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So I'm one of the students who enrolled into a university in Australia during COVID. So I completed my year 12 back in Delhi in 2021 and then made the decision to study abroad. I'm a part of the herd that actually started studying online.
So a lot of people took a semester break. A lot of people took a whole year break, a whole gap year, but I didn't want to do that because personally my own mother, she's a teacher.
So she had some problems with me taking a gap year and if I'll be able to do anything valuable, anything productive. So yes, we made that decision collectively as a family to just start studying online because everybody was hoping the borders would start opening pretty soon.
A little bit about myself – I play professional cricket. So I used to play cricket back in Delhi, India. And one of the primary reasons for moving to Australia is to pursue that dream of becoming a cricketer. But what I wanted to do on the side is to align my passion for marketing and my passion for cricket.
So yes, taking baby steps, but yes, I finally moved to Australia in January, took the first flight that I could find to come to Adelaide. And yes it's going to be two years.
Absolutely. Currently I'm just about to finish my bachelor's of business degree, majoring in marketing.
My graduation date is 10th of December. So, just three more assessments to go, and as per work, I'm currently working part time as a marketing executive at Aussizz Group Australia.
Currently in the capacity of a marketing executive, I'm handling community engagement and events and content creation as well. So it's a bit all over the place. We recently threw a careers and networking event for international students like myself on the 23rd of October.
So planning everything from getting businesses on board, getting students on board, making content and finalising the venue space. Finalising the panel discussions, everything, even to the point of finalising catering, coffee and everything. So liaising with the venue space and liaising with different stakeholders all at once.
General day to day tasks look like creating content, working on the next event, how we can promote the services and products in a better way.
My employer's name is Aussizz Group Australia. So they're one of the top migration and education consultants in Australia. They have more than 30+ branches. And they basically help international students and working professionals with their visas and with their education queries.
They have an offshore team and onshore team. So if I talk about offshore, we have multiple offices in India, we have multiple offices in Philippines, we have just another office that opened up in Canada as well. So if somebody is looking to migrate to Australia, they'll help you from the point of you being offshore to the point of you being onshore.
So everything in terms of student visas, temporary visas, permanent visas, partner visas – all things visa-related. There are also education consultants as well who will help you with what course you should be doing in terms of your values or interests. Let's say if I'm interested in marketing, and particularly I'm interested in graphic design – they'll suggest courses and institutions.
Our target audiences are both students onshore and offshore because. So when we are producing content, both of the target audiences are in mind.
The services that we can provide for students who are currently in Australia and need help with the visas.
Content is:
Anything visual. So it can be a post, it can be a photo, it can be a video, it can be a 10 second reel, a 10 second video, a 20 second video, it can be anything that is visual.
Anything that is written. Posts on LinkedIn are also content because they're linked to informative content, knowledgeable content, entertaining content.
And it's our responsibility to basically communicate what we offer as an organisation through content.
If I'm seeing something that is working on Instagram, I would like to implement that on my organization. So let's say there's a trend going on, which is very funny, which is very entertaining, but what sort of values, what sort of vision that our organization stands for, it's more so informative. It's more so knowledgeable, right?
Because when you're trying to communicate your services, it's more so informative. So finding creative ways to implement that trend that is viral at the moment, but in an informal informative way. So with experience, you while you're working in marketing, you get to when you make one piece of content then you branch out into two, three, and while you're implementing those trends on your sort of vision on your sort of organization through experience, you get to learn a lot of it.
Absolutely. It wasn't for this organisation, but I used to live in a student accommodation named Scape. And there's this trend going on that is very popular back in India, back in Southeast Asia at the moment.
And it's just a basic audio that is very viral at the moment. I used to work with Scape and their marketing team and still do on a freelance basis. So they had this brief that came out that asked people to make trendy, viral content for us. So I was like, you know what, that audio can be implemented.
So I did that and it's performing really well. So actually it was just posted an hour ago and it's already at 2000 views. So things like that when you do that sort of thing, I become like, Oh, actually these things do work out.
If I talk about my current organisation, there's this trend that was going on with a bunch of people in sunnies. And again, it was an audio and it was very funny. It was very entertaining.
But we were just brainstorming how to implement that in our organisation because the employees in our organisation are migration agents and education consultants. From a personality point of view, they're serious, they're here to give advice and they're here to actually add value to students. So getting them to do a funny and entertaining trend, sometimes it's a task, but that is where we build our people skills. That is where we build our creative skills. And that is where I think I love this industry as well.
Off the top of my head, I would say the coolest thing that I've done at work is, throwing the careers and networking event that I just mentioned.
We actually got 300 plus registrations. So I'm really proud of myself because of that. And I think that, “Oh, I had that ability of driving students to this value adding event and actually getting a bunch of attendees.” So yeah, that is, I think one of the coolest things that I've done.
So we tried a bunch of methods. So when things weren't looking that great, we went to each of our partnered colleges and universities and actually walked in with flyers. We talked to receptionists, we talked to their marketing team that, Hey, this is the event that we're coming up with. It's a completely free event.
We have 12 to 13 businesses coming on board. So it would be great if you could reach out to your students, send an email or two, tell them about this event and just get them to sign up.
So I think one of the most effective ways was that through that we got a lot of reference.
Second we created and put out at least two to three pieces of content every week leading up to the event. So I think that got a lot of traction as well. And Instagram, mostly because it was targeted to uni students and a lot of international students.
I still feel that not a lot of international students are on TikTok, but so we were targeting Facebook and Instagram. We actually put out posts in all of the Facebook groups. Student clubs, student societies, student informal and unofficial student groups like Indian students in Adelaide, Philippine students in Adelaide, Sri Lankan students in Adelaide people from different countries like Canada, England.
First of all, asking them to promote this on our behalf, because we are not allowed to post that actually reaching out to clubs and societies of different universities. To put it out in their email blast or newsletter, which not a lot of students, not a lot of clubs and societies were eager to, but still, however many we got, I think that really added value.
So it was a very time consuming task, but I believe that still led up to 300 plus sessions and actually getting 12 to 13 businesses on board, which was an even more difficult tasks. So it wasn't more of sponsoring. It was more of just coming to the event, holding a stall. Talking about any vacancies they have talking about their businesses, talking about their industry, because what has happened is that I've seen a lot of my friends who've just come to Australia, they're either studying IT, marketing, civil engineering, whatever occupation.
But they don't actually know what that industry is like or what they're getting themselves into. So that is why we wanted to get businesses from every vertical so that they could talk about their industry just so that they could give them the real life experience, the reality check of what it is actually like working in consulting, what it is actually like working in civil engineering.
So things like that. And we tried to get at least two to three businesses from each and every vertical, which in the end we were able to do.
So all in a span of 20, 25 days, we had to get students on board. We had to get businesses on board. We had to plan for panel discussions. So we had to get panel members for that. So yeah, those 25 days were really hectic, but they were really fruitful because it added a lot of value to students.
Absolutely. So I think the answer was in your question. If you're in a university or in a college anywhere, once you're a part of a student club or a student society, yes you can be in charge of content, but you can also be in charge of events.
Events are a big part of marketing as well nowadays. It's like a Venn diagram. So if this is events, this is marketing. So there's a section of marketing that is related to events altogether.
So you can be in charge of events, you can be in charge of getting sponsors, also a part of marketing, you can be in charge of relationship building, you can be in charge of budget, you can be in charge of people management.
You can be a leader because skills like leadership skills, communication skills relationship-building, people management – you’ll need these in all the roles, whether it be content creation or generic marketing.
So you can start branching out from content. Go into sponsorships, go into admin, go into events and just handle that for a club or a society. And then just communicate that on your resume because you've been in that certain position, despite the fact that it wasn't paid, who cares? Show that as a project, show that as a club or a society that you're a part of.
So it's an interesting story. So my mom has always wanted to work in marketing, but when she was growing up, my grandmother, she was a teacher herself. So she pushed my mother to become a teacher and not do anything else. And at that time, my mom couldn't say no. So she became a teacher.
But she's always had this passion of becoming a marketer. Now we've pushed her quite a few times to give up her job when teaching and do something in marketing. But again, that sort of financial stability and comfortable environment has still kept her in that teaching position.
But that sort of was ingrained into me. And I would say genes as well. And one thing that I always talk about is that it gives me creative freedom to implement something and if it doesn't work out, I have time to resolve it and re-implement it and that sort of thing, I only get in cricket.
So in the cricket field as well, I can plan something, implement it if, it doesn't work out, I resolve it and I re-implement it and that sort of feeling I get in marketing. So that is why I started to pursue this industry.
Yes. So now that I've been working in marketing, I've taken a liking to content. So I'm targeting organisations such as Cricket Australia, the Big Bash League, which has eight other franchises. So let's say Adelaide Strikers or Melbourne Renegades or Sydney Sixers, Hobart Hurricanes.
So there are eight different franchises under the Big Bash League, which is a T20 cricket competition. So I'm targeting that sort of content positions in cricket. So I want to align content creation marketing campaigns and cricket altogether.
So basically connecting with professionals from that organisation on linkedin asking them what they did to get a role in digital marketing in that particular organisation.
If there are some platforms that that their marketing team already uses I want to upscale myself on that platform or software, so that when I'm ready to apply or when I have upscaled myself to that extent where I can reach out to individuals and ask for vacancies or ask for roles, I already have that in my arsenal.
So let's say they're working on Adobe Premier, Adobe Photoshop or other softwares. I'm upskilling myself on those sort of softwares already so that when they ask me this question, I'm already prepared. I'm like, yes, I know all of it. So that's what I mean when I say I'm targeting these organisations.
And I think that is where LinkedIn comes in because I think LinkedIn is a very big gold mine. So I'm leveraging that and I'm trying to get into different conversations, difficult conversations and trying to upskill myself through that.
Absolutely. Absolutely. To my surprise, a lot of people have.
And I think that is where having a personal brand on LinkedIn is very important because if I'm reaching out to you and I'm asking, how things work at Crossfill, I'm interested in the organisation. And when you go to my LinkedIn profile and you see nothing, you'll see just a profile, you'll see just a headline, you'll see 500 connections, let's say, but you don't see any posts.
You don't see any experience. You don't see anything that reflects me as a personality. So that is where I'm working on myself in terms of posting consistently on LinkedIn. I'm posting about my niche, myself, my experience and my professional development as well.
I think the first contact is always that sort of a professional profile picture or headline. But I feel that when people actually scroll down and go beneath that, they more so see, have you been posting on LinkedIn? Have you been interacting with other people in terms of liking, commenting, and they also see your experience.
So let's say if somebody goes to my LinkedIn profile now, they will see that I've posted two times every week for the past couple of months. So that sort of thing will get noticed. And what I see personally is a lot of people reposting other people's posts, which is still all right, which is still very good.
You're actually taking the initiative of reposting and putting all of those things on the feed, but taking that next step, taking that additional step to voice your opinions as well. See that, hey, I have reposted this, but this is my opinion on this post. That goes a long way as well. So I think that personally is a deciding factor on people messaging me back.
No, at the moment I'm aiming to get more experience in the field. So the current job that I am in, I have only been here for the past four months or so.
So, I will start working full-time here and once I'm confident in myself and in my abilities, I’ll reach out to these people and ask them for help to get a role. That is when I will start reaching out, when I will feel confident.
And that also builds from me upskilling myself, connecting with professionals from these organisations, and actually getting a picture of what it will be actually like working there.
I know I want to work there, but I don't know if I will like working there. So I'm wanting to get that picture from professionals of how it is actually like working at these organisations.
I think what I'm wanting to do is start freelancing for a couple of cricket clubs, for a couple of local cricket clubs. So when I'm reaching out to an organisation like Cricket Australia, I can actually say, “Hey, I've worked in content for XYZ Cricket Club, XYZ District Cricket Club.”
So that I have something on my resume because if the HR team of Cricket Australia is looking at my resume, and they see marketing roles, content roles, content creation roles, but none of those companies or organisations are from their industry or sport, then they'll feel like this person is lacking because he hasn't worked in this industry before.
So I'm wanting to build up that experience. Maybe even if I have to do an unpaid internship or something, I'm happy to do that until I get that experience.
So basically. I was living in Scape and I was working as an ambassador. So I had the job side of things sorted where I was only able to work 24 hours. I was getting 24 hours at Scape and it was a really good job. I love interacting with other residents and holding events, creating content for Scape as well.
But unfortunately my lease was coming to an end and my friends and I wanted to move out because we wanted to get our own place. And while moving out, it clicked me that once I move out of Scape, all of my jobs will be gone. So I actually wouldn't have a job. And I thought, hey, I think I'm competent enough. I've become skilled enough to get an entry level marketing role. So that is when I started actually taking everything seriously.
That is when I realised that a lot of my peers, a lot of my mentors who have been in Australia for longer than I have, they're still not working in the industry. They're still working in casual roles such as hospitality, fast food. And I have a hundred percent respect for them, but personally, I didn't want to see myself in that role.
After I graduate, I wanted to secure a professional job as soon as I could. So I started to take extra steps. I reached out to my mentors. I reached out to all of my success coaches and asked for advice on how I should go about things.
I already had a good resume in place and then I saw this job on LinkedIn, which was like a marketing executive job for Aussizz Group. And the call to action was that you have to send your resume and cover letter to a personal email that was the hiring manager’s. So I ended up doing that at the end of June.
But I got a reply like, Hey, I'm currently on leave and I'll get back to you in a couple of days. Unfortunately that couple of days never happened. What I did then is that I reached out to another mentor of mine and she said that, you're currently studying so you have to do something out of the box.
So she suggested me to actually come up with a document where I have analysed this organisation's current social media. So I analyse the current social media and tell them that, Hey, look at me as if I'm already in this role and this is what I'll be doing. So she actually suggested that I take that extra step to do that free work in terms of analysing social media and recommending changes.
And then I sent them a document expressing my interest again and telling them that I'm still very much interested in this role. I sent that on the 10th of July and actually got offered an interview on the 12th of July.
So then we had an interview on the 15th or the 16th of July, and then I was on boarded around 24th or 25th of July.
And because the thing is, I had roles in marketing, but all of them were around content creation. And marketing executive consists of content creation, but it's just a minor role. Bigger roles are also communicating, communication skills, event management, people management, sponsorships, influencer marketing, relationship building with other with other stakeholders.
So content creation is just a small part of this current role. So yes, I had to take that extra step and I had to take that extra step in terms of proving myself that, Hey, I'm actually competent enough for this.
So in the interview the hiring manager actually had that printout that I had made for them, which was the analysis of their current social media. And the things that I'm recommending. So he had this printout in his hand and we actually went over all the steps because he just wanted to check that I've actually worked on this document.
And that is where I think my communication skills and my creative skills came into place where I actually laid down everything in a step by step process. Let's say I'm recommending that we should do X, Y, Z thing. Now, how will we get to that end point?
So I recommended all of those steps. And actually that is what helped me communicate my skills and how competent I am.
I do believe that they're okay with hiring international students because they're a migration consultancy anyway.
So they know everything, they know the rules more than I do. So the hiring manager already knew that I'm only allowed to work 24 hours a week. He already knew which visa I'm going for next after my student visa expires. He already knew what I personally have to do in terms of visas. So he was really empathetic in that way.
And the best thing is that I've heard from a lot of people that once you're finishing your studies and you're going on your next visa. It's very hard to get a professional job in that tenure because not a lot of employers know that you're sure shot going to get your next visa.
A lot of employers think that, oh, you haven't gotten your next visa. So we don't want to take a chance on you. We don't want to onboard you. We don't want to train you and then have you see. Then I don't have to see you go back to your home country and in that way, my current organisation and my manager and my hiring manager, they were all very empathetic.
They knew that I'm sure I'm going to get my next visa because everybody does. And who else to understand that better than a migration consultant, right?
Absolutely. I would highly recommend targeting organisations like these, even if you're working in admin, even if you're working in IT, even if you're working in HR marketing as well. So yeah, these are the sort of occupations that every migration and education consultant will be looking for.
One thing that was a little I would say out of syllabus was that since I'm only allowed to do 24 hours, I was in a couple of other roles where I was just doing three to four hours a week.
And with all these two to three roles, I was making up 24 hours of my time. The one question that the hiring manager asked me was, “How will you be able to give 24 hours to us if you're already in a couple of other roles?”
So that is where I had to think creatively. That is where I had to do that sort of critical thinking. Wherein I told him that, hey, the tenure, the project that I'm currently working on will last to this date. The project that I'm currently working on in my second job will last to this date. And that is how it aligns with your values and your joint data.
Nobody will hire a student if they're not willing to give 15, 20, 24 hours. Nobody will hire them if you just have a four hour availability or a five hour availability, because then that sort of employee is more so a waste to them because they might as well hire someone who can give them 24 hours.
So that is where I wanted to be very vocal. Be very proactive that I want to join you guys. I want to give all of my 24 hours to you because it's a professional job and this will really help me in my career.
To be very honest the role that I originally applied for was full time. And exactly what you said I had the hope that once I am in that interview, I can convince them to change that full time role to a part-time role because of my hourly conditions.
But an interesting thing that I got to know was that until the time I took that additional step of sending them my analysis, they were already conducting interviews for that role, and that was the major reason for them not responding because they knew that I was still studying.
So by the time I had the the interview with my hiring manager, there was someone that they had already hired as a full time. But because I took that extra step, I was proactive and I sent them that analysis, they made a part time role for me.
So this part time role wasn't planned for them. They hadn't budgeted for this role. But they hired basically two new marketing staff at the same time. One, my senior, who is full time. And one, myself, who is part time at the moment.
I am really grateful and fortunate. I'm really happy for that. But I think all credit goes to that mentor of mine. Her name is Alina Muller and she's working with StudyAdLib to provide job skills workshops, resume workshops interview workshops.
And she's been working with StudyAdLib, I think for the past six, seven years or so. So she's my go to person every time I am in a pickle or every time anything happened.
It's a very interesting story. Alina I met during COVID. I was back home and I had already enrolled in a couple of subjects. Being from India, being from that sort of a schooling method that isn't identical to Australia's university method at all. So at that time, what happened was that we got automatically added to the Study Adelaide Facebook group where they used to talk about where they used to promote their events and they used to talk about how they can help international students.
And one of the events that they had going on was their resume workshop. So that resume workshop was actually headed by Alina and that was more so focused on students. to get their resumes up to date to get their resumes to an Australian format before they even come to Australia so that they can be job ready while this COVID phase was going on.
So that is how I got introduced to Alina through StudyAdLib. I kept in touch with her, connected with her on LinkedIn, and when I came to Australia, I met her through another one of the StudyAdLib events. I just started picking her brain for different roles, asked her a bunch of favours, which I'm very grateful about. And yes, we're on very good terms. I called her my mentor. She knows that.
And success coaches is a term of Torrens University. When you enrol into a subject in Torrens University, you get assigned a success coach. And a success coach is supposed to help you with everything from subject selection to academic workshops, to referencing workshops, to building up your resume for you to get internships. And that is where my success coach came into play and she is also someone that I reach out to immediately.
I think as a 19 year old who moved to Australia, I didn't know what networking meant. I didn't know what relationships meant. I didn't know what relationship building meant, but getting that networking 101 and getting the importance of networking from these mentors from these success coaches is what is something that added a lot of value.
And it's that I would say that networking insect got ingrained into my brain and still I'm all for networking here.
Yeah, no, absolutely. Because it's not just. It's a two way street because they will only add value to you when you add value to them.
And it's not “Oh, now I've added value once. So they'll add value to me once.” It's not like that. You don't need to keep a score. But it's just that it's a two way street. You need to add value, then they'll add value as well.
You mentioned you add value to them. Can you share a bit about how you do that?
Now, if you ask me, Oh, how do I add value to someone who has 10 plus years of experience than me, who has 10 times of the network I have, how can I add value to them? Because I'm just a 21 year old who is just starting out.
It's as little as sharing an article with them that can add value to their network, their life, or their role in their current industry.
So let's say if I'm working with someone who is my mentor, but they're in aged care. Let's say that they have an organisation that is to do with age, care and disability. I can share a news with them that they might have not heard of, which might affect their organisation.
And I can put it in a way that, “Hey, just heard this news. Maybe it can help you, or maybe it can affect you. And maybe you would like to make some changes.” I can share a couple of articles with them. I can share a couple of LinkedIn posts with them that remind me of them or remind me of a couple of favours that they did for me. It's as simple as that.
And it can also go up to a point where in this time, the careers and networking event that I was talking about, I was able to invite Alina as one of the panel members. So I believe that added value to her personal selves and professional self as well, as she was able to talk about what she does to a whole bunch of new students. And I was able to help her get that opportunity. And that is me adding value to her.
So step by step, you build up from sharing LinkedIn posts, from sharing articles. You get them an opportunity where they're a panel member at an event that I threw. Simple as that.
No, absolutely not. For example, it can be as small as on my personal LinkedIn, I started this series, which is all to do with international students. So on my personal LinkedInand youtube, I basically was talking about cost of living in Adelaide, and this series has been going on for the past three to four weeks.
So, there's been times where I've tagged my mentors and my success coaches in those posts because they actually helped me navigate through all of that. And why not give them the attention? Why not give them the recognition in my LinkedIn posts? And that adds value to them. Yes, my LinkedIn, like thousands of people are not looking at my LinkedIn posts, at a maximum I'm getting 50 reactions or 60 reactions.
But just tagging them goes a long way because that communicates the fact that I'm still thinking about you. I am grateful for what you did to me and whatever you did for me, that still has an impact.
Absolutely. Absolutely. Absolutely. And it can be as simple as talking about them and how they added value with someone else. So let's say I'm at a networking event or I'm at an event, and we're talking about people who've helped us in our international student journey.
I can easily name drop Alina, which will actually add value to others. And then they'll think, Oh, who's Alina Mueller? Who's this person who added value to Anshul's life? And how did she add value? Now that stems on to a different conversation altogether, where I'm talking how she added value to me.
That sort of sparked something in my friends’ lives and they want to connect with Alina. They want to talk to her. They want to get into a conversation with her. So that sort of builds her network as well. So it can be as simple as that.
I would say the informal hangouts and that sort of camaraderie in between colleagues.
That's a very big thing in Australia, I would say. Going out for drinks after Friday. So like when the weekend starts, going out for drinks, having events for different festivals. So let's say Christmas is coming up. Already you can see the holiday season in our office.
Nobody wants to work anymore. Because that sort of break is coming near. So yeah, that sort of camaraderie and that sort of employees and people being together and being friends and having so many commonalities. Because they've worked on for so many years together, that sort of was a cultural shock, which I'm currently over now, I believe.
I would say just find commonality, because there'll always be two people that know each other and are talking to each other and are having a conversation. And you'll always feel like an outsider, you'll always feel like a third person. But finding the commonalities and trying to talk about that and then branching out from that commonality into different conversations is personally how I got over it. And I'm starting to get into circles. I'm starting to make friendships, relationships. And that is one thing that I would like to talk about here.