Hiring a Marketing Intern is a Huge Mistake If You’re Serious About Your Business

I ran across a brilliant article yesterday by Social MS “10 Reasons Why an Intern Will Not Solve Your Marketing Problems” that explains the dangers of hiring an intern (I’d like to add: or an entry level admin) to handle the most important task of growing a small business: marketing.

I’ve been working with small businesses, entrepreneurs, solopreneurs and startups for years and nearly every single one of them makes the mistake of hiring an intern or entry-level admin to manage their marketing.  They’re reasoning? It’s Cheap. (Read about the real costs of cheap )

Why is hiring a Marketing Intern a Mistake?

Business owners and entrepreneurs who hire interns or entry level admins get an order taker, someone who follows their own (often non-expert, inexperienced, unfounded) marketing instructions. And the result is always the same: no – or minimal – results.

It’s true: if you want real business growth, hiring a marketing expert with real experience and expertise- like a marketing consultant – is the smartest choice.  You need someone who is trained in the strategic side of marketing and not just a poster of cute memes on Facebook. Someone who understand the value of market research, analysis, testing, tracking and measuring. Someone who gets that your business, your brand –  and your future –  is at stake.

Don’t make the mistake of hiring a tactical order taker when you need a Strategic Marketing Consultant who will tell you the truth (even when it’s not what you want to hear) and point your small business in the right direction through strategic planning.

Author Susanna Gebauer makes two key points about hiring an intern (rather than a marketing consultant or another expert) that are critical to acknowledge in her article, “10 Reasons Why an Intern Will Not Solve Your Marketing Problems”:

 A Marketing Intern May Not Even Be Cheaper

Can you expect an intern to get the same amount of work done as an experienced marketer? Maybe after a while, they will, but certainly not in the beginning, when they are still learning. Here are your options: Get less work done or hire a second or even third intern. And even that does not guarantee that the work that needs to be done really gets done – because how are they to know what is important? So, you lose time with your interns learning and pay double or even three interns. Maybe you should think again about hiring that {Marketing Consultant}?

 In the End Saving on Marketing Wages is Going to Cost You.

Your intern needs more time to learn than an experienced marketer: you lose time.

Your interns will (in the short time they are with you) will never have the knowledge and deep understanding of your product or service that only time spent working with you can bring.  Therefore, you will lose marketing success.

The marketing concepts and campaign ideas your interns can come up with in the short time they stay with you are limited. They lack experience and knowledge about best practices and ideas. You lose marketing success.

 Together all of this is going to cost you time, success, revenues – and in many cases your business. The cases of business success for new ventures with no marketing are rare – really rare.

 

The author makes critical points that any small business owner who is considering hiring an intern or another entry-level marketing administrator should consider. Is it really worth it to go cheap? I mean you’re talking about your business here – your baby; your life!

If you want help growing and marketing your business, talk to an experienced Marketing Consultant. Fortune Marketing has more than 20 years of strategic and tactical marketing experience working with small business owners, startups and multi-national corporations. Let us help you by giving you the experience you and your business need (and deserve!).  Download a complimentary marketing self-assessment or Contact me for a no-obligation consultation.

Susanna make some other excellent points to consider before hiring an intern, for the rest of the article, click here.