During the second semester of my senior year, I got the opportunity to continue my internship as the Undergraduate Marketing Intern at the Upchurch University Center at Longwood University. During this semester, we had to adapt to the COVID-19 crisis and learned to work from a strictly online platform while still maintaining the relations we had made on social media with students prior to leaving to go home.

Before we went home, our initial plan was to incorporate as much Longwood spirit not only into the social media content but into the initiatives we started for the students as well. Within a week, myself and the office assistant were given an assignment to create a video for the incoming freshman to introduce the Upchurch University Center to them, and give them a tour around the facility. Although this seemed like a daunting task, after filming, editing, and turning it in, we felt a great sense of accomplishment within our ability to document the building and the organizations that are in it. I am very thankful for my internship coordinator and her direction throughout this entire process. Without her, I would not have been given this opportunity in the first place, nor would I have gotten to branch out and create digital marketing flyers like the ones above.

After we were sent home, we spent much time collaborating on what kinds of activities we should do to keep engagement with students on social media. This was a key to our marketing strategy over the course of our semester to promote the profile as a whole, as well as the virtual events we came up with. With help from the Upchurch Advisory Board, we were able to promote on different social media platforms the different activities we were able to put together as well as come up with different ideas for students to get involved while being at home.

This became an interesting task not because of the lack of ideas, but because of the students not being on campus. We found that because the students were no longer on campus, it was harder to maintain interaction with them through the social media platforms we had chosen as well as the specific virtual activities we had chosen.

The visuals above were all for different purposes as you can tell. First, the Upchurch University Bingo sheet was created during quarantine for our followers to not only increase attention to our account but to increase activity to other Longwood accounts as well. This was created specifically for Upchurch activities and was the most successful virtual event we put on for the students. The next visual I created was an instructional guide for a room in the Upchurch University Center called the Soza Ballroom. This guide was posted in the ballroom and is used daily by visitors and students. The next visual I created at my internship this semester is a flyer for a contest to submit your favorite picture of you and your pet where I created this fun flyer and promoted it continuously throughout the week on our social media platforms. The next visual I made was for the Spring Break Hours to inform our followers about upcoming change in hours. Lastly, I created the scavenger hunt visual that I promoted on all platforms which we noticed was not as successful as the bingo sheet as far as interactivity with students and gaining followers, however, we did feel that we could adapt for the following weeks.