First Summer Internship Begins!

I’ve hired a group of student interns for the summer! Read this article to learn more about the program, the interns, and how their work will benefit you.

You may have noticed more blog posts on the site recently, and that’s because of the great teamwork of my interns who are writing about Dragon Ball.

The summer internship team consists of 5 students. Two journalists, two social media marketers, and one data analyst.

Their goal is to produce more content that you enjoy reading, to promote that content, and to then analyze the results and learn how to give you more of what you want.

The summer internship began May 20 and will end August 19, for 90 days.

Meet the Interns

Journalists

The journalists write articles about Dragon Ball’s culture, history, fandom, and news. You’ll see their author bio and picture at the bottom of each article they write.

Adam Bakr is a recent Bachelors’ degree graduate of Michigan State University’s Journalism major. He’s a long-time fan of Dragon Ball and One Piece, and he likes to write about the deeper aspects of Dragon Ball’s characters and lore.

Sierra McIntosh is an incoming junior in Michigan State University’s Journalism major. She’s been a fan of Dragon Ball since childhood, and her favorite character is Vegeta. She likes to write about the latest Dragon Ball news.

Social Media Marketers

The social media marketers promote the articles written by the journalists, and other content related to my business.

Skyler Streeter is a senior in Grand Valley State University’s Film and Video major. He’s passionate about social media, communication, photography, film, and music.

Alexandra Davis is a junior in Eastern Michigan University’s Simulation Animation and Gaming major. She likes graphic design, personal branding, and social media influencing. She hopes to learn more about how to run and market a personal brand and company.

Data Analyst

The data analyst collects data from the website, social media platforms, and advertising platforms, analyzes it, and then reports the data to the team with suggestions on how to improve the visitor’s and team’s experience.

Jack Warner is a Masters’ degree student at Michigan State University’s Business Data Science & Analytics program. He’s a life-long anime fan, a gamer, and a chess player. He wants to apply his passion for problem solving to help the team.

About the Summer Internship

Why am I running a summer internship for writing about Dragon Ball?

I’m so busy working on my business that I haven’t had the time to write articles for the site.

With a huge increase in workload, it turned out that I was the funnel through which everything passed, and there wasn’t enough time, energy, or concentration available to get everything done and also produce more content for the site.

As enjoyable as it can be to write about Dragon Ball for a living, it’s also a lot of work.

I was getting burnt out, but at the same time had more work to do. It was an endless cycle of fatigue.

The solution was to realize that it was necessary to expand the business beyond myself.

Likewise, to acknowledge that I had a lot of experience and skill at running a creative business that could be taught to others. From writing, editing, formatting, marketing, branding, graphic design, and every other aspect of how to be an influencer.

I’ll teach the interns how to communicate to Dragon Ball fans around the world.

To start the process I taught myself how to write job listings, post them on Handshake (an American platform to hire university students), select qualified candidates, conduct interviews, hire them, and then train them.

This is the first time I’ve ever hired and managed a team, so it’s a learning process for everyone.

All of the interns are from universities in Michigan because this is where I was born and raised, and I wanted to give back to my community.

If the summer internship proves to be a win-win, then I’ll consider holding another one in the fall, and at that point I’ll welcome applicants outside of Michigan.

If you’re interested in working for me in the fall, please leave a comment below. You must be an active student or recent graduate, an anime fan, and of course it helps to be a big Dragon Ball fan.

Internalizing

The summer interns are improving their techniques and becoming more familiar with their roles and the roles of their teammates.

After 15 years of working alone, it’s still weird for me to realize that this is a team effort now, and not a one-man show with occasional hiring of freelance translators. There are processes and workflows to consider, and people depend on one another.

Hopefully this will be the beginning of something even bigger, and the start of many internship programs to come.

We’ll work hard to improve every day, just like Goku and Vegeta. Always striving to reach the next level!