This article is written by a student writer from the Her Campus at Illinois chapter.
Meet this week’s campus celeb, Joanna Dutra!
Her Campus: Tell us about yourself, what is your major, what do you do on campus?
Joanna Dutra: My name’s Joanna Dutra. I’m a junior in the College of Media studying advertising. I’m apart of Gamma Phi Beta and one of the Red Bull Student Brand Managers (SBM) on campus. Pretty much all I do is promote the product to students through different events and activations to build brand loyalty. Oh and I get a looooot of Red Bull… I think it’s safe to say I haven’t slept much since I got the job.
HC: Tell us about your involvement with RedBull?
JD: Actually the other SBM Facebook chatted me during class saying that he thought I’d be a good fit for the position so I sent in my resume, had an interview, obsessively checked my email for a response and then ended up getting a call saying I got it! I was so excited that I wouldn’t be surprised if the person on the other end of the line could hear me panting as I sprinted around the house looking for somebody to tell.
HC: How will this work help you with your major?
JD: How will it not?! I’ve already learned so much about maintaining brand image and positioning and other things that apply to advertising as a whole that I can take with me wherever I go. Getting to work for such a well known brand that’s notorious for being so out-of-the-box has given me the chance to get creative with how to promote not only the product, but the brand all together. One thing that I truly love about this brand, and I guess the industry as a whole, is the go big or go home mentality. You’re encouraged to try something different. If it doesn’t work out, so what? You learn from it. I’ve interned for smaller companies doing social media and marketing, but nothing ever like this before. There’s literally a whole world of Red Bull and it amazes me how it all started with an energy drink.
HC: What suggestions would you give to other students wanting to become involved with an organization like Red Bull?
JD: Something our North America CEO, Stefan Kozak, wrote on the Red Bull University discussion blog that really stood out to me was this, “We pride ourselves on working and playing hard. We never take ourselves too seriously, but we take our work very seriously.” That goes for anything you do in life (because being serious is boring), but especially for something like Red Bull which is such a fun, adventurous brand. You gotta really commit to what you do and if you are truly passionate about it, that won’t take too much effort.