ASSISTANTCOMMUNICATION MANAGER

MAY 15TH TO JULY 13TH, 2017

PaulineStaub

Enterprise tutor: Mrs Céline CamaraAcademic tutor: Mr Jesus Miranda ISEG Marketing & Communication School – Campus of LyonCompany: DesPasRayés – 250 rue du Sanjhon – 74200 Le Lyaud

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TABLE OF CONTENT

Acknowledgments

03

Introduction

04

Description

05

Professional context

05

Missions, actions and results

09

Personal input

16

Perspectives for N+1 internship

17

Conclusion

18

References

19

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ACKNOWLEDGMENT

I would like to thank all those who contributed to the success of my internship and whohelped me prepare this report. First of all, I would like to convey my deepest thanks to Céline Camara, Founder andDirector of DesPasRayés, for her warm welcome, her time and precious advices, and forsharing her expertise. Her guidance, constant encouragement and careful monitoring through the entireinternship were so great. Even my most profound gratitude is not enough to thank her. Thanks also to ISEG for giving me the opportunity to do an internship, and especially toMr Miranda, my academic tutor. I would also like to thank those who guided me through the writing of this report, as wellas those who proofed-read it.

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INTRODUCTION

To end and validate my first year at ISEG Marketing & Communication School, aninternship was required. The purpose of this internship was to familiarize the students with the enterprise worldand put their knowledge into practice.  In fact, even if during this first year, we had a lot ofgroup projects which aimed to give a sneak at teamwork it is not the same thing asworking in a company with actual co-workers that you already know.An internship is thebest way to acquire experience and to take a first step into the working life.  I did my two-month internship in the company DesPasRayés, located in Haute-Savoie(74), France.This is where I was born and raised and also where my parents live.Theseelements motivated my decision to work at DesPasRayés. This experience went reallywell. I got to do several tasks that will enrich my knowledge and skills and will bebeneficial for my future career. Working at DesPasRayés taught me a lot. This was an experience I will never forget. My internship was a great opportunity to usemy theoretical knowledge and learn a practical one of the field. First of all we willdescribe the company and its sector of activity. Then the missions I was given during myinternship and the assessment of it.

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DESCRIPTION

Professional context

DesPasRayés is a fashion company sellingsocks, shoelaces, tights and tote bags. Butthese products have something special, infact they are mismatched. The socks aresold by three and none of them have thesame design. The shoelaces and tightsalso have a different design on each leg orshoelace. And the each faces of the totebags are different. But the colours are inharmony and the designs are in the samespirit. In fact you can find the same fewcolours on the three socks for example,and if the designs are geometric they willbe geometric on all three to stay in thespirit of the theme, as illustrated there.

The company is an e-business and sells its product on itsown website, market places (such as “La Redoute”, “BrandAlley”,…) and in some boutiques.  The company was founded in September 2012 by CélineCamara. She wanted to create a unique product in Francefor children. Since the beginning success was on thecards. And parents wanted socks and other mismatchedproducts for themselves too, not only for their kids. So thebrand expanded its product range by offering socks foradults who are now the main customers.

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DesPasRayés created a clever logo to berecognized. In fact the logo symbolizes thespirit of the brand. The logo is the letter “R”but the two bars of the R are in differentcolours. This is the mismatched spirit: youdon’t wear same socks and so does thelogo. One orange sock on the left foot andone pink sock on the right one. The logoembodies the spirit of the brand: fun,dynamic and colourful. This is exactly howDesPasRayés is seen and how it wants tobe seen.

The web is the heart of the marketing plan. The e-commerce website is reflecting theimage and values of the company and is user-friendly. The website also has a blog partwith articles made to explain the mismatched philosophy to the customers, the “behindthe scene” of the company (both good and bad times, problems, issues, solutions,mistakes, everything that make the customer feels closer to the brand). But it’s also auseful tool for natural referencing1. In fact writing a lot about socks will make the page,and with it the website, appear on the first pages of Google results. Natural referencing isvery important for a website as if it shows on the fifth results page, no one is going to visitit. Whereas on the first page (and even better in first position) everyone sees it. The blogallows to use various keywords that will serve for the natural referencing. A blog also allows communicating with the customer database, it creates a communityaround the mismatched products. But DesPasRayés communicates only via social media.The accounts were created at the very beginning of the brand and now has a lot offollowers, especially on Facebook (22 000 followers). Using social media to communicatemakes DesPasRayés look like a dynamic brand, well aware of new ways ofcommunication.

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The socks used to be made in France but not anymore due to too high manufacturing costs.You can still find on the website some “Made in France” socks from prior collections but onlychildren sizes remain.The socks from the previous collections were made in Turkey.The new collections (summer and autumn 2017) are made in Portugal, and from now on, sowill all future collections. Having products made in Europe can be a future asset for thecompany. DesPasRayés is a one-person company. Céline Camara is the Founder and the Director. Sheworks by herself even though she delegates some tasks such as accounting, the creation ofthe website or even the socks graphics when it contains several drawings that required moreknowledge of graphics software.So far she doesn’t intend to extend her company nor take an associate. Even though shewanted an intern to help her with some subjects she can’t find the time to deal with.But she could really use an intern or someone to help her during the winter. October toFebruary is the busiest time for the company. There are lots of orders to prepare and send(sometimes around a hundred per day). Doing this, all on her own, is an exhausted and quitetedious mission. In fact she explained that in November mostly all she does is preparingorders. During those times she could really use the help of an intern. But besides it she reallyenjoys being a self-employed person and managing the company on her own and doesn’twant to change that. DesPasRayés’ biggest time of the year is definitely winter. This is the busiest period with a lotof orders so this is the time when DesPasRayés has the biggest turnover. Since the companyopened its website in autumn 2012 its turnover increased in a spectacular way. In fact if wecompare December 2013 for example with December 2016, the turnover is almost three timesmore important. December 2016 was a bit of a record for DesPasRayés. The companyachieved an amazing turnover, which is now the number to beat in December 2017.But even in spring, where the weather is less suitable to wear socks, such as in April or May,the turnover still increased by almost two to three times between 2014 and 2017.The company has grown well and won’t stop growing. In fact the past two years have beenreally good years for DesPasRayés in an economical way. Indeed the turnover increased bymore than 45% between 2015 and 2016.When establishing the business plan of the future company, Céline Camara thought itwouldn’t be too risky hoping for a turnover rise of 30% each year. The goal has been achievedthanks to a commercial and marketing strategy adapted to the customers.  Speaking of marketing strategy, DesPasRayés did a good job in this field. First of all, at thebeginning of the company the socks were “Made in France”. It was DesPasRayés’ biggestasset. People are more and more looking to buy “Made in France” products. It really helpedthe company building its name and its customer database. It was the asset DesPasRayés washighlighting and it helped the brand to be distributed in boutiques. A lot of boutiques,especially the ones for children, are focusing on “Made in France” original products. Unfortunately nowadays the products are no longer “Made in France”.

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At first DesPasRayés was targeting parents in higher socio-professional category who havechildren (a little girl from 0 to 14 years old or a little boy from 0 to 8 years old). The secondtarget was the people close to this kind of family willing to offer a gift for the kids. But when parents fell in love with the concept and wanted mismatched socks for themselves,DesPasRayés started selling socks in adult sizes and adults are now its main customers. Thetarget has obviously changed to focus on adults, especially the moms who want mismatchedsocks that match the ones of their kids. The second target hasn’t changed as the productsmake an original gift for children and grown-ups alike. About its positioning, DesPasRayés offers several advantages. The possibility to have fun withsocks (most of the time defined as a boring piece of clothes), and the ability to be differentthan others. Good quality and nice products, but more importantly, an original product uniquein France. In France, DesPasRayés has to face competitors, such as “Berthe aux grands pieds”, “Achile”,“Archiduchesse” and “Dub & Drino”. They all have strengths and weaknesses.

Berthe aux grands piedsSells really colourful and original socks, and other products “Made in France” which is avaluable asset, but the socks are really expensive (more than 20 € per pair).

ArchiduchesseSells plain socks, which is not really original, and their socks are quite expensive (6.50 € perpair) for just plain socks; but they are “Made in France”.

AchileSells original socks “Made in France” and their cost is around 12 to 19 € per pair.

Dub & DrinoHas really colourful socks (around seven colours by sock) with baroque patterns, which isoriginal; unlike Archiduchesses they are not plain. They cost around 12 € per pair and are“Made in Italy”.

These brands are competitors but not direct ones, as they do not sell mismatched products(DesPasRayés’ hallmark) so the company is not too worried about them; they are not a directthreat.

During my internship, the main mission I was given was to take care of the communication ofthe brand. The main communication ways used are social media, so I was the company communitymanager. In other words I had to take care of the Facebook and Instagram accounts ofDesPasRayés. First, with the help of Céline Camara, we had to decide how often we wanted to publish onsocial media. We decided that for Facebook twice a day would be a good idea. It is not toomuch so people do not get bored with the brand. And it is not too few so people don’t knowthe brand exists.For Instagram we said we would try to post a picture at least once a week.Focusing more on Facebook was a strategical move as the brand has way more followers onFacebook (over 22 000 followers) than on Instagram (around 460 customers). In general,people tend more to have a Facebook account than an Instagram one.  The publications on Facebook were at specific hours: 7:15 am and 5:00 pm. In fact around 7:00am people are either having breakfast, or in public transit. A time where they usually areactive on social media to fill time and see what happened for the past hours. Posting early allows the post to be in the people’s feed. Usually only a few people see thepublication right after it has been published. Most people see it in their feeds when they scrolldown.And around 5:00 pm people are leaving or are about to leave their workplace and they arechecking on Facebook once again to fill time or to keep them busy whilst taking publictransport. Or at work when it’s almost time to go, they do not want to start something newthey won’t have time to finish so they spend a little bit of time on Facebook.It’s proven that to be efficient a post must contain a picture. It will attract more attention thana post without any picture. In addition it will be easier to mark the spirits, because as we allknow a picture is worth a thousand words. So to start posting on social media the first thing Ihad to do was to take pictures of the products. 

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DESCRIPTION

Missions, actions andresults

With Mrs Camara we agreed that pictures in the nature, inthe every day life or wearing the products looked moreappealing than a regular pack shot2 on a white plainbackground. I was free to take the pictures I wanted as longas the products were well shown.So for an entire day I took pictures of the socks.I asked one of my friends to help me. She was wearing thesocks and I was taking pictures. We took pictures of thesocks by the Lake Leman, around flowers, worn in the everyday life, worn with matching mismatched shoelaces, or justlaid flat to really show the colours and patterns on the threedifferent socks.When wearing them you can’t see the three socks becausewe only have two feet so I had to take pictures of laid flatsocks. I took around 60 different pictures with differentscenes to have some material for the Facebook posts.Posting twice a day for two months requires quite a lot ofpictures if you don’t want people to see the same ones allthe time.

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After that, we planned the post every day twice a day. The posts contained a picture of theproducts and also a comment related to the product on the picture or a special event.For example when we got past 22 000 followers, I wrote a comment to thank everyone fortheir loyalty. Also when it was time for the private sales and the summer promotion I wrote iton Facebook and I gave all the information needed (date of beginning and end of thepromotion, code to get the discount and the percentage of the discount). It was a way tocommunicate with people like a conversation. For instance, if it was raining I was writingabout it and saying that this weather was perfect to wear the mismatched socks and keep thefeet warm. People would respond in the comment section, and it created a link betweenthem and the brand.

On Facebook, I also had to post a publication made from a partnership with a Facebook pagecalled “10 minutes par jour”. The goal of this page is to invite people to get out of theircomfort zone by offering one small challenge per day.For example, it can be trying to write with the left hand if you are right-handed or put intoorder all the administrative papers that you have, try gardening, learn Argentinian tango,… So“110 minutes par jour” asked for a partnership with DesPasRayés. I was in contact with theadministrator of the page and I asked her what it implied exactly. This partnership was for achallenge they were going to post about wearing mismatched socks. They thought ofDesPasRayés and asked us if we would be interested in posting the challenge on ourFacebook page, and in return they would write a comment on their post and tag us. It was apartnership I dealt with and posted the challenge on our Facebook page.

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On Instagram, we posted once a week our picture of the socks or shoelaces with thehashtags “#chaussettesdépareillées” and “#chaussettesoriginales” so that people could findus. Hashtags are a really useful way to get more visibility.

Another way to communicate on the brand was through newsletters.In fact DesPasRayés used to send newsletters to its customers. Unfortunately with the time,as Céline Camara had to deal with everything on her own and as it takes quite some time tocreate newsletters, sending them didn’t become a priority. In fact the last one dated back in2014. So as I was there to help I could create and send newsletters.With the help of the software “Mail Jet” creating newsletter is really intuitive. To begin with,DesPasRayés already had a database of customers email addresses. So all I had to do was tocreate the contents of the newsletters. No need to fill in the addresses in the software. I justneed to add the new ones. If people had subscribed to the newsletter recently I added theiraddresses in the software. The first newsletter I did was to inform the clients that the newsletter was back and toapologize for the absence we offered a discount on the website. It was a way to remindpeople that we still exist. They might have forgotten about DesPasRayés because they hadn’treceived any newsletter for a while. We decided to do a newsletter anytime something important was happening. Otherwise itwould have been pointless to do a newsletter just to show the products, it is not reallyinteresting for the clients. So we sent newsletters to announce the private sales and the summer promotions but also toannounce the new collection.Newsletters are means to remind people that the brand still exists but also to let them nowabout something important happening to the brand. 

During these two months I also had towrite articles for the blog. Writing articlesfor a blog has two beneficial aspects. Thefirst one is that it creates a link betweenthe customers and the brand. You talk tothem and share things with them youdon’t share anywhere else. And thesecond one is that it adds contents to thewebsite pages, which is good for naturalreferencing. For example, when using thewords “original socks” often, the websitecan be found on Google first result pagewhen searching the words “originalsocks”.

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The second important mission I was givenwas to take care of the orders. In fact, assaid earlier, the brand only sells itsproducts online; either on its own websiteor through market places. These optionsare two different websites with differentorders and also different ways to preparethem. The orders are prepared in the morning.This is the first thing we do when we get tothe office. Indeed we have to be quick asthe orders must be delivered to client’shome in 72 hours (via the normal postalservice). First we prepare the ones fromthe market places. To prepare an order,we look at what the client wants, selectthe product from the stock, check thequality to make sure the quality matchesthe DesPasRayés standards.  We add the receiptand a little card withthe brand emblem (a chicken with threelegs and three mismatched socks) and onthe back of the card a message to thankthe customer for buying the product. Thenonce everything is in the envelope, we putthe customer’s address on it, we addstamps depending on the weight of theenvelope, and on the back the sender’saddress. This is quite simple and doesn’tneed much qualification but when CélineCamara does it on her own in winter withmore than 100 orders per day, it can be atricky task. For the orders on the DesPasRayéswebsite, we pay more attention to thedetails and try to add something to thankthe customer for ordering directly onDesPasRayés’ website.

First of all we look at the customer’s order.Once we get all the products we checkthe quality and if the three socks areindeed mismatched or if two are the same.If there is a problem of course we changethe product and get another one. Then wewrap all the items in burgundy silk paperjust like a present. The silk paper isburgundy because it is what looks theclosest to the colour of the logo. The bodyof the “R” is burgundy so it’s a little nod tothis. But also everything is in the samecolour range.  On the top of the package we stick thechick card with a sticker shaped as thelogo of DesPasRayés, then we puteverything in the envelope and we addcandies. Only one if the customer onlyordered one item and two if the ordercontains two or more than two items. Onceagain it is an extra attention to thank thecustomer for ordering on DesPasRayés’website instead of doing it via marketplaces. When it comes to its direct clients, theones who choose to order throughDesPasRayés’ website, the brand reallywant to spoil them.Once the package is in the envelope withthe candies, we add the receipt and wecan close the envelope. The next step is towrite the client’s address, the sender’s oneon the back and stick the stamps thatmatch the weight of the envelope.

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Articles are a means to get a better position in Google’s results pagesand with it potential new customers who find the website when typingkey words for a search. I wrote an article per week. It wasn’t a problem for me because at ISEGwe had blog classes, so I know how to write blog articles. The first oneI wrote was to introduce myself and explain what I was doing atDesPasRayés. Then I wrote one for Mother’s Day, and one for Father’sDay. It was an opportunity to tell people mismatched socks ormismatched items would be a really original gift for those special days.And after that, one to summarize my first three weeks in the company,one to let people know it was time for the private sales, the summerpromotions. The main purpose of the blog is of course to “talk” with the customerswho are curious enough to go onto the blog but it is really useful fornatural referencing. That’s why every time I used the words “originalsocks”, “funny socks”, and “original gift” I had to put them in bold tohelp natural referencing. A blog is a way to communicate but also toimprove the website’s position in the search results pages, which canlead to a new clientele.

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We have three categories of stamps: Onefor parcels of less than 100 g, one forthose weighting between 100 and 250 g,and the last one for those between 250and 500 g. In the extreme case of a parcelof 500 g or more, it won’t be an envelopeanymore but a little box and the stamp willbe made with “Colissimo”. We stick theweight stamp only if the customer wantedthe envelope to be delivered through “LaPoste”. But there is another option:“Mondial Relay”. In fact the client candecide if he doesn’t want the order toarrive at home and then he chooses to goto a pickup point to get his parcel. For us itchanges the fact that the stamp must bemade with the exact package weight andalso the stamp is made via a software.  All orders must be done by 11:00 ambecause the postman comes at 11:15 am atthe post office. So we go drop the parcelsat the post office, which is either oneminute away by car of 5 minutes away onfoot. For the Mondial Relay packages wehave to go a little further, to a smallsupermarket, which is a pickup point, or inour case, a drop off point.

This task may not be the more excitingone but it is very important. And when wehave a lot of orders it means that thecommunication we are doing is working,that we are not doing this in vain. Forexample, after the newsletter about theprivate sales was sent and after peoplecould see it on Facebook, we had a lot oforders using the discount code wecreated. People had read what I wrote onFacebook and in the newsletter, which isgood. If you are communicating a lot throughevery possible platforms, but you haveonly a few orders it means something iswrong. But here it meant we were doinggreat! I had the opportunity to participate inmany missions and tasks some moreinteresting than others but I learnt a lotabout all areas of this job. These two mainmissions were the ones I have worked onthe most and also the ones I loved themost.

During this internship I was able to learn a lot in several fields. First of all, it was a first work experience for me. I had never worked before and I had never experiencedthe work rhythm. I learned about it. What it was to really work all week from nine to five, and not havingsome days where you finish earlier. At the end, of the day after being in traffic and coming back home, Iwas quite exhausted and it felt like once at home I didn’t had much time for me but it was a really goodexperience. Céline Camara was an amazing tutor. She really took time to explain the things she was doing. Sheasked for my opinion and took it into consideration. She showed me lots of aspect of being a self-employed person. From a legal point-of-view or a financial one. I learnt a lot about the job of self-employed person and what it implies really. In fact you areindependent and you can do the hours you want which is cool, no boss and no one to tell you what doto. But it also means you have to do every thing on you own. You must not be afraid to work a lotespecially at the beginning to launch your company. You have to be in the project at 100%. Beingversatile is important; you have to know about accounting, some legal aspects, computing and evenmore. You have to be curious and learn about things you never thought you would use. And moreimportantly you must not be scared of being alone all day. Indeed, being a self-employed person isgood because of the “boss-less” situation but you also have no one to talk to during the day, unless youhave an associate. During this internship I had the opportunity to discover this job and I have to say it isquite pleasant from the outside. Being your own boss is something thrilling and I would love it.  An internship is an opportunity to apply our theoretical knowledge and turn them into practical ones, aswell as reinforce our skills; but it’s also a chance to learn new things. In fact the main purpose of theinternship is to apply what we have been taught in class to real life, but if we can learn even more that’seven better.  Before this internship I had never configured a website and now I know how to do so. I also know howto use the software “Prestashop” used for e-commerce. If in the future I have to use it, I know how itworks. Same thing for “Mail jet” for the newsletter. I was also able to improve my skills with Photoshop,InDesign and Illustrator for real projects which have been helpful for the company.  To conclude, I would say that this internship has been an amazing and fulfilling experience for me. Notfor all the skills and knowledge I had the chance to learn and develop, but it also taught me a lot aboutmyself. Now I know that I am able to learn quickly things that I had never did before. Now I know what Iam capable of and I think this is the purpose of an internship: to find ourselves in a professional way.

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DESCRIPTION

Personal input

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For the next internship I hope to find one asinteresting and fulfilling as this one. In fact my firstinternship was a huge milestone and DesPasRayéshas set the bar very high. I couldn’t imagine better.

But if I really have to discuss the way forward, formy next internship I would love to do it within awedding planner agency. In fact when I was little itwas my dream job. I love weddings and all thepreparation that comes with them. And I know it’spossible to be a wedding planner once we finishISEG so why not try and see if this is what I want todo later or if it’s just a childhood dream. In addition,the internship takes place in the summer, which isthe weeding season so agencies could use somemore help. I say this now but maybe once it’s time to reallythink about the new internship I would change mymind and do something else.

But really I would love an internship asfulfilling as this one and with a tutor as niceand supportive as Céline Camara. For mewhen you get along with the co-workers oryou boss, it makes thing way easier and thedays seem shorter. You don’t go to workgrudgingly. So this is what I expect for mysecond internship.

DESCRIPTION

Perspectives for N+1internship

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CONCLUSION

This internship was really fulfilling as it taught me a lot, allowed me to improve my skills and todiscover the job of self employed person. I had the opportunity to take part in various missionslike the communication manager mission that I especially enjoyed. It opened me to theworking world and showed me that having its own business can be challenging but it is worthit. My experience was a real milestone that I will never forget. It will be an undeniable asset formy future career. I am beyond grateful for the opportunities I was given and hope I was up tothe tasks I was given.

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RFERERENCES

1     Natural referencing is about all the technics that aimed to position is favourably a websitein the first organic results of a search engine (an organic result are the opposite of the paidsearch which is for example the result with the word “Announce” written in green below theresult in Google). In practice, it’s mainly about positioning the websitefavourably on the firstresults pages of Google and if possible on the very first one. Natural referencing includes theoptimisation of the website pages, research of external links (https://www.definitions-marketing.com/). 2     Pack shot is apictureofthe advertised product that clearly shows its name and packaging,usually on a plain background.