We all know that Digital Marketing is on the rise. More companies are knocking on your door asking for help with their social media and online marketing. They have started to notice that everyone is stuck on their phone and they want to be able to grab a piece of all that attention.

We also know that you might need help with all this demand. You need a couple of young, smart, respectful, hardworking and (luckily) experienced people. But where do you find them?

You can take the traditional route and place a job vacancy in the top 2-3 job listing sites. But who wants to go through hundreds of CVs and do dozens of interviews? And good luck with finding experienced people in social media!

You can also hire a recruiter to find you a good match. But you’re on a tight budget and would rather not sacrifice the agent’s commission.

How about going straight to the top Universities’ career offices and ask for the best marketing graduates. That is a good idea, and it can actually work for you a few times, but all those students are inexperienced and most of them are quite immature. They might know the theory but have zero practical skills.

It is always a risk betting on a new employee. Especially if the new hire is inexperienced. You have zero time for quality training because, let’s face it, day-to-day work consumes all your available resources.

Even if you had the time, there is a huge risk that the money and time you invest in a new hire can go straight out the window if he or she decides to leave in the first 6 months. So, once they become somehow productive, they abandon you.

Here at StudentLife, we have had the unique opportunity on the one hand to work closely with hundreds of students and recent graduates through our virtual internships in content writing, and on the other hand to work closely with dozens of executives at marketing agencies. We feel the pain and struggles on both sides.

That’s why we developed the “StudentLife Academy”.

The StudentLife Academy is a 4 month intensive training program in Digital Marketing and Business Fundamentals that helps to bridge the “skills gap”. We interview and select about 20 young graduates every semester and involve them in 5 real marketing projects given to us by brands in our network.

Each project lasts 3 weeks and all participants repeat the same “campaign execution” activities. They receive constructive criticism on a daily base and grow accustomed to receiving feedback (actually at the end of the training they start asking for it). The goal is to get them “job ready”.

We pay great attention in helping them develop skills in the fundamentals of digital marketing. But we pay even greater attention in helping them mature as professionals and help them shift their mentality. It’s a beautiful sight when you get to see how young people can flourish when the are provided with the right guidance.

So what do you get when you hire one of our graduates? Let me provide a list with the top 8 benefits:

1. They are hungry for work. They are convinced that working hard and producing results is the secret sauce to becoming a pro. They are motivated by the vision of their future self.
2. They have been involved in real digital marketing projects, thus have built some experience and have practically developed skills in the fundamentals of digital marketing. They have conducted market research, have produced most forms of content, managed social media campaigns, made sense of analytics and presented results.
3. They are eligible for HRDA funding. Thus, their salary for the first 6 months can be subsidized by the government (we can talk more about this if you are unaware).
4. We intend to continue our relationship with them through various executive trainings and will continue cultivating their mentality and skills. So, you get an employee that is devoted to lifetime learning and personal development.
5. We have immersed them into the methodology of Inbound Marketing (they are all certified by Hubspot). They are looking for an opportunity to take a brand or specific product line and help optimize its digital marketing with the end goal of developing a “content/market fit”.
6. They are organized. They know how to follow a calendar, a to-do list, set priorities and never leave anything to luck.
7. They have developed a great attitude. We broke down a lot of their bad habits and misconceptions they may have had. Society has really messed them up!
8. They know what they want. We guided them through a process of getting rid of confusion and make a clear statement of what they have decided to go after.

Our graduates are definitely not perfect. But compared to other graduates, they are much more ready to reach their employer’s expectations. They aren’t just looking for a job, they want to help add value. They are better aware of the market around them. They won’t complain as easy as other employees because they learned that complaining is a weakness and it can doom them to a future of mediocrity.

I am very proud of our graduates and would love to introduce them to you. We can sit together and build an ongoing training program and take advantage of the HRDA executive training funding schemes. Plus, did I mention that we don’t charge a finder’s fee?

Let’s work together to develop these young, talented, hard working and passionate individuals. It’s a winning situation for all. You can email me at [email protected] or call me at 99442403. It will be a pleasure to work with you!