Hi! My name is Baily Kruzan and I am from a small town way up in Northern Wisconsin called Highbridge. I am currently going into my senior year at the University of Stevens-Point, as well as starting my MBA this summer as a 4+1 student. I am a double major in marketing and business administration and there’s not a day when I regret that choice! I additionally chose to do my MBA here at Point because I was looking to elevate my education and career and this program fit perfectly with what I was looking for.
This summer I got presented with another amazing opportunity, completing a fellowship with the Stevens Point Area Convention and Visitors Bureau (SPACVB). I initially started working with the SPACVB in January for my marketing internship and was excited to continue on with this opportunity. I will be working on projects with Sara Brish, executive director, Melissa Sabel, director of marketing, and Hannah Klein, director of partnerships.
When I initially started working with the SPACVB in January 2021, I was asked what some of my interests were. My mind immediately went to outdoor recreation as that is one of the things I love most about this area. As time went on I got to work on a lot of projects that were geared towards outdoor enthusiasts. Many of those projects were blog posts, smaller webpages, or helping write PR leads. Now, as I moved into my fellowship here at the SPACVB, it was time to take on a larger project – which is currently re-working the existing outdoor recreation webpage to have a new look as well as creating all the sub-pages and content that go along with it.
Before jumping right into creating the pages, I had to do a decent amount of research into what was already living on the StevensPointArea.com website, what was missing on the website, what related content we had, what images we had or needed, and much more. Taking all that information, I then pumped it into an Excel spreadsheet and began planning what the new pages were going to look like – drawing a lot of inspiration from Travel Oregon’s outdoor recreation page.
From there I started creating the home page for outdoor recreation. That entailed creating all the graphics, writing or reusing existing content, and playing with different overall formats and flow of the page. Once the main page was done (for the most part), I then had to begin creating all the sub-pages – which entailed all the categories that fall under outdoor recreation, such as winter sports, golfing, disc golf, etc. While I have created all the sub-pages, I am still working on adding content and figuring out which layouts look best – keeping in mind the end user and what information they need to know and what kind of experience as a company we want to create for them.
In addition to starting my fellowship this summer, I’m taking my first two MBA classes as a 4+1 student and I have already found those classes to be beneficial when it comes to my fellowship. Before starting those classes I was the type of worker who wanted to get things done fast. I loved the feeling of checking things off my list and moving onto the next project. That was then the initial approach I took when tackling this project. I thought in my head, “This won’t take that long. It’s just doing this, this, and this and it’ll be done.” But as I’ve been working through these MBA classes, I have realized that I need to slow down and really fine tune what I’m doing. I’ve learned that it is okay if things aren’t done right away, projects like this are going to take time and require a lot of thought and planning.
With those lessons placed in my mind, I’ve really been enjoying the process of creating these pages. I’m taking my time, looking through every little detail, and giving the project a lot of love. I’m additionally doing my fair share of trial and error and not viewing those changes as failure. I’m understanding that I am not going to be able to come up with the best idea right off the bat. It takes time, it takes talking with other people and getting different perspectives, it takes trying 20 things before getting the best outcome. Overall, the first month of my fellowship at the SPACVB has been a great experience and I’m excited for what else is to come!
Baily Kruzan is majoring in business administration and marketing at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point while also enrolled in the MBA program as a 4+1 student. Baily is serving as an MBA Fellow for Stevens Point Area Convention and Visitors Bureau, assisting with market research, recruitment and on-boarding, and organizational framework of SPACVB.