SALES AND MARKETING INTERNSHIP IN ASSOCIATION

WITH OUTLOOK GROUP

Summer Project Report
Submitted by

Abhishek Mishra

215120003

In partial fulfilment of Summer Project for the award of the degree of

Master of Business Administration

Department of Management Studies

National Institute of Technology
Tiruchirappalli -620015

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 INSTITUTE BONAFIDECERTIFICATE

This bonafide is to certify that the project entitled Summary writing reports, calling
candidates and interviewing potential interns is a bonafide record of the work done by Alice
M S M Rynjah (215120013) in partial fulfilment for the award of MASTER OF BUSINESS
ADMINISTRATION in DEPARTMENT OF MANAGEMENT STUDIES,

National Institute of Technology, Trichy, during the year 2020-2022.

I declare that I have carried out the work presented in the report and that I have not submitted
the results in any form previously for the award of any degree or diploma.

Dr.M. Pooniyamoorthy Dr. G.Muruganantham

InternalGuide Head of Department

Department ofManagementStudies Department of Management Studies

National InstituteofTechnology National Institute ofTechnology

Trichy- 620015. Trichy-620015.

Project Viva- Voice held on………………...

InternalExaminer ExternalExaminer

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COMPANY BONAFIDECERTIFICATE

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 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

I take this opportunity to express my acknowledgement and deep sense of gratitude to the individuals
who have rendered their valuable assistance to me. Their inputs have played a vital role in the
completion of this project.

I am grateful to Mr. Indranil Roy (CEO, Outlook Group) for providing me with this internship
opportunity, which gave me a better understanding and practical exposure of the publishing as well
as the retail industry.

I express my sincere gratitude to Dr. G. Muruganantham (HOD, DoMS, NIT, Trichy) and my
project guide at DoMSNIT,Trichy Dr. N. Thamaraiselvan for their generous support, constant
direction and mentoring throughout the course of the project.

Abhishek Mishra

(215120003)

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 TABLE OF CONTENT

CONTENTS

ABSTRACT…………………………………………………………………………………… 6

CHAPTER 1. INTRODUCTION……………………………………………... 7
1.1. Background of the Project…………………………………………………………......... 7

1.2. Company and Industry profile………………………………………………………......... 7

1.3. Scope of the Project…………………………………………………………………......... 9

CHATER 2. TASKS PERFORMED DURING THE PROJECT…………... 10

2.1. Lead Generation and Sales….……………………………………………………….......... 10

2.2. Competitor Analysis……………………………………………………………………… 10

2.3. Digital Audit Report………………………………………………………………………. 11

2.4. Branding and Co-Branding Strategy Formulation………………...……………………… 13

2.5. Venture Strategy Formulation…………………………………………………………….. 17
2.6 Marketing Strategy Formulation……………………………………………………........... 18

CHAPTER 3. CONCLUSION………………………………………………… 19
3.1. Concluding Remarks……………………………………………………………………… 19

3.2. Limitations………………………………………………………………………………... 19

CHAPTER 4. LEARNING AND EXPERIENCE…………………………… 20

4.1. Knowledge-Based learning……………………………………………………………….. 20

4.2. Organizational-Based learning…………………………………………………………..... 20

4.3. Career-Based learning…………………………………………………………………….. 20

REFERENCES………………………………………………………………………………… 21

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ABSTRACT

This internship in association with the Outlook Group was aimed at helping the interns refine their
sales and marketing skills. The internship gave the interns an experience of working in a hierarchical
structure in an organization. The existence of a sales target and a performance-based compensation
motivated the interns to work hard in order to achieve their respective targets. The second half of
the internship was aimed at giving the interns an opportunity to put the marketing knowledge learnt
in the classroom to good use. By performing tasks like competitor analysis, marketing strategy
formulation, branding and co-branding strategy formulation among others, the interns were able to
get an idea of the real-life roles and responsibilities of a marketing professional.

This internship with Outlook Group helped form a good foundation for a career in marketing and
helped the interns discover their strengths and weaknesses and the areas that they needed to work in
order to improve as a marketer and as an individual.

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1. INTRODUCTION

1.1. Background of the Project

This internship at Outlook was offered to a select few candidates after the successful completion
of a live project in December 2020. The internship was focused on two major areas, sales and
market analysis. The first half of the internship required all the candidates to generate leads and
convert them into sales. This task was designed to give the candidates an idea about ground zero
and what challenges are faced when pushing the organization's product. As a sales
representative, it was important to be thorough with the various products on offer and the
advantages they offered over their competitors. Apart from possessing knowledge of the
products, it was also important to know the various forces at play in the market and how to use
them to convert a lead into a successful sale. The second half of the internship required all the
candidates to analyze key aspects of Outlook's parent organization, Raheja Group and give
recommendations based on the analysis. This half also included tasks which invited new product
ideas from the students and recommendations on how to market a new product line that Outlook
had developed.

1.2. Company and Industry Profile

Outlook Publishing Pvt. Ltd. is a publishing house responsible for publishing weekly, fortnightly
and monthly general interest English and Hindi news magazines. These magazines cover a wide
array of topics ranging from business, finance, travel, sports, politics and many others. Outlook
was first issued in October 1995 with Vinod Mehta as the editor in chief and is owned by the
Rajan Raheja Group.

Outlook Publishing has many product lines that helps them appeal to a plethora of readers.
Outlook Weekly is India’s premier fully loaded newsmagazine and for around 25 years it has
continued to consistently drive the news, provoke, engage and thrill its readers. It is basically a
sectional magazine covering technology, lifestyle, science, politics, national, international,
sports and other areas. Outlook Traveler is one of India’s best travel magazines and has been the
gold standard for travel related print content in India for well over a decade. In a rapidly changing
and highly competitive environment, the magazine has managed to maintain the quality of its
content and evolve at the same time, adding new elements while strengthening its core. Outlook
Business is an insightful, thought provoking, compelling, in-depth business magazine which
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delivers a fresh perspective, coupled with a holistic approach on upcoming business practices. A
holistic approach ensures all influences on business: economic, political, regulatory and market
driven are examined. Outlook Money is India’s only personal finance magazine; Outlook Money
has relentlessly helped its readers make smart investments with stories which are focused on
giving the readers specific and actionable tips that they can use to make their money grow.
Outlook Money acts as the readers' money manager, helping them invest well, borrow wisely
and spend smartly. Apart from these staple products, Outlook Publishing also has many regional
language magazines, and the company has also gone digital keeping in mind the current
environment. Outlook Publishing's products face stiff competition from other magazines like
Business Today, Forbes, India Today, Vogue, The Week, GQ and many others.

Print media in India is more than a century old and a well-established industry. The print industry
mainly comprises of newspaper and magazine publishing. Even though it's a mature industry,
new magazines are being launched every year. India has been one of the fastest growing world
economies since the past three years. Robust consumption and rising income levels have helped
the growth of print media. New titles that focus on niche topics continue to launch in the market.
The revenue sources for a magazine are subscription, single copy sales and advertisement.
Approximately 73 percent of revenue comes from advertising and 27 percent from circulation.

The magazine industry is going through a tough phase in India just like in other countries.
Newspapers have added supplements to their main issue and infringed on the content covered
by magazines earlier. Television channels have launched in different genres that didn't exist a
few years back. Also, with the increased penetration and adoption of the internet in the country,
more people are now consuming news and stories on different topics online. There is still a
demand for high quality print content and if magazines fail to deliver on that, they might lose
their market share to other mediums. Many magazines have already started exploring and
distributing their content on the web and mobile platforms to give choice to their subscribers to
consume content from anywhere and at any time.

India has over 49,000 publications, but annual revenues total just $1.1 billion. Most publications
lack technology, marketing, and capital to grow which has resulted in a handful of publications
dominating the market with the Times of India Group being the market leader. Distribution is
critical for a magazine since it must be readily available and marketed to consumers. With the
growth coming from Tier-2 and Tier-3 cities, publications must expand their distribution channel
aggressively in those locations and localize content where needed.

Another challenge faced by the print industry in India is that it is highly fragmented due to the
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large number of regional languages. Regional language publications own 46 percent of the
market share, Hindi language publications cover 44 percent, and the remaining 10 percent is
served by English publications. The primary penetration of English language magazines
currently is in metropolitan and urban centers, though the growth is widening to smaller cities
as the education and income levels increase among the middle class.

With the opening of Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) policy, several international publishers are
aggressively entering the market and this trend is expected to continue. There is little doubt
about India's market potential and according to a national survey, 248 million literate adults still
don't read any publication. Readership of newspapers and magazines is up 15% since 1998 to
180 million which is a clear reflection of a younger, more educated population, especially in
smaller cities. Now that the doors to foreign investors in print media have been thrown open,
one can expect activity to pick up in this sector. Companies such as Pearson, Haymarket, Time
India, News Corp., and Dow Jones have eyed India's big, English-reading market. ICICI
Ventures, which holds stakes in three media companies, is quite bullish about the industry's
prospects.

Outlook Publishing and its competitors have a tough market to crack but the potential is immense
as literacy rates keep growing and people thirst for content, magazine publications must change
rapidly with the changing times and cater to the needs of their new consumers.

1.3. Scope of the project

As a sales and marketing intern, my work profile included various tasks. The first task was
generating leads and converting the generated leads into sales. The next task was to perform
analysis on several key aspects like Competitors, Net Promoter Scores (NPS), Digital Audit
Reports etc. and give recommendations based on the findings. Another task that was assigned
to me was to develop a brand strategy after studying the existing one in implementation. The
final task was to develop a marketing strategy for a new magazine that Outlook Publishing was
going to introduce.

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2. TASKS PERFORMED DURING THE PROJECT

2.1. Lead Generation and Sales

Lead Generation and Sales was the first task that was assigned to all interns irrespective of the
specialization they had opted for. The task was designed with the primary objective of making
the interns realize how important lead generation and sales is to drive an organization. Sales
forms the backbone of an organization and is the very foundation on which the organization
operates. Without revenue being generated from sales, organizations would not have an active
cash flow and would eventually collapse. The secondary objective was to help the interns
become familiar with the products, their strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. This
would eventually help the interns in future tasks when they would be asked to give
recommendations to better the product line. To motivate the interns to perform well in this task,
10% of the sales revenue generated was offered as incentive, and this compensation served as a
huge driver for intern generated sales. The first task had a deadline of 2 weeks and required each
intern to generate a minimum sales revenue of ₹ 10,000 to qualify for the next task.

2.2. Competitor Analysis

This task required the interns to perform competitor analysis on Outlook’s major competitors
and compile the observations. The analysis was performed using SWOT, MOST, Porter’s 5
Forces, and the BCG Matrix. The following observations were made once the analysis was
completed,

• Outlook sells more than Business Today and Forbes and is a premium business magazine.
While Business Today relies on its economical pricing, Forbes uses its marketing presence
to ensure that both new and return customers know about them. While Outlook offers
premium gifts and rebates on subscriptions and a discount for return customers, Forbes
provides goodies and online membership free while Business Today also provides gifts to
customers who spend above a certain amount.

• Outlook has an NPS score of 40%, while that of Business Today and Forbes are 35% and
45% respectively. Judging by the NPS score, these magazines should work towards
converting the detractors into passives and then promoters.

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2.3. Digital Audit Report Analysis

This task required all the sales and marketing interns to perform an analysis of the Digital Audit
Report of a Rajan Raheja Group company and one of its competitors. On the basis of the analysis,
a compiled report was to be formulated consisting of a brief overview of the analysis and key
recommendations for the Rajan Raheja Group company on how to improve their digital
presence. The Rajan Raheja Group company chosen was Shoppers Stop and the competitor
company chosen was Westside.

A strong digital presence has become essential and necessary for all brands in today’s world. A
digital presence gives the brand an ideal platform to communicate with consumers. It gives
brands an opportunity to set the narrative on what they wish to identify as and set themselves
apart from competitors. More than just the website, digital presence expands to all the touch
points a consumer may have with the brand online. A strong digital presence helps make the
brand memorable and near and dear to consumers thus helping the brand stand out in the midst
of what can definitely be called the most competitive era.

Shoppers Stop, one of India’s leading fashion and beauty destination, has been implementing
newer technologies to connect with its customers. The brand has radically transformed its online
business strategy to make it more engaging than ever before. In this post-COVID world, the
brand has stood up to the challenging times and created innovative solutions to assist customers
with their shopping needs, leading to a digital transformation. As a part of this transformation
journey, the brand has moved on to a new enterprise solution, SAP. The brand has also digitally
revamped its popular loyalty program, First Citizens and has now offered the customer the
convenience of shopping across various platforms: In-Store, Online (website and Mobile App)
and via WhatsApp calling connecting with the Personal Shopper Program.

The digital features of Shoppers Stop are supported by a robust technology backbone and has
been enabling the brand to go the extra mile to deliver value to its customers. Upon the analysis
of the Digital Audit Report, certain key digital aspects of Shoppers Stop were identified and are
as follows,

• Endless Aisle was introduced to fulfil the objective of helping customers find what they are
looking for, by widening their choice and ensuring they do not walk away from the store
empty-handed.

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• Click-and-collect is about providing customers with the convenience of buying online and
collecting their orders from the store, ensuring faster fulfilment

• Ship from store leverages the full might of retail stores and warehouse inventory to promptly
fulfil customer orders.

• SNAP. FIND. BUY. is a visual search feature on our app which allows customers to learn
more about a product by clicking a picture of it.

• Google directs customers, when they initiate a search on the platform, to digital ads
promoting specific offers from Shoppers Stop.

On analysing the social media presence of Shoppers Stop, the following was found,

• Shoppers Stop was one of the first Indian retailers to recognize and leverage the potential of
digital and social media to engage with customers.

• Shoppers Stop is present on four important social media platforms: LinkedIn, Facebook,
Twitter and YouTube and has a large follower base.

• Shoppers Stop uses its social media presence for several things among which are, addressing
customer issues and queries, marketing its products, presenting employment opportunities
to job seekers.

• The Shoppers Stop app provides the brand a huge advantage over its peers because of the
use of smart tools to aid customer experience.

The Digital Audit Report of Westside which is available to the general public did not carry many
insights but gave a brief overview of the future of digitalization at Westside. Westside’s parent
Trent Ltd. acknowledges that in the years to come, online fashion retail play will get much bigger
in India. With an aim to address this fast emerging market, and especially to enable the
convenience of its customers seeking to shop online, the company is working to launch Westside
online as part of the Tata Group market place initiative. It believes this approach would provide
the company adequate visibility and control in respect to various customer experience elements
including pricing, omnichannel integration and range of offering.

On analysing the social media presence of Westside, the following was found,

• Westside engages its customers by providing latest updates across all its social media
handles.
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• Westside lacks in social media presence in terms of followers and only uses Twitter as the
major channel for communication.

• Westside does not have a dedicated app and relies on the TataCliq app for all its services.
Apart from this, Westside does not interact with customers to the extent of what its peers do.

Key recommendations were formulated on the basis of the analysis and are mentioned as
follows,

• Shoppers Stop should make its social media handles more interactive and engaging. Since
most customers consume a lot of content on social media, Shoppers Stop can tie up with
content creators to market products and services on their social media platforms. This would
provide a connection between the customers and the brand which can lead to a higher
conversion rate in terms of sales.

• Shoppers Stop should keep updating its app with new features to aid and enhance customer
experience and maintain its image as a tech savvy brand.

2.4. Branding and Co-Branding Strategy Formulation

This task required the interns to analyze the branding and co-branding strategies that were being
followed by Shoppers Stop and Westside. The analysis was done on a few key areas of the brand
which are as follows,

• Brand Positioning and Repositioning

• Logo and Tagline

• Communication Strategies and Campaigns

• Co-Branding and Associations

• Brand Personality

The analysis was done based on secondary data found on the internet and from various other
tangible and intangible sources. On completing the analysis, the key recommendations were
compiled which are as follows,

• Shoppers Stop was earlier positioned as a high-quality fashion retail outlet with premium
brands from across the globe. Upon further research, the management of Shoppers Stop
realized that for successful positioning, they needed to include fashion brands that were

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 much more affordable and kept in line with global fashion trends. This repositioning strategy
yielded good results as Shoppers Stop was able to maintain its premium positioning
meanwhile attracting a wider target consumer base to its stores. Shoppers Stop repositioned
and reinvented as a bridge to luxury brand with the unveiling of the tagline, "START
SOMETHING NEW".

• Reaching out to the customers in their own style and language. For example, the first
Shoppers Stop store in Lucknow was named ‘Tehzeeb’. Shoppers Stop launched a unique
and interactive festive promotion campaign by the name, ‘PARIKRAMA’. This campaign
gave customers an opportunity to interact with local artisans. Shoppers Stop organizes
thematic promotional events from time to time like ‘Fly to Santa Land’, ‘Gear Up for School’
and ‘Salwar Kameez Dupatta Exchange’ among others. Shoppers Stop also organizes local
festivals like Durga Puja in Kolkata, Onam in South India and Dhanteras in North India.

• Shoppers Stop offers various privileges to customers who opt for the First Citizen
membership program. The various benefits offered are, reward Points for every time
customers shop at Shoppers Stop, HomeStop, Arcelia stores located all across India and
online on www.shoppersstop.com, exclusive benefits & privileges, exclusive Preview Sale
only for First Citizen Members, updates on what customers can look forward to shop for at
Shoppers Stop, HomeStop, Arcelia and Online on www.shoppersstop.com, exclusive cash
counters at Shoppers Stop so customers can spend more time shopping than waiting in a line
and parking privileges at stores for First Citizens.

• Shoppers Stop deals in a wide plethora of luxury as well as premium apparel and accessory
brands. With an unparalleled assortment of the leading international and national brands in
clothing for men, women, and kids; accessories, fragrances, cosmetics, footwear; home
furnishing and decor products, Shoppers Stop aims to provide shoppers a truly international
shopping destination.

• Shoppers Stop’s corporate vision is, “To be an inspirational and trusted brand, transforming
customer's lives through fashion and delightful shopping experience every time." Shoppers
Stop has a premium feel to it, not only with the products and brands it has on offer at its
stores, but also the ambience and the aura of its stores which exude an upmarket feel.
Shoppers Stop projects itself as a transformative, open and socially responsible brand. This

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 strategy led to Shoppers Stop being the recipient of many prestigious awards. In 2019,
Shoppers Stop won the Best Department Store Award at the Retail Leadership Summit.

• Westside was established in 1998 when the Tata Group acquired Littlewoods. It offers
branded fashion apparel, footwear and accessories for men, women and children, along with
a wide range of home furnishings and decor. It has over 200 retail stores measuring 8,000-
34,000 sq. ft. in 82 major Indian cities under the Westside brand. Westside was designed to
be a one-stop shop for the complete family. When compared to Shoppers Stop, Westside is
more focussed on affordable fashion for everybody. Westside brands cover a very wide price
band that suit almost all demographics and psychographics. Westside decided to give their
brand a dynamic and youthful tagline in the form of “Where fashion comes alive!”

• Westside often entices customers with discounts, some of which can run up to 50% the
marked price. Westside also does a lot of in-house brand promotions, with space availability
for some formidable international labels. The company uses theme-based stores such as
Westside Woman. In addition to all these, Westside does run advertisement campaigns and
is often credited for increasing its customer base through the addition of international brands.

• Westside has its own loyalty program to reward frequent shoppers. The various perks offered
are, unlimited access to fashion with weekly updates on new launches and fashion essentials,
style Voucher worth ₹400 off on minimum spends of ₹4000, more to the in-store experience
with complimentary beauty makeovers with a friend, 20% off on minimum spends of ₹5000
for customers in their respective birthday months, free shipping on any two orders on
Westside.com, and a curated box of fragrances, colour cosmetics and bath & body products
on annual spends of ₹12000.

• Unlike other retail chains, Westside has positioned itself as a private label with 97 percent
in-house brands, with a few exceptions in the beauty segment. This strategic decision made
way back in the ’90s and has helped the chain carve a niche for itself. Be it Bombay Paisley,
the Indian fusion-wear brand; or the office-wear brand Wardrobe or Nuon for youth; or the
men’s range E.T.A and Ascot; or Gia, the brand for plus-sized women, each of them have
the hard-to- miss Westside signature in its cuts, designs, patterns and pricing. Westside also
promotes many boutique designers by collaborating with them on a frequent basis. One such
designer is Aneeth Arora, and his creations are sold under the premium ethnic wear
collection, Zuba.
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• Westside's vision is to design and deliver fashion and lifestyle brands, while always keeping
it fresh. Westside describe themselves as young, agile, risk-takers who love including
everyone in the exhilarating journey of fashion. Unlike Shoppers Stop, Westside has a more
price friendly brand personality. Westside stores reflect the same by being welcoming and
having a warm aura to them. Being part of the TATA fold, the core values of Westside echo
sustainability, compliance and engaging in mindful business.

After doing an in-depth an analysis of both Outlook and Westside, both the brands were put
to a comparison test on the basis of the aforementioned parameters and the observations are
as follows,

• While Shoppers Stop is no doubt a premium brand and offers an unparalleled shopping
experience, Westside with its conservative strategy of including all demographics
outperformed all its peers in sales and YoY growth.

• The major reason behind Westside’s success was the rise in their operating profit margins
because of their strategic decision to deal in 97% in-house brands.

• The major chunk of fashion-conscious customers fall in the age group of 15-35. With fashion
trends changing by the hour, these customers prefer affordable fashion. Though brand value
is equally valued by these customers, Westside through its clever associations with boutique
designers has that covered as well.

2.5. Venture Strategy Formulation

This task was assigned to all the sales and marketing interns, and it required them to formulate
a complete branding strategy for a retail venture. The key parameters used to analyze Shoppers
Stop and Westside in the previous task served as the outline for this task. The new venture was
named Global Fusion and aimed at incorporating the strengths of Shoppers Stop and Westside.
The major outline of the strategy is mentioned below,

• Global Fusion will be positioned as a youth friendly brand that is premium in brand feel and
the overall experience but light on the pockets of customers. Global Fusion stores will be
less in number but offer a clandestine and niche shopping experience so that it becomes the
favourite destination of shoppers. Global Fusion will focus more on online sales as that has

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 evolved to be the preferred medium of young customers. Although Global Fusion will
majorly target the youth, it will follow a demographic friendly strategy to make all age
groups feel comfortable and address their needs.

• Global Fusion will follow communication strategies that will be crisp, catchy, and easy to
understand. By this strategy, Global Fusion will aim to achieve maximum retention of its
promotional campaigns and other brand communications in the mind of potential customers.
Global Fusion will offer promotions and launch campaigns during all major festivals and
regional campaigns for regional festivals. To promote the online medium, Global Fusion will
offer customers additional discounts when they shop online. Global Fusion will aim to
always offer some or the other discount campaign, as young customers are particularly
attracted to such offers.

• Global Fusion will try to create a unique brand line-up that would consist of both in-house
as well as premium and affordable global brands so that customers get a good selection.
Global Fusion will try to promote its in-house brands more by offering the same quality and
trends as global brands but at affordable prices. By collaborating with up-and-coming
designers, Global Fusion will promote its youth friendly personality while giving its
customers access to boutique brands at an affordable price.

• Global Fusion’s vision will be, “To bring the best from across the world to your doorstep.”
This will showcase the global nature of brands on offer and promote the brand’s online
shopping experience. Global Fusion will aim at giving customers an upmarket and premium
shopping experience, be it in retail outlets or online stores. Global Fusion will aim at being
popular among the youth as they are the opinion drivers in most modern families.

2.6. Marketing Strategy Formulation

This was the last task that the sales and marketing interns were required to do, and it required
them to formulate a marketing strategy for Outlook’s latest magazine, Outlook Spurge. The
three areas in focus were buzz creation and PR management, influencer marketing and
corporate advertisement. The following key recommendations were suggested as a part of this
task,

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• To help market the upcoming Outlook Spurge magazine, Outlook should position it as a
window into the world of fashion influencers, a behind the scenes take. By including articles
and interviews about fashion models and influencers and how they spend their lives when
they are not in front of a camera, Outlook can ensure the inclusion of quality content as well
as free marketing by the influencers who are being interviewed. Apart from this, Outlook
can start a discussion column on social media channels and encourage people to participate
in it by offering a chance to be featured in the magazine. This would help in keeping Spurge
in the discussion in between its production cycle. Outlook Spurge can be an interactive
magazine where readers are given an opportunity to choose the topics on which they want
articles through a monthly poll across all social media platforms.

• By tying up with the most followed fashion influencers on leading social media platforms
like Instagram, YouTube and Twitter, Outlook Spurge can offer subscriptions at a discounted
rate to the fans of these influencers. Outlook Spurge can start a weekly podcast where such
fashion influencers are invited to talk about their favourite trending topics. This would help
in garnering a lot of engagement and would serve as a marketing tool.

• To ensure that Outlook Spurge becomes a well-known and reputed brand in the corporate
world, there can be a dedicated section about corporate fashion. This section can include
dressing ethics, trending formal fashion and a list of recommended formal wear compiled by
leading corporate fashion influencers. Outlook Spurge can tie up with leading hotels and
airport lounges to promote the magazine to their guests. This way Outlook Spurge can ensure
a good brand presence.

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3. CONCLUSION
3.1. Concluding Remarks

In conclusion, this internship in association with the Outlook Group served as an inspiration as
well as a strong foundation to ensure that the interns got a good idea of what waits ahead for
them if they opt for a career in marketing. The sales part of the internship helped improve
communication and persuasion skills while the marketing strategy formulation helped in
improving analytical and observational skills.

Other than the knowledge and the experience gained, this internship also provided the
opportunity of working in a hierarchical structure in a large organization. It was very gracious
of the Outlook Group to provide the interns with a performance-based compensation to motivate
and reward the interns.

3.2. Limitations

Due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic this internship in association with the Outlook Group
was online. There were several restrictions and hindrances in the sales part as the sales could
only be done through calls and emails. The pandemic meant that the internship was work from
home and this limited the experience the interns got of the organizational culture.

The internship experience was devoid of the allure of working in a physical office. This meant
that the interns got limited experience of working in teams and having to answer to a superior.

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4. LEARNING AND EXPERIENCE
4.1. Knowledge – Based Learning

By definition, the term sales refers to all activities involved in selling a product or service to a
consumer or business. This definition is however limited only to the literal meaning of the word
and in practice sales is a way more skill intensive task. Sales teaches an individual persistence,
perseverance, discipline, punctuality, confidence, determination, persuasion, and negotiation.
The skills learned in a sales job are essential to communication outside of the business world.
To be a successful seller you need to understand what you bring to the table, what you are willing
to compromise on and when to walk away from the deal.

Being able to perform competitor analysis and formulate marketing strategy helped put the
concepts learnt in the classroom to test. This internship was critical in the realization of the fact
that knowledge is everywhere and it is upon the beholder to gain as much from the situation as
is possible.

4.2. Organizational Culture - Based Learning

As the internship was online, it was tough to gauge the work environment and the
organizational culture. Despite the aforementioned difficulties, being able to work under a
hierarchical structure provided some insights into how an organization functions and how
employees are responsible for the growth of the organization. The superiors that were
responsible for our training were courteous and polite. They helped us get up to speed with the
skills that were required to start contacting prospective clients and encouraged us to perform
better throughout the course of the internship.

4.3. Career – Based Learning

The internship helped gauge the requirements organizations have for a marketing professional
and the expectations in terms of skill. Being a sales and marketing intern helped sharpen
observation and analytical thinking skills. As an aspiring marketing professional, this
internship played a crucial role in shaping the thought process that is needed to add value to an
organization.

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References

https://www.outlookgroup.com/

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