1871 Intern by Chi Tran Nguyen

Being an intern in a business incubator is a completely different experience to me, when your customers are startups in many stages. 1871 is the flag ship project of The Chicagoland Entrepreneurial Center (CEC), a non-profit organization that supports entrepreneurs on their path to building high-growth, sustainable businesses that serve as platforms for economic development and civic leadership. Their purpose is to create the experiences and space that founders need while they build extraordinary businesses. There are almost 50 employees at 1871, with a dozen of interns at multiple departments. They are all managed by Betsy Ziegler, who is the first woman CEO of Chicago tech incubator.

As a Research and Analytics Intern, my tasks are currently focusing on measuring conversions of user activities on 1871 website. Since COVID-19, the rate of user engagement has decreased. Therefore, tracking how users interact with the website, what sources lead them to the website, the number of new/ returning users are significantly important. The softwares that I use are Google Analytics, Google Tag Manager, Google sheets. In addition, other platforms such as Hubspot, PeopleVine, Slack and Google Meet are utilized to increase the effectiveness of work and communication.

Although this is a virtual internship, I still enjoy my experience at 1871 because of the support and interaction in the Marketing team as well as among employees at the company. My manager, Jenna, who is the Director of Marketing is flexible and supportive. I have a 30 minute meeting with her and another 30 minute meeting with all Marketing members every day. Once every two weeks, all interns at 1871 have a virtual lunch meeting or happy hours. We share our experiences and get to know others’ tasks and departments. What I like the most from working here is there are tremendous events and workshops hosted by 1871 that I can attend for free. Many of them are about Marketing, Branding and Data Analytics; which are the topics I’m passionate about.


This photo was from a Virtual Intern Team Lunch.

Overall, being a marketing intern at a business incubator is a new challenging but rewarding experience. I have become more confident and prepared for the journey ahead.