Some success on the application front!

Just wanted to drop a little side note here and let you all know that I have had a few interviews over the past two weeks and I am very excited. The interviews made me nervous but I felt like I knew what i wanted to say and I felt confident.

Confidence is key. Just let the person interviewing you know how passionate you are about what you do, your work and enthusiasm will speak for itself.

So anyway just wanted to put one more piece of advice out there for everyone. Like I said it is important to be a part of as many social networks as possible this is also good advice when it comes to signing up for career websites such as monster and career builder and Beyond. Don't put all of your eggs in one basket so to speak you want your brand to be out there in as many places as possible.

So anyway looking forward to my career I cant wait to get started. Hope you all have similar success!

its been a while!

Hey all I know it has been a while and I am sorry for that but I just wanted to keep you in the loop about what has been going on.

 I have been applying none stop and still working at Applebees so it has been hectic. I wanted to talk a little about what was discussed in my last post on advertising. Like you all know there is a shift happening and that shift is towards online. One thing that I highly recommend is to get yourself in to a class or find out some kind of information on social media marketing and online advertising. Online is the future and everyone has to keep up with the times, that includes you, stay current and stay active in all the new advertising techniques. I know I don't have very many followers of my blog but that doesn't mean I'm not trying to obtain some search engine optimization for my blog. Remember you are your brand, sell it and let your brand speak for you.

In future posts I would love to talk about creating a blog and getting started in the online advertising landscape, getting your brand out there and being successful. Also I think it is important to just get involved in social networks even if they are not your thing, just sign up see what its all about.

My next venture will be to take a class on building websites. I think that is extremely important and I would love to learn how to build my own website.

Remember stay current and stay hungry, you never know when that new opportunity will come along!

It has been a while! Lets get back into advertising shall we!

Hey, I know it has been a while but I wanted to take a little break after I graduated and focus a little bit on my job at applebees so I can try and make some money, as I'm sure most people can relate to.

But I thought we should get back on the saddle and discuss some business. I have seen a lot of bad advertising lately and I am not sure what is going on in our field. Yes it is true that comedy is good angle to take when creating an add but more and more ads lately have gone overboard on the comedy and have passed that line into corny. You want people to laugh with your ad not at it. So I think we should start focusing more on getting the message across and less on trying so hard to make the consumer laugh because you don't want to annoy the customer more than they already are by your ad interrupting their favorite show!

So I though I would leave the floor open to anyone who has other good angles to use in ads, we know of comedy, drama, family, dogs, etc. all of these are good ideas but lets think outside of the box, what other angles can we take to convey the information we want the consumer to know but also entertain them while not annoying them.

Get back to me!

I GRADUATED!!!!

So I am happy to announce that I graduated from Michigan State University on Friday May 7th with my mother, grandma, sister and fiance looking on with pride. I am so proud of myself and happy that I stuck through it all and came out the other end a smarter and more happy spartan!

entering the job market!!

So folks, since I graduate tomorrow I would like to get some feedback on some of your experiences with entering the job market. Tell me the good the bad and the ugly!! I want to know how you got your job what hoops you had to jump through and how your all doing now that you landed the job. Let me know!!

jimmys b-day

Hey all sorry I have not written in forever, I graduate tomorrow and my fiance's birthday was yesturday so I have been busy. I will keep you all updated.... more posts coming soon!!

Lots and Lots of homework

I am trying to manage all of my homework and work schedule but its hard so I might not write on my blog for a little bit, I will try to though. Talk to you all soon!

my computer broke down!!

Awww the wonderful world of electronics, they help you with your homework, they show you funny videos and they also crash on you leaving you with no outlet to the online world!!! Anyway I am back now sorry about the long hiatis....

class today!

Today I got to class and to my surprise we had to all get in a circle and do stretches and make loud noises.... I am being completely serious, this is what I pay $500 a credit for to exercise. This was all an exercise to help people with public speaking but if you ask me it seemed like it was a bunch of filler because the professor had no content to actually teach us. This is so wrong!

how could you do this to me social media???

Lately I have been encountering many problems on my social networking sites like facebook and LinkedIn. People I have not seen in years and people my fiancée has not seen in years are coming out of the woodwork and causing problems for us. Can't we all just get along I mean really is facebook becoming the new porno, the new chat rooms were mischievous things are to take place. Lets clean up our acts and let facebook be used like it's supposed to be use, for friendship and to connect with people and share our thoughts and ideas and feelings, not to poach on other people's lives and try to create drama!

still sick

Hopefully I will be better soon..... sorry everyone!

sorry I broke my promise!

I have been feeling really sick lately and today I feel worse, I am sorry that I broke my promise to write every day. I will try my hardest to never let that happen again. Im going to go to bed early tonight hopefully tomorrow I will be up and running again.

A promise is a promise!

I promised to write every day and I will never break that promise, I just got home from work so until tomorrow!

Date Night!

Hey everyone tonight was date night and we are having a great time so I will get back to all of you tomorrow. Night!

Goodnight

Hey everyone I am tired so I will talk to all of you tomorrow. Goodnight!

powerpoint presentations!

Yay dont we all love powerpoint!! not.... Well regardless of weather or not you like powerpoint everyone should know that your going to have to use it, probably sooner than you think so I thought I could share some things that I have learned and discovered about powerpoint presentations. The number one most important thing I know and cant stress enough to you is practice practice practice!! Honestly if you make a script and practice it you wont need to be looking at your powerpoint the entire time and neglecting your client. Clients like to make eye contact with you and know that you are talking to them and relating with them not ignoring them so you can stare at your powerpoint! Another thing I cant stress enough is powerpoint should just be highlights of what you want to talk about. Don't crowd the slides with tons of words because first of all who wants to read a bunch of data when you could just be telling them about it while they look at a pretty graph that describes what you are saying. Design your powerpoint, don't be boreing and go for a black backround with white font color, cmon your not going to grab anyones attention like that. Use similar font families and dont go overboard with sounds and funny fads or word drop in's remember this is still supposed to be professional. lastly have fun with this, who wants to sit through a stiff powerpoint presentation, I'm sure we have all done it but did you really like it or even pay attention to it, I would say NO!! So have fun and be creative, most importantly don't stress out about your slides, you should be close enough to the project your making slides for that you know all of the information you need to cover and talk about right?

Social Media networking! huh?

Ya know one thing I have learned, or one thing that has been burned on my brain by my professors at State is how important it is to be on as many social networking sites as possible.
Now with this being said, yes you should join as many sites as you can or enjoy to be a part of, but realistically, don't just join sites to join them. You do want to get your name out there and be in contact with many people but you don't want to be on a social networking site that you never visit and never contribute any content to, because then your just a name on someones list who they eventually delete, and no one wants to get deleted right? So lesson here is, yes join social networking sites, get your name, your brand out there and get as close to #1 on Google search for your name as you can but don't over do it otherwise people will get annoyed with your brand and then where do you go from there?

I think I am sick

Sorry about this everyone, but I think I am coming down with something and cant really type about anything interesting. I will try tomorrow to suggest an interesting topic. Night!

I still am at a blank!!

Honestly I feel bad but I seem to have some writers block along with being extremely tired from work so I will get back to all of you tomorrow. good night!

sorry really tired....

Hey everyone I am sorry this is so late but I got home late from work and I am really tired so I am just going to go to bed I promise I will have something more interesting for tomorrow. Night all!

SMR: the news release of the future!

Ok that sounds dumb to say that social media news releases are the news releases of the future since they are already being used today but what I really meant was that if your not using social media news releases or don't even know what they are you are falling behind, fast!
Social media news releases are press releases that are solely meant for online distribution and your target audience is any online journalist that writes related news stories online. There are many, and I mean many, resources online for templates on social media news releases and I suggest doing a Google search to just get a basic idea of what I'm talking about. But generally a SMR should contain all of the following elements:

• A headline which describes your news story, what your release will be about, BUT make sure your headline does not exceed 14 words
• Next is your subhead, which is optional but I like to use it, this goes into more details about your news story, just gives more focused information, BUT make sure your subhead does not exceed 10 words.
• Next comes the date and time of your release, usually sometime around 3 p.m. is good but any time is a good time.
• Now we get into the central part of your release, the Key Facts which are bulleted key points about your news story, try to keep this limited to around 6 or 7 bullet points, so get right to the facts, don't put useless information in here.
• Then we get to the quotes section which are also bulleted and appropriated with the name and title of the person you are quoting, make sure you get permission from the person to use the quote! you usually want 2 quotes per news release
  
• Then we have the multimedia section which is also bulleted and this is were you put videos and photos but you just write what the photo or video is and link to a page were they can see it, for example if you want them to see a photo of your companies logo you put Photo: company logo and then link that to the logo for your company.
• The last main component of your release is the related links section which should have links to any site that relates to your release and news story, same as the multimedia section, just put a description and link it to the website.
• Last but not least, put your name, phone number and email address.

Your done!! Just like that. Now what I would suggest is picking a company and one of their products, so some research on the product and then practice writing a social media release for that product, its not as hard as it seems I promise.

Just always keep in mind that a SMR needs to be short and concise, don't fill your release with a bunch of language just get to the point, SHORT AND SWEET! good luck everyone!

I have nothing today!

Hey everyone... Honestly I don't have very much to say today I worked for 6 hours and I am pretty tired but I did not want to leave all of you hanging so I just wanted to let you know that I will always write something and hopefully tomorrow I have something better to talk about. Good night!

Whats Most Important?

What is most important thing to know when trying to enter the job market and get an interview? Well some would say college degree others would say experience or even who you know.... They are all right. You do need experience, one thing I have learned is internships directly translate into an advantage over your competition, don't wait until the last minute to start looking for internships because what I have found is it gets harder the closer you get to graduation so start early!! OK so now lets get into who you know, this one is a big one it is all about who you know and how they can help you! Networking is one of the most important things to understand and utilize, the more people you know, the better your chances are at landing an interview or finding opportunities. I know this all sounds like common sense but I never knew these things were so important and knowing is half the battle, especially in today's job market. So just a little advice for today, hopefully I have a better topic tomorrow. I am still a waitress but I promise it wont be for long!

Branding Yourself

Branding yourself is extremely important especially when you are trying to get a job or create opportunities through marketing yourself. With this being said there is a warning, Be careful what kinds of information you publish in a blog or on facebook or mayspace, etc. Always remember that social media can be used for good and for bad.
I have often been given good advice on this subject like you should have a private facebook page that is just for yourself and that you share with only close friends and family and then you should have a corporate facebook page where you can direct potential employers and promote yourself and your brand. Like I said before you never know who you will meet, where you will meet them and what potential opportunities might arise so dont ruin it by airing all of your dirty laundry so to speak all over facebook or myspace.
Always remember that people are watching what you do via social media and you never know what could be harmful to your brand so play is safe!

Nothing Much!

Hey all Im sorry this is so late but I am dead tired from work today and I do not have much to share... I will talk about more tomorrow, sorry. If I can leave you all with anything important try and think about how blogs and social networking can help you in your business career, share your experiences with me and with others, let us know how social networking or blogs have helped or hurt your business career or aspiarations!!

you never know who where or when?

Today I was at work, I was going on my 12th hour of being there and I was tired, I mean so tired that I didn't even want to wait on the tables I had let alone get sat another one. Yet, as is my luck, in walks a couple of business men and they head right for my section. Don't get me wrong they were extremely nice and funny but I was just done by then. Anyway, me and these guys get to talking and it turns out they work for citadel broadcasting and 97.5 radio station in Lansing, MI. I told them I was a senior at Michigan State University and I'm about to graduate with my bachelors of arts in advertising and guess what? They gave me their business cards and told me to fax them or email them my resume so they could set up some interviews. WOW!!! It was great, I felt on top of my game. The entire point to this story is to share with you one of the most important facts I learned while at Michigan State. You never know where or when you could meet a potential employer or even a great networking opportunity, you must always be prepared and be hungry for that next business opportunity, you never know who will walk into your life, or in my case sit down at my table to eat dinner. Always be aware that anyone could potentially be your boss in the future and be aware of potentially business leads that surround you, you never know where your next job could come from!!!

Alright I'm off to bed but for now Im still a waitress but not for long!!!

My Mission!!

What is my mission? Well I want to inspire anyone out there who thinks they cant aspire to anything in life and let them know, I may be a waitress now, but not for long!

I have been a Michigan State University student for years now and I am finally down to my last 2 classes. I created this blog because of an assignment, but I can already tell its going to be much more than that. My purpose here is to share the ups and downs of life as a waitress who is trying to break into the world of advertising. Its tough and very competitive but I think by sharing my experiences and getting feedback from all of you, we can learn from each other.

While on my mission to inspire the world there might be some serious bumps in the road, anyone who is a waiter or waitress can attest to this statement, but I promise to try and remain upbeat. I can also promise that I will write in this blog every day for the first 2 months of creating it just to prove that I really care about this blog and I'm not just creating some frivolous blog to put out into the web or to get a good grade on my assignment, I want this blog to mean something to me and hopefully to you.

In closing, lets see how much we can help each other, share your stories with me and I will promise to share mine with you. How many of use can start at the bottom and work our way to the top?

Lets find out!!