My Internship at Spotted by Locals

Image by Daphne Blok

Hello there! My name is Daphne, I’m 21 years old and currently a student in my last year of IBACS at Erasmus University Rotterdam. You see, an internship is actually a mandatory part of my studies and to be honest I thought this really sucked! I worried because I hadn’t actually ever worked in the cultural field and I doubted that my year waitressing tables was going to help me here… And I was right too, after getting rejected a few times I was basically ready to give up the last three years of my life (Yes, a bit dramatic I admit but bear with me!) and start over. You see, I’m usually a pretty confident person, but every time I managed to get an interview, I would be so nervous I’d completely shut down…

After a particularly disappointing rejection I decided that asking for a bit of help was necessary, so I made an appointment with our Internship Coordinator. Probably the best choice I could’ve made since she recommended Spotted by Locals to me. After doing a little research I decided to give it a shot, I sent my resume (shout out to my sister Laura who helped me make it) and motivation and the rest is history!

If you follow any of our Social Media there is a big chance that quite a bit of the content you’ve come across these last few months came from me! I really enjoyed my internship, even if Monday morning meetings and I will never be friends, because I learned so much over such a short amount of time. I not only got to experience what it’s like to run social media from a business perspective, oh no, I also learned about interacting with your audience, about writing articles, and even a little about video editing! These last few months were busy and sometimes things went really well, while sometimes, well, they did not…

A few things I struggled with where working from home and managing my time, and figuring out the tone for posting content. But most of all, I struggled with reminding myself that just because you might get critique, this doesn’t mean you and everything you do sucks! Thankfully Bart was always kind and helpful when giving criticism and always answered all my questions, even if they where a little silly.

My favorite part of my time here at Spotted by Locals was definitely the chance to write articles! I’ve always loved writing and to get a chance to do so for an actual business was truly an amazing experience. I also really loved interacting with people online, every time I’d get a nice comment or reply I’d get this nice feeling in my stomach and I’d just feel really happy!

Overall, I’d pretty much recommend this internship to anyone who enjoys working with nice people and is interested in traveling and social media. Working from home is very comfortable and you can work anywhere as long as you have your laptop and internet. However, if like me you’re prone to procrastinate, do be careful about your time management because trust me, there are fewer hours in a day then you think!

I’m very thankful for my time here at Spotted by Locals and everything they thought me. I’m thankful for Bart for giving me this opportunity and for all his guidance. And while I’ll always look back on this time as something great, I am ready to move on and finally get my degree in a few months!

Looking for a distance / remote internship yourself? Check out what we can offer!