Celeste Littrup, a senior marketing major with a minor in sales, completed her summer internship at Trace3. Trace3 is an IT consulting company providing services across a wide spectrum, including data architecture, analytics and intelligence, cloud adoption, and much more! Celeste connected with one of the recruiters from Trace3 with the help of a Ferris professor. From there, Celeste went through the interview process and landed an internship focusing on technology sales!
The 12-week internship for technology sales incorporated many different responsibilities. For the first six weeks, Celeste focused on learning more about the company and performing sales roleplays for different situations. During the remaining half, Celeste developed prospecting lists for account managers and cold-called businesses. Celeste noted that the culture and work environment at Trace3 was amazing and how many great leaders there were throughout the company! There were also many professional development and networking opportunities made available to interns. Often there were informational events or times when interns met with upper-level management.
This internship requires pivotal listening and communication skills at all times in order to communicate effectively with potential customers and co-workers. It was important for Celeste to apply these skills throughout the entire sales process to ensure the best chance of closing a sale. Customers frequently won’t reveal all the desired information to a sales representative right away, so it’s essential to actively listen to the customers’ needs and learn more about them. Celeste states that the sales classes at Ferris State have helped her gain a better grasp of these skills while preparing her for acquiring a sales development representative role in the near future.
Celeste’s favorite part of the internship was how welcoming and supportive her co-workers were during these 12 weeks. Even on the bad days, the other interns within the program and the sales development representatives would always make the day better. Celeste highly recommends an internship with Trace3 to anyone interested in information technology (IT) or sales, as the program is very well-structured, and you’ll learn tons of applicable information.
AMA Ferris is excited for Celeste and her success!