In this blog post, an advertising and public relations major shares how to showcase your strategic thinking and execution skills in your cover letter, based on your project experience and practical marketing savvy.
Growing up
“Something I can immerse myself in”
Growing up, I tried to find something that I could immerse myself in. First of all, I used to think that I was usually bored and boring. In school, I used to think that the routine of going to class, studying, going to study hall after school, and then coming home and sleeping was boring. So even if I tried to hang out with my friends or read a book, I didn’t find it particularly enjoyable and immersive. So I tried many things to have a hobby that I could enjoy. First of all, in middle school, I started playing sports.
Basketball was a great way to work up a sweat and pass the time, especially since I was on the short side for my age, so I often teamed up with friends to play basketball. It was a way to get taller and more athletic. Once I started playing basketball, I enjoyed it so much that I started looking for and watching games and learning about players in order to get better at basketball. I shared my basketball knowledge with my friends who were interested in basketball and had fun playing basketball-related online games with them. In this way, once I started immersing myself in one thing, I would spend time on it and enjoy my life.
In high school, my interest in basketball waned. Sure, it was fun to play sports with my friends, but I needed something else to fill my high school days. I was studying, of course, but I thought there was nothing worse than majoring in something you don’t enjoy. So I started to consider my interests in different fields, and I was intrigued by an advertising unit in my language arts class. As my interest in advertising grew, I realized that I wanted to create my own advertisements, and I also gained knowledge about advertising-related careers, so I continued to pursue my interest in advertising in high school and majored in advertising and public relations.
Personality strengths and weaknesses
“Always confident in speaking up”
One of the traits that people who meet me for the first time are interested in is my way of speaking. My way of speaking is a little different from others. I’ve always had a loud voice, straight pronunciation, and a tendency to say things one letter at a time, which is why I’ve been asked to be an announcer or voice actor. I personally believe that this way of speaking is a trait that comes from a confident personality. I am always confident, no matter where I am or who I am with. I tend to have what I call “unfounded confidence”.
If you ask me why I’m confident, I don’t really have an answer to that question, because I think if you’re happy with yourself and you try to be confident, you can be, so I always try to act confident, whether it’s justified or not, and I think that’s a trait that makes me communicate well with other people. People who are not confident in themselves, who have no strength, and who try to stay quiet all the time are far away from the value of communication. I think that a person who can actively communicate with others and still express his or her opinion accurately is a master of communication, so I always practice speaking and talk a lot with people around me in order to have a confident speaking attitude.
If there’s one downside, it’s that I’m so confident that I end up being stubborn, and when I’m assertive, I’m stubborn to the point of making people around me uncomfortable. Other people also have their own opinions and points of view, so if I’m too stubborn about my own opinion, I’ll get into trouble. So I often try to listen to the other person’s point of view and think from their point of view whenever there’s a problem. Of course, I think I’m right, but the other person also thinks they’re right, so I try to find a compromise or respect their point of view. I’m especially careful when I’m in meetings or sharing ideas.
Field of study
“Understanding consumers, marketing through advertising and public relations”
When I was in college, I majored in advertising and public relations. I originally became interested in advertising when I was in high school and started to develop my skills enough to participate in advertising competitions with my friends. I especially tried to excel in the areas of advertising planning and idea generation, and I read a lot of books to gain professional competence in creating advertising copy. After entering university, I was fortunate to be able to gain specialized knowledge in advertising and public relations, and to take classes from professors who had worked in the field.
I was particularly interested in the consumer and marketing aspects of the advertising and public relations curriculum. I can say that I studied with active interest in areas such as consumer behavior, consumer psychology, and identifying consumer needs. Especially in these areas, when there were assignments such as market research and target analysis, I showed enthusiasm for actually going around the relevant market to collect information, and I also worked to establish marketing strategies by reflecting the information about consumers that I collected. In order to establish a marketing strategy, you need to have basic information and knowledge about various strategies, so I tried to read a lot of related papers and explore various perspectives.
As a result of frequently reading papers through marketing case studies, I found that market research and consumer analysis are the key to establishing a marketing strategy. Therefore, I majored in business administration to know the market and consumers well. Therefore, I specialized in courses such as organizational management, service marketing, and marketing research, which can be learned through business administration, and frequently read related papers. Reading papers was very helpful in my studies of advertising and marketing. First of all, through papers, I was able to gain knowledge about the assumed topic, and I also learned more about how to collect social data for writing a paper. When I graduated, I wrote my thesis as a result of direct application of the information I collected.
Work experience
“I worked as a marketing researcher.”
I majored in advertising and public relations in college, and I also worked as a vice president of the university’s advertising club. My duties as a vice president included leading the club’s planning meetings and sharing the workload through external projects. In the case of our club, we often participated in external competitions and participated in university projects, so I mainly played a role in eliciting the cooperation of the members in order to show my abilities in these areas. I learned the importance of eliciting cooperation by identifying the characteristics of the organization, and I can say that I learned leadership.
When I graduated from college, I immediately joined the marketing staff of ○○○ Company through a university club. My main job was to manage the Research Academy. There is a separate research academy within ○○○ Company, so I worked as an administrator here and did office work, research work, and I also did research work directly in the public relations projects that the company itself conducts for education. I tried to get everything I could from the research academy, such as planning educational courses and completing service instructor training courses. Therefore, I will work as a competent employee as a public relations and marketing employee based on these aspects in your company.
