This is a sponsored feature. All opinions are 100% from Her Campus.
Whether you’ve nabbed your first job out of college in the media industry or you’re anxiously starting your first-ever internship this summer, you know how important it is to have the best, most up-to-date software. As a graduated collegiette now working in digital media, I pretty much live and breathe by Microsoft Office. And now, since the company launched Microsoft Office 365 Home Premium earlier this year, you can do more than ever before! Office 365 offers both web and desktop versions of programs like Word, Outlook and Excel, as well as website creation tools and other business apps.
Develop Your Own Personal Brand
With a lagging economy and the competition for jobs being so fierce, we collegiettes always hear how important it is to develop your own “personal brand” – that is, define and market your skills, and position yourself as an entrepreneur to potential employers. For someone working in the media industry, it’s crucial to have a confident presence in social media as well as a rock-solid online portfolio. Unfortunately, there are so many outlets to manage from personal websites to social accounts on Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook. How do you keep track of it all?
With Office 365, it’s all too easy. Instead of having to juggle several different tools at once, Office 365 streamlines everything with neat features like customizable email addresses, website naming tools, and contact-tracking systems. What’s even better is that with your data accessible on up to five different devices, everything is at your touch via the Office Web Apps, up in “the cloud.” (I can’t tell you how many times I’ve left my laptop somewhere when I needed one file, ughhh.) Oh yeah, and did I mention that as a Home Premium subscriber, you get an additional 20GB of SkyDrive storage space? Awesome, right?
Create Media Projects With Word, Excel and PowerPoint
Word, Excel and PowerPoint – chances are you’ve used all of these programs at least once for school projects and presentations. But when you enter the workforce, you’re given so much more responsibility and that calls for more capabilities. Nowadays, I rely on Word and Excel for tracking all of my project spreadsheets, deadlines and reports. Whether it’s a new advertising campaign or keeping track of my editorial content schedule, I would honestly be lost without them.
But now with Office 365, you can do so much more with Word documents (and no, we don’t mean clipart): you can include an online video or edit a PDF. Not to mention, you can use your keyboard or a pen or touchscreen. That’s cooler than anything I’ve ever used in Office before. And I can share and collaborate on these documents with co-workers on these projects in real-time with the Office Web Apps.
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Take Notes (Your Way)
No, I’m not in college anymore. I’m not scribbling in lined notebooks. But I still have to take notes whether it’s for a meeting or just as little reminders to myself and I do it through OneNote. Through this program, you can collect your notes and sync it all in a searchable app. Everything is just a click away. Feel free to get creative with it and embed links, pages, videos, images, and other media into your notes. If you prefer handwritten notes (like me), then you’ll love the inking option. On a touch-enabled device, you can literally draw and edit with your fingers or mouse, and then it’s convert your handwriting into text. How cool is that?
Luckily for collegiettes, you can get a specially-discounted version of Office, Microsoft Office 365 University, for just $79.99. What’s more, this price includes a four-year subscription so Office will stay with you throughout your college years! You just have to be an enrolled student (part-time or full-time). And for the rest of you ladies like me, who have already graduated and are trying to make it in your industry, I still recommend signing up. This is seriously the most streamlined software you’ll ever need – trust me!