First-Year Marketing MBA Students
Start by counting your lucky stars that you’re missing out on the worst of this sh*tty economy. Then, get A’s in all your required courses, join or start up an on-campus Marketing Club, and line up a kick-ass summer internship (don’t expect much official campus interviewing, by the way, even by next spring).
Then, a year from now, come back and read the next section for further instruction.
Second-Year Marketing MBA Students
The market will still be grim next spring, so all your efforts until then should be on creating the most distance between you and your competitors.
Start reading five marketing e-newsletters every day. I’m always amazed by students who think they can break into and succeed in this industry without knowing the issues, the players, the budgets, the metrics, the jargon, the debates.
If you’re in the student Marketing Club, put together a full-day event featuring top-drawer marketing speakers. Video it and put it up on a website. This will be a tremendous plus for your resume, great exposure, and good experience at trying to market an event. (P.S. Do this even if you’re not in the Marketing Club.)
In the spring semester take nothing but strategic electives - anything marketing, business, or brand related with the word strategy in it. Run, do not walk, away from any courses offered on “topical” subjects such as social media.
Get involved now in some extracurricular project - help a local business or the chamber of commerce achieve a difficult but tangible, MEASURABLE goal. Stay away from nonprofits unless that is your career aspiration.
Write something. Get published in something with broad distribution in the marketing world. There are a ton of places to ask. The worst they can say is no.
Currently Applying (or Considering It) For Next Fall
Start with this earlier post. Bear in mind application volume will most likely hit a near-record peak this time around. If you want some individual counseling, hit me up. For a meager $150, you’ll get a 30-minute phone discussion plus a review of your background and work samples, with a written set of recommendations.
It is the best and worst of times for MBA candidates. You can escape the lousy economy for a year or two, but you have to come back and join the rest of us eventually.
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MORE DATA YOU SHOULD KNOW...In Aspen Institute’s late-2007 MBA survey, it asked “what factors will be most important in your job selection?” High ethical standards came in a distant 9th place.
