I interviewed at a small local magazine for an unpaid internship.
I’m a senior in college. I felt overqualified for the internship. My education is in design, and the internship is a marketing
internship. I’ve had 2 previous marketing internships that worked in public relations and promotions.
I asked if they hired on interns after internships and my interviewer said no.
But they are on a hiring freeze, but they need to hire another design associate. Graduation is not very far away and I think I have what it takes to do the job well. I like what I do and have an excellent education from a very well known prestigious school.
I showed her my portfolio of work from my previous internships and she really liked my concept development. It’s always nice to include corporate marketing retail design work in your portfolio even though the design gets diminished into nothing by the time it hits pre-press, but chya know.
I always feel like I didn’t get the job because I feel too qualified. Would that put off an interviewer? Like…”Oh I don’t like her because her credentials are better than mine and she might want my job type of thing.”
She asked me to send her 5 reasons why I want an internship there. Not because she doesn’t think I want it, but just to get a feel for my writing style. I enjoy writing and the sample was pretty good.
Essentially (in a nutshell) the 5 reasons were…
1. Experience.
2. Education. (it will help me obtain credit for my degree.)
3. Networking. (it’s always nice to make new contacts with people in the industry.)
4. Opportunity to work with and learn from such a talented staff.
5. Experiencing the internal workings of the magazine and applying my knowledge and creativity to the work I do.

If you really want to impress them send a thank you note and express your interest in interning there.
Good luck.