Hiring a Gen-Z Intern May Be the Best Thing You Ever Do for Your Business

There comes a point when your company is bringing in more business than you can manage on your own. That's when most people start hiring help or looking for a business partner. Another option is hiring an intern.

A large portion of Generation Z are graduating high school and working their way through college. As they do, they'll be looking for job experience and career opportunities. They'll likely make up the bulk of your intern candidates. Members of Generation Z were born from the mid-1990s to the mid-2000s and make up approximately 25% of the U.S. population. They grew up surrounded by advanced technology and are the most social media and tech-savvy generation yet. If there's a technological aspect of your business that could use some help, a Gen Z intern can probably help.

What Can You Offer an Intern?

Before you look for an intern, decide what you have to offer one. Interns may not work for money, but they do expect to receive some compensation or benefit for their labor. This could be something solid they can put in their portfolio, job experience for their resume, or a letter of recommendation they can present to future employers. Check with local high schools and colleges to see if your internship qualifies as official school credit. Whatever you're offering, be straightforward and let potential interns know what they can expect from you.

What Can an Intern Do?

Interns don't usually work the same number of hours as regular employees, so you want to make their job highly focused and include a specific goal they can complete by the end of their internship. Some areas an intern may be able to help you with include your website, social media, and marketing.

Website

Do you need a new website, a fresh look, new content, or someone to go through and audit your site to find and correct errors? Decide exactly what you want done and write an internship job description that describes the goal you hope to achieve. Depending on whether you want new content, a new design, or new features, you may include that your ideal intern would have a background in writing or web design.

Social Media

There's a lot to be said for putting the right person in charge of your social media presence, and since most members of Generation Z were raised with social media, they know what they're doing. A social media intern can help you create a content schedule and calendar and help find tools that you can load your content into to automate posting. They can respond to questions, comment on your followers' posts, and otherwise create activity on your social channels.

Marketing

An intern can also handle other marketing efforts like creating flyer templates, designing and implementing direct mail campaigns, or researching buyers and sellers in your area to discover the best targeting criteria for each group. You could also enlist an intern to consolidate your contacts into a primary CRM or to help with marketing events.

Whatever you hope to accomplish by hiring an intern, be sure to check with your company's legal department or consult an employment law professional to learn about the legalities of hiring an intern in your area. Some things you may need to consider include liability insurance, workers' compensation, and how minimum wage requirements apply to unpaid interns.

To view the original article, visit the Homes.com blog.