Anna’s 6 Week Digital Marketing Internship
Week 1
My name is Anna, I am 19 years old, and this is my first week of my internship at Digital Butter. I’ve spent the last several months on a Gap Year, and wanted to finish the summer working and learning in a creative, stimulating environment, before I head off to college at the end of the summer.
I used to attend the Canadian International School of Hong Kong, which is located in Aberdeen. Every morning, my school bus would drive past a large, yellow building, covered in comic art; each time, I wondered what the building was. Fast-forward five years later, I received the opportunity to intern for Butter, whose office happens to be in that very building: The Factory.
The Factory, situated directly across the street from the now-completed Wong Chuk Hang station, is home to a multitude of businesses. The Loft, a Tribeca-style coffee shop on the first floor, has been my primary stop each morning. At 10:00AM, coffee in hand, I make my way up to Butter’s office on the eighth floor.
A large, open floor plan embellished with a fully-serviced refrigerator, pool table, Nintendo switch, standing desk, and glass paned conference room all greet me as I walk through the office doors. Yellow industrial windows line the back wall, allowing the spacious “workshop” to be filled with natural light. Directly in front of those windows lie our desks––mine furnished with a 27-inch iMac, others with laptops, folders, post-it notes, coffee cups, and creative inspiration. Above us all hang two posters, one reads “Break Free,” the other, “Unlock Your Mind.” As the day commences, hello’s and 早晨’s are said, and the team of seven file into their respective work spaces. The collective sound of tapping keyboards, phone calls and muffled chatter all become white noise against a chosen Spotify playlist softly played in the background.
Amidst all this, web design, development and marketing projects are all being cultivated. Respective employees are responsible for the enterprise’s individual components: design, coding, marketing, management, etc. Collaboration between parties is essential for each project; a few times a day, several shuffle into the glass conference room for meetings on the proposal’s progress. A provided TV and whiteboard allow for easy communication and presentation, as does the soundproof room.
My work thus far has mostly been introductory: market and competitor research for current clients and project pitches, learning the ropes of digital marketing (SEOs, CMSs, IDEs, and other fun acronyms), and trying to make myself useful to an otherwise highly-efficient team––the latter, naturally, being the most challenging. Individual members have patiently helped brief me on everything I need to know, from explaining front-end coding languages to the WiFi password.
As this week draws to a close, I am both pleasantly surprised and relieved how smooth-sailing my introduction to Butter’s intimate troupe has been. I am sure there is much to learn and be excited for in the weeks to come.
Week 2
As I close out my second week of my internship - thanks to a short week for Dragon Boat Festival - there is much to look back at and reflect on. With no day quite like the other, the sun seems to set hours in advance at Butter–– that is, until I check the time and realise the full day has passed.
Week two has been full of new experiences: client meetings, writing copy, sourcing material for Butter’s social media accounts, learning the basics of Photoshop, and finally setting up a functioning personal LinkedIn account. As far as meetings go, I’ve had the opportunity to be introduced to large property developer, smart technology manufacturer and restaurant clients. Besides from the obvious thrill of meeting clients at all, my favourite part of these meetings has been seeing the practical use of what I’ve been busy compiling; work indeed feels less gratuitous when you realise it’s a small part of a much bigger project.
It has also been fascinating to see what goes on behind the scenes of things I previously overlooked. There are so many aspects of user friendliness and aesthetics that, if not seriously considered, will inevitably create problems for clients in the future. Part of my competitor research is actually looking for those ignored aspects and making sure that we don’t make the same mistakes. While compiling information for the technology manufacturer, for example, I was astounded by how many competitor sites were, ironically, practically archaic.


The key to creating a good website, I’ve learned, is clearly understanding user personas: who is going to be using the site? What type of person are they? What do they want to achieve - not simply, what does our client want them to do. Once various personas have been established, the design decisions and content strategy all seem to fall into place. Notably, when I say “all fall into place,” what I really mean is that several experts are able to determine the appropriate next steps. Though far from that kind of expertise, I am thoroughly enjoying aiding the process in whatever small ways I can––with several large projects coming to fruition, I’m sure there’ll be plenty to keep me busy.
Week 3
Each week at Butter comes with new surprises: this week, anti-extradition protests broke out in Hong Kong, with a fair amount of disruption to local transportation links.
Transportation routes to Wong Chuk Hang were hit quite hard this week, and many of the team were unable to reach the office for a few days (myself included). Thankfully, however, work goes on with the ability for remote working to be handled seamlessly, with communication over Slack, and tasks managed via Asana.

