La vie est belle chez Kosmoss

Bonjour à tous, I started my internship last week at Kosmoss. It’s a marketing agency where they work on different projects with an enthusiastic team. Kosmoss is located in Saint-Étienne, near Lyon. My internship will be for three months and I’m sure this will be an experience of a lifetime. I could have gone to a country where they speak Dutch or English, but I challenged myself to go to a country where I don’t know the language, only the basics.

Besides that, I decided to choose a marketing agency that does a lot of things so I can learn as much as possible in three months. My motivation: Challenge yourself and grow.

Anyway, let’s not get off topic because this blog is about my experience at Kosmoss, so here we go.

Me at Kosmoss, illustration made by Élise Molac.

Why Kosmoss? 

I chose this agency because when I browsed through their website, I read that they use Design Sprint. If you know me, then you know that I immediately look up what I don’t understand. If you want, you can look it up here.

Design Sprint is a book by Jake Knapp with ‘How to solve big problems and test new ideas in just five days’. I was instantly sold, I bought the book, and sent an internship proposal to Kosmoss. Of course, I also chose this agency because they do so many different projects and they have a lot of specialties. I thought it’s a great opportunity to learn in the field with a company that is specialized in marketing. 

First impressions 

WOW. When I arrived at Kosmoss I was impressed by the cosy atmosphere. It’s not like a boring office, it’s more like a cosy workspace. There are a lot of motivational quotes on the wall, beautiful illustrations, there is a little bar where you can grab a coffee or tea, etc. The sentence that caught my eye was ‘Some are born here, some drawn here but we all call it home.’ So I guess I know why they have so much inspiration. The surroundings immediately gave me motivation and inspiration. 

Me on my first day: absorbing all the information, trying to understand all those French words, no I didn’t, in case you were wondering. Luckily some can speak English so they translated everything for me. I’m secretly still hoping my French will come overnight but I think the best way to learn is to practice. Practice makes perfect, right?

My first week

The first two days, I observed, talked with members of the team to hear about what their tasks are at Kosmoss. I learned about the short daily meeting they do before they start the day, which projects there are right now, the software they use, etc. It was a lot of information.

Besides that, I also followed a meeting with an explanation about SEO, I followed a brainstorming session and I got an Apple laptop that I can use, believe me, the first hours were hard if you’ve never used Apple before.

In two days I already got so much information, it was amazing that they just welcomed me with open arms and they treat me like one of them, if you know what I mean. 

Okay, on my third day, Wednesday, I got information about the beer Kosmoss is making. It’s a really original idea to make beer with a story. They make different labels for the beer with different sports and it’s to tell a story. They asked me if it’s possible to come up with some new names for the beer, do an analysis, buyer persona and give my thoughts and ideas. I got started and made a little presentation for the next day, not something big, just my point of view backed-up with some research. 

The next day, I did my final research and the finishing touch. In the afternoon, I did my presentation for the team during the exchange, every Thursday the team comes together to do an update.

Now I talked about Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday but what about Friday? I always wanted to learn Adobe Illustrator, so on Friday I started using Illustrator and of course I wrote this blog so that somebody at Kosmoss would have the time to read it and give her opinion about it.  

So flashback to my first week. It was overwhelming because I moved to France, with a very basic knowledge of French, and I started in a marketing agency with so many talented people. Luckily the team gave me a warm welcome and they are helping me a lot by explaining things in English. 

Expectations

Like I said before, at Kosmoss there are so many talented people. I would love to learn from every team member so that after this experience I can say I’ve grown. They work differently than I’m used to and they use different software.

My goal is to know the basics of every software they use and expand my knowledge. I also want to work on a project, together with somebody from the team, so I learn how their marketing strategy works, in the field. Besides that I hope I can give something in return, some knowledge I gathered through all my years of studying. 

I think my motivation is clear, right? ‘Challenge yourself and grow’. I can’t wait to see what the next weeks will bring. Bring it on!

Credits to Sylvain Vallier for the pictures.