.  But it is her business-minded decisions and marketing that will make her remain atop the music world.

It’s coming down the end of the semester. (Dun-dun-dunnnn.) During this time, the trees turn all kinds of pretty colors and I get to wear sweaters and boots. That alone makes this kind of season spectacular despite the cold. Aside from weather changes, other things also come with this time of year. Namely, Christmas. Christmas seems to come sooner and sooner every single year. This year, I went shopping for food for a Halloween party the day before Halloween. I walked around the store, got the food I needed, and then decided to look for some extra decorations. That is when I noticed it. Christmas trees everywhere. Why in the world would Walmart start Christmas before Halloween? While I don’t know how I feel about starting the Christmas celebration in October, I do like the idea of starting to watch Christmas movies sooner rather than later. Christmas movies are a big of my pre-Christmas celebration. I have quite a few traditions that I try to keep up with every year. One tradition is to repeatedly watch Elf. If you have never seen Elf, you are doing life wrong. If you don’t like Elf, you have no sense of humor and also are doing life wrong. (#sorrynotsorry) Elf is one of the single best Christmas movies of all time. Because of this, a few friends and I have set a standard for ourselves. We have decided to work at least one quote from Elf into our conversations every day. Don’t judge. It’s a good time. (Here are some of the best Elf moments/quotes ever.)

Aside from Elf, I also have a tradition of watching Rudolph with one of my best friends from high school. We started the tradition sophomore year with and have continued to keep the tradition throughout college. If you were wondering, the tradition consists of going to his house, eating dinner, and going outside where we project the movie on the side of his house and sit around a camp fire eating s’mores.

While Elf and Rudolph are great and a lot of fun, there is one movie tradition that I do with my family that I look forward to the most. Every year, on Christmas Eve, my family watches It’s a Wonderful Life. This tradition has gone back as far as I can remember. My family gets together, opens one present each, and then watches the movie. Pretty simple. Nothing to extravagant. But, to be honest, I think I look forward to this time more than Christmas morning. With being away from college and moving out of my parents’ house, I realize how much I really miss spending time with my family. Getting to stay with them during the Christmas season and spend time relaxing and just watching a great movie is something I cherish and look forward to every year.

Sincerely,

Online Marketing Intern

When I accepted this internship in August, I was a little nervous. As a post-graduate, I was searching for a full-time position, not something temporary! But after visiting the office for my in-person interview, I left with a great feeling. I knew that even if I only spent a few months here, I’d come away with a lot of valuable experience. I knew it would be worth it.

A couple of weeks ago, at my mid-semester internship evaluation, LanNhi and Vu sat me down and offered me a full-time graphic designer position. I almost couldn’t believe it. I mean, I don’t even mind getting up at 7am every day to make it here. This is a big deal. I immediately said yes.

This week marked my first as an “official” employee. Besides keeping slightly longer hours that results in a slightly longer commute (yay suburbia), for me the transition so far has been seamless.

When I graduated in May, I did a lot of thinking about whether I wanted to pursue design in a corporate or agency setting. The first keeps regular hours but can suffocate creativity, while the second offers plenty of variation and energy but typically requires late hours that can lead to early burnout. I did enough of the latter in college. I like my sleep. To me, RadiusOnline is the perfect blend of a corporate and agency setting. Everyone here has such positive energy that having fun at work and making cool, creative things happen are givens.

And now, that creativity has a department! Guy and I are the first members of Radius’ new Creative Department, and we have a lot of big ideas for how we want to help the company grow. We want to use design to make a brand that people can identify with and feel a connection to. We want to make things happen. And maybe dance to some TSwift along the way.

Bailey

Online Marketing Intern

My time here at RadiusOnline has truly flown by, and I cannot believe that I’ve been interning here for about two months now. When I started in August, I had no idea what to expect, or what would be expected of me, but I can honestly say that this internship has been one of the most impactful and engaging experiences of my college career. From the incredible team atmosphere, to the delicious free treats, to the opportunities and educational experiences I have been granted, I can’t imagine a better internship atmosphere, and I look forward to learning more and contributing more as the semester continues.

While I am passionate about business and marketing, I have several other interests as well, including travel, photography, art, corny humor, poetry, cooking, and fitness, and I have always been concerned that in my educational and professional pursuits I will no longer have time to devote to these passions. Through this internship, I have learned not only that this is not the case, but also that these interests can integrate with my professional passions. This has been especially evident with the RocketLevel project I have working on, where I have had the opportunity to develop most of the literary content for the marketing materials and the company website. I have been given a lot of creative freedom with this content, which has allowed me to sneak in ample space puns. I have loved this project, especially because it has allowed me to fuse my love of written language and cheesy humor with my work.

Due to my love of language, I enjoy discovering new words. One word that I have been especially keen on recently is acatalepsy. Acatalepsy refers to the idea that human knowledge can never reach certainty, only probability, and that it is more meaningful to question than to draw conclusions. Throughout the past week, I have been contemplating this word, and I think it is incredibly relevant to my internship experience. There will always be more for me to learn and explore at RadiusOnline, and I find that so exciting. I can’t wait for the coming months!

To finish, I will exit with a corny space joke: How do you get a baby astronaut to sleep? You rocket!

Sincerely,

Online Marketing Intern

Last week, during a leadership development meeting, I was listening to a speaker discuss keys to becoming a successful person. He had a lot of great points and I loved what he said, but his material isn’t what stuck out to me. What stuck out to me was the fact that he continuously referred to the group as “sports fan”. I don’t know how much you know about Georgia Tech, but sports are not something that we are well known for. Video games? Engineering? Math? Robots? Yes. Sports? No. I mean, our band even performs a tribute to science and math every home football game. So, if I were talking to a group of Georgia Tech students, “sports fans” is not something I would refer to them as.

Even though we are not too well known in the sport’s world, occasionally GT will do something to end up on ESPN. During the GT vs Miami football game a couple weekends ago, Georgia Tech actually made it on ESPN for something other than a blown play. Our football chaplain, Derrick Moore gave the best pre-game speech ever. If you haven’t heard it yet, I’ve included it at the bottom of this post. (P.S. This video will get you pumped up even if you don’t like football or Georgia Tech.)

There are a few things that Derrick says in his speech that I think are really important to everyday life. One thing he points out is that most of the hard work the team had done to prepare for the game was done in the off season. For those of you that don’t keep up with GT football, before this game, GT was 4-0 and went on to beat Miami and ended up ranked at 22 with a record of 5-0. This is a big deal because Georgia Tech hasn’t beaten Miami in 5 years or been ranked in quite a while so after the victory all the students swarmed the field. The team worked hard for that win and every one of them was cheered for by all the people in the stadium. That win was a result of a lot of work off the field during the off season. The guys had to lift weights and run while no one was watching in order to celebrate with all of Georgia Tech that night. The same applies to life outside of sports. We all have to do our best when no one is looking. If we want to achieve our goals, we have to work those extra hours and stay up late after all of our co-works have left and our boss doesn’t know we’re still there. We have to do things we don’t like or don’t want to do knowing that it will all pay off one day.

The other thing that Derrick says that stood out to me was when he talked about sacrificing for the guys next to you. Getting ahead in life isn’t about stepping on people and pushing them down to achieve your goals. My first internship really emphasized the importance of team work. Our promotions to management were based off of the accomplishments of our team and not just on our results. We had to make sure our team was meeting their goals in order to meet our own goals. During my time there, my manager was always willing to meet with me when I was struggling and never looked down on me for asking questions. He made sure to keep in contact with me during the day to make sure I was doing alright and would answer my phone calls immediately. Between my last internship and the internship I have now working at Radius, I have learned firsthand the importance of team work in the office. There is a quote, “the sum is greater than its parts.” Just like Derrick was saying and what my last internship taught, to be successful, you have work hard and help the people around you. When people work together, they achieve more than any one of them could do individually. Georgia Tech’s running back is pretty good, but there is now way he would be able to win a game on his own. He requires help from the quarterback to give him the ball and the line men to take out the guys in front of them. Do your job to the best of your abilities and sacrifice every day to push your team toward success. If you do your job and remember to support the people that you’re working with, there is nothing that your organization will not be able to accomplish.

Sincerely,

Online Marketing Intern

I can’t believe it, but I’ve been here for almost a month and a half! It makes sense that the time has flown by, though, because there’s never a dull moment here. The past week especially has been a little crazy. Between a) having pro arm wrestler and Over the Top star Johnny “The Iceman” Walker come in to referee our arm wrestling competition and b) taking a quick (but very necessary) break to take pictures on top of the roof in our superhero costumes, we’ve been busy. As Guy mentioned yesterday, anyone who looks at our Instagram who’s not a part of Radius is probably pretty confused.

That constant energy doesn’t just apply to the culture — it also applies to the work. When not eating birthday cake, petting dogs, or running around taking pictures for the Radius Instagram, I’m working on a variety of design projects. The one I’ve been working on the most lately is RocketLevel, our new web hosting site. Because many companies offer web hosting, we’re making RocketLevel stand out through strong marketing, design, and branding. It’s been a lot of fun working through the look and functionality of the site with Caroline, Carolyn, Guy, and Montana, and, essentially, creating something from scratch. I’m excited for it to finally launch — it shouldn’t be too much longer!

Over the past few weeks, I’ve learned so much about using WordPress themes and plug-ins to take a bunch of ideas and make them into something tangible. And by working on RocketLevel, CarCareCONNECT, and eDentalImage, I’ve also learned a lot about site functions and designs that can lead to greater conversion rates — a real-world application to my college courses, which often separated design and marketing rather than exploring how the two work together. Being at a company with a great culture and a range of projects has been nothing but awesome so far, and I can’t wait to see what else it brings!

Sincerely,

Online Marketing Intern

I’m a late addition to the online marketing interns here at RadiusOnline.  You probably never would have known it though, as I have been quickly accepted and thrown into the fire.  I’ve loved what I’ve gotten to do so far, and it has been like drinking from a fire hose.  It is very possible that I’ve learned more in my first week here than I have this entire semester of school.

What my focus has been these first couple of days is looking at the data that Bronwyn has collected and trying to see it in an intelligent way. It looks like a lot of numbers and confusion at first, but as I’ve dove more deeply into it, it becomes more clear what we can learn from it. One of these things is that the design of the website is absolutely crucial to your conversion rate. For example, what does the amount of time spent on the website tell us?  Or is the website effective in getting people to read the relevant information that leads to a sale?  These questions are some of many that need to be answered and it is awesome that I get to be a part of it.

One of the coolest parts of looking at all this data is what you can actually learn about your customers.  Pinpointing where people are accessing your website from, the types of devices they are using and what people are searching to get to your site all tell you something different about your customer.  Making the conclusions about your customers based on this information, while difficult, can lead to tremendous success if done correctly.

RadiusOnline has already been a great experience for me and I can’t wait to see what it does for me moving forward.

This is my first online marketing intern job in the USA and I love it. For me, Radius Online is not a company, but it’s like a family because you can talk, ask for help and have fun with everyone.  The work environment is awesome. So far I have been working and learning a lot of things that are not only about coding, but also about sales, marketing, planning, and so on. The first 2-3 weeks I worked on the Shape and Handwriting Recognition Project. It is a very cool and awesome project, but obviously it is a complicated project. However, I have made some progresses such as I could make a program to recognize simple shapes like rectangles, triangles, and so on. Now I have been working on the site analytics project which is about how to rank any website based on searching engine optimization (SEO). Up to now, it is almost done — we can get information from a website to rank their website, capture the screenshots of their websites, and generate PDF files from their website. To conclusion, I really love learning new things, working on awesome projects and helping the company.

Technology is improving rapidly, and these innovations are important not only with the work we do here as RadiusOnline Online Marketing Interns, but in other industries as well.  One of my favorite new innovations is the 3D printing of food products.

Chocolate is one of my greatest loves, so naturally I was ecstatic when I heard about the new technological capabilities that enable the 3D-printing of chocolate. Riding the wave of improvements in 3D printers, a group of students at India’s Manipal Institute of Technology took it upon themselves to pursue a radical and life-changing idea: to 3D print food. From this idea, the team formed the start-up Global 3D Labs and the latest and greatest 3D printer was born: the ChocoBot. This novel 3D printer is built with capabilities to 3D print custom-designed chocolates, decorations, and icing, and is on track to be sold commercially within the month at about $1000. Unfortunately, this printer still suffers from the same limitations as other 3D printers in the industry, namely the time needed to print the product, but with more technological advances, this machine could become widely used by confectioners and companies such as Nestle and Hershey. And I may just have to purchase one for my personal use.

Over the last few weeks, I have been working on a project that involves marketing metrics. I’ve always been a math person, but marketing math is something totally different. In marketing math, it is less about the numbers and more about what they mean. In a way, these numbers teach you how people think. I like to think that by doing marketing math I am kind of doing business psychology. By looking at data and seeing how people respond to advertising on a base level, you learn how to better position your company so that people connect and take action toward becoming a client. You want to make sure they are engaged with what you are doing at all times and on all fronts. You need to make sure they are opening your emails, clicking that big orange button, and reading your posted content.

The tricky part about marketing analytics is determining what information is important and what is not. With the expansion of digital marketing, companies are working hard to provide information on every aspect of digital marketing campaigns. You can find anything and EVERYTHING about what your visitors are doing and all those numbers can be overwhelming. In order to even begin to strategize about what numbers to track, you need to look at the business goals of your company. What is your end goal? What parts of the marketing strategy do you consider most important? What areas are you struggling in? What does your sales/marketing/management team need to know to do better? I’m not saying that some things won’t be the same for every company. I have done enough research to notice a few common things that managers need to look at such as traffic on your website, followers on social media, average page loading time, etc. In the end though, it’s all about you and your company needs.

It’s important to remember that you’re never locked into recording one set of metrics. You can always add some later or get rid of a few that you realize you don’t really need. Measuring marketing data is fluid and customization. Feel free to experiment with it. Also, remember that all the numbers you receive have a financial value. Each part of the digital marketing process helps push people to buy so each part is an investment with a return value. You need to keep this idea in the back of your mind so that the numbers carry more value to you than just interesting facts to know. Managers like to know about the bottom line and most could care less about the number of people click on the blog page until they realize that those people are 20% more likely to buy from them after visiting that page. The job of a marketing professional is to take marketing data and make it make sense to managers by presenting them with financial facts. If you can take marketing math and show projected revenue, you are well on your way to being successful on the digital front.

Sincerely,

Online Marketing Intern

When I first stumbled upon the RadiusOnline online marketing intern application, it was immediately clear to me that this company is different from most. One quick look at their Instagram and you get an instant peek into a company culture that is anything but corporate — co-workers chatting on beanbags, enjoying Atlanta food favorites, and lounging with dogs. The agency-like setting appealed to me, but what stood out even more was the team’s commitment to working together and getting to know each other outside of the office.

Because I graduated in May 2014, I’m able to be at Radius almost full-time — something I’ve really enjoyed so far! After college, I wanted to find something that could combine my interests in design and marketing — and I found it in Radius!

So far I’ve worked mainly on WebSoCast — a cool app that will allow clients to create their own digital coupons and promotions. I’ve been working on creating design templates that are a little different from the “generic” coupons you flip through or tend to ignore. Now I’m working on a variety of projects, from helping RocketLevel’s branding to brainstorming ways to use design to drive sales!

I’m also excited for our Intern Project. We’ve decided to boost RadiusOnline’s social media presence by consistently updating the Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. Hopefully this will allow the public (and potential clients!) to become more aware of our brand and our company goals. I love that I’m already getting to try something new and fun while helping the company!