A Taste of Agency Life Brings the Future into Focus
Dory Butcher and Alexandra Del Tufo found King Fish Media, a digital marketing agency, right in Endicott’s Beverly backyard. And they’re glad they did.
The pair found out about the agency through a friend and alumna of Endicott who is now one of the company’s employees. She also interned at the site while a student at Endicott and was offered a full-time account management role with King Fish Media after graduating.
A marketing and communications major, Butcher wasn’t even aware that account management was a part of marketing. She’s happy her friend encouraged her to pursue the internship because what she found out from the experience was that account management is her next step as she embarks on a career.
She explains, “I think that’s what I want to pursue in the future. It’s been an amazing internship and I’ve learned so much about it.”
Del Tufo, a graphic design major, was considering switching majors in her junior year. She stresses, that her graphic design internship with the company has helped her see her future in design more clearly. She says, “being at King Fish and experiencing the corporate side of graphic design made me really want to stick with it and pursue it for a future career.”
Butcher and Del Tufo didn’t only share an internship site. The pair are roommates and best friends and, for them, interning at the same site was a no brainer. Both gained an insider perspective into the other’s role and a better understanding of the process of the whole team because they each had roles with a different focus.
Butcher points out that this insider perspective helped her to better understand Del Tufo’s workload and helped Butcher manage projects more effectively. She explains, “For account management a lot of it is understanding what’s on her [Del Tufo’s] plate and managing her time and what she can get done.”
“There are actual clients and businesses depending on you, so it teaches you a lot and you have to be accountable,” explains Butcher, on her experience. Del Tufo says the experiential learning was invaluable, “No class is going to be able to teach the aspect of actually being there from 9-5, Monday through Thursday, being really involved in the company, client work, and associating yourself with the client and communicating with them. There are so many aspects you’re not going to learn in a classroom.”
Both say their ideas and opinions were valued at King Fish Media and that they never felt like interns. Instead, they felt like an integral part of the company. As for what’s next for the pair? Butcher plans to pursue another account managing position while Del Tufo, who is originally from New York, plans to return home to pursue a graphic design position in the city. She says, “The internship really changed my whole opinion about graphic design. Having art and business mixed together makes for many opportunities.”