Twelpforce Agent On Duty

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I created this video for Best Buy’s “Unleash Your Inner Director” contest for employees to send a short video explaining how they reach out to customers to help them with their technology issues.

Twelpforce is Best Buy’s “Twitter Helpforce”, which I’ve been a part of since launch, and have sent out over 1,900 tweets for already. It’s been an awesome experience so far, which is why I knew instantly that it would be the subject of my entry.

Job Hunters: Clean Up Your Online Profiles!

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I had an opportunity to speak to Fox 8 News in Cleveland awhile back about how job hunters can clean up their online profiles via social networking sites like MySpace, Facebook or Twitter. Here’s the video …

My advice:

  • Privatize Your Profile – Set your Facebook profile to private and enable “Protect my updates” in Twitter. This requires potential recruiters to get your approval before they can access your updates.
  • Check Your Content – Take a look at the photos, text and comments on your page through the eyes of a potential employer. Remove any negative references to past employers and/or frustrations with work. Don’t forget that poor grammar and high amounts of slang can also work against you.
  • Google Yourself – Once you’ve cleaned up your online presence, run searches on your name on Google, Yahoo and Bing in order to check for any remaining negative content that may still be seen by potential employers.

Back to School: Netbooks and Notebooks

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With the summer winding down and school on everyone’s minds, we’re getting more and more questions on whether those tiny (and cheap) netbooks make for a good back-to-school purchase.

I had an opportunity to speak with Fox 8 News about the pros and cons of both netbooks and notebooks for students.

The Statistics of Social Media

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The most surprising thing for me when it comes to stats about social media is just how quickly it’s becoming popular with the traditionally non-tech orientated non-teen population.

New Twelpforce Commercial – “Annie”

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This one made me laugh, if only because I’ve actually heard parents of college-bound children say similar snarky things while in the field.

Barry Judge, the Chief Marketing Officer for Best Buy, mentions the commercials in a blog post about Twelpforce and how it is blurring the line between customer service and marketing.

Also, John Bernier talks about the Twelpforce learning experiment in a blog entry called Getting Dressed in a Glass House.