What is really happening in the interview is actually quite simple. There are only two questions in the mind of the interviewer:

1. Do I like this candidate?

2. How can this person impact my department, company– can he/she do the job?

Most of the interviewer’s questions are designed to help them find out the answers to these questions.  Smart candidates, on the other hand, will use every tool at their disposal to serve up the answers at every opportunity.

For example, if every job candidate would find out more about the company and what they do, they could be better prepared.   They should bring a HERE IS EXACTLY HOW I CAN HELP YOUR COMPANY plan, documented with ideas and action steps. All it takes is a bit of work, and some presentation skills.

Same idea with the bigger question of DO I LIKE THIS CANDIDATE?  But, even this is in the control of the candidate.  I am not suggesting undertaking a personality transplant, but I am suggesting that you think a bit about how to come across in a more likeable manner during the interview.  Here is one of my posts on making yourself MORE LIKEABLE.

Humans tell stories.  We have since the first caveman told Thor where all the bears were hiding and how to make fire (again).  What is your story?

I suggest you prepare a short elevator pitch on several topics that are sure to come up during the interview.  When the interviewer asks a question, then, you are prepared with a story to tell that answers the question, but you are going to tell it in a compelling, interesting manner.

Let’s say the interviewer asks you “Do you have any experience working with outside contractors?”

The aveage candidate says, “Yes, at my last company we worked with xyz company, and I was in daily meetings with them, presenting our changing issues.” Good enough.

Or the candidate, having done some research and knowing that this job does work with outside contractors, but mindful of the always present DO I LIKE THIS CANDIDATE question—prepares another answer:

“Yes, I have. (leaning in, because visual clues help) But, you know, I really have never thought of them as outside contractors, to me they have always been part of the company, they are that critical to most companies’ success. They are insiders, at least to me.  For example, we had a high level project due on Monday and on Friday, a key spec was changed. I don’t need to tell you what that can do to planning and scheduling.  I was able to call our outsiders-insiders– in over a weekend to help us get the job finished, on time.   Frankly, I think our work surprised everyone.  It wasn’t me, even though I got the credit, it was my outside team.”

Sure, the story is longer.  It might take you more work to prepare, but  prepare it you must.  So much of it has to do with not only the words, but your manners in telling it.

Some hints to make you more likeable as you prepare the story—see if you can find them in the above example.

Hint 1:  Make it more compelling by looking at the issue from a different angle. Maybe the interviewer has never thought of the issue in those terms.

Hint 2:  Relate it to a real world situation that the interviewer can relate to.  Make it real.  Be specific, not general.

Hint 3:  Be humble.

Hint 4.  Get engaged about your story. Practice it. Smile. Lean in.  How would an actor like Tom Cruise tell this story to make the audience believe it.

Lastly, if you find this job opportunity via LinkUp, one of the best job search engines around….you will be able to click around and find out more about the company because you are taken directly to the company’s own website, which contains countless clues for you to tell a  better story.

“The greatest resource of potential demand lies in the area of non-customers.”

Each one of us can apply this simple truth in our job search or in our current jobs.  Said another way, this quote could easily be:

“The fastest way to a remarkable career lies in becoming bigger than the job itself.”

I am not sure how to measure this…but I am convinced that most jobs are, frankly, bigger than the people who are now in them. You just have to browse through one of the best job search engines now on the net, LINKUP.com, to see what I mean.

Any job you hold deserves your best.  Ask some of the 10% who are craving your job.

Don’t get me wrong.  I love Gen X and Y.  I really do.  But I am not in agreement with all the trend-setting books that purport to know how to manage or lead them.  I have a feeling that most of those writers haven’t led anyone anywhere.

I believe that traditional leadership models work no matter what the age group, business model in place, situation or industry niche.  We can debate that at another time.

There is one thing that I do hear more now from the  younger generations.  It is that feeling or wish on their part to have a meaningful career or to have an impact on others or most commonly said in this version:  “I want to find a job that I can be passionate about.”

Don’t we all, don’t we all?  We all wanted this, but we just didn’t verbalize or articulate it as often or forcefully.  So, when you tell this to your parents, trust me, they “get it.”  And they certainly want you to have a great job and to be passionate about it because they know this is a guaranteed pathway to a happy and productive worklife.

I say “go for it, and good luck.”
But, on behalf of baby boomer parents everywhere, let me share something with you that is a harder advice to give…and even to receive.

Never forget that passion can be found in all sorts of jobs that you know nothing about.  Yet.  For every worker at Taco Bell that you think has sold out or hates it, I can find you another who thinks this is the best job ever.  My belief is that most jobs can be bigger than the people holding them—so, by that definition, one can find passion by trying to figure out how to make this crummy-on-the-outside type job a fantastic career choice.

The real problem it seems to me is when the quest for that passion-producing job becomes something that paralyzes you.  You can never find the perfect job.  Something is always wrong.  It is never quite the thing you wanted.

It’s like having your own raincloud over your head, constantly.  You just know the sun is shining over the next horizon, but you can never quite make the journey.

Instead, you fall into the trap of believing that those with passionate jobs were somehow selected, lottery-like.  You begin to muddle through, hoping for that one person—maybe a gray haired, career advisor type person—to select YOU for this one job.

Even Lady Gaga worked at her “job,” no one picked her off the subway platform and said, “Stefani (her real name),  I want to make you a star.”

The Department of Labor will release its jobs report for December tomorrow, and the data will undoubtedly show that the economy is a long way from healthy recovery mode. Economists are expecting that the U.S. economy actually added jobs during the month, marking the first monthly job gains since December of 2007. The Conference Board’s Consumer Confidence Index, which rose again in December, adds a faint glimmer of hope that this might be the case.

Not a chance.

If LinkUp’s data is any indication, the U.S. economy is still on life support and job growth remains a mirage. LinkUp, a job search engine that only indexes job listings that are found exclusively from over 20,000 corporate websites around the U.S., released its December jobs report today and the news is grim. Job listings on company websites in the LinkUp index dropped by 108,837 (24%) from November. Total job listings on company websites dropped by 142,641 (17%).

LinkUp is not simply a predictor of information. It is a quite valuable tool for job seekers who understand that one of the best ways to find a new job is to find the job on the company website. In fact, we have created all sorts of tools that will help the job seeker and the relevant company. From our IPhone app (now in the top 33 of all free business apps), to our Facebook app (Current Jobs at Our Company), we are constantly improving the job seeker experience…and the likelihood that he or she can find a job. (BTW, about 70% of the jobs on LinkUp are not advertised elsewhere.)

So the next time you search for a new opening on SimplyHired or Indeed, remember to check out LINKUP next. Simply Hired and Indeed aggregate jobs from job boards…a good idea in its day…but as they say, Garbage In, Garbage Out.

For media types, you can get the inside LINKUP information ahead of the Department of Labor by calling us.

by Toby Dayton

Marty Brack, in a recent ERE post, provides an excellent case study in rethinking traditional methods of recruitment advertising. In the test, he analyzed the cost per quality resume using both Careerbuilder and LinkedIn. Not surprisingly, given how horrendously Careerbuilder and Monster (the 2 most bloated, polluted, antiquated, pay-to-post behemoths) typically perform for employers, LinkedIn delivered far superior results. LinkedIn provided almost as many applicants as Careerbuilder, but a higher percentage of their candidates were qualified for the positions advertised. This resulted in a much lower cost per quality candidate and therefore a much higher ROI. In addition to just providing solid information, the article delivers 3 important lessons for recruiters, employers, and even job seekers.

1) While the hype can seem excessive, and in some cases it probably is, social media has become an essential, mandatory component of recruiting efforts and companies must be thinking both strategically and tactically about how they can best leverage it. (One simple example would include automatically publishing jobs from a company’s career portal on their corporate website onto their company’s Facebook Fan Page using the Facebook application Current Jobs At Our Company).

2) Just because someone has used Careerbuilder and Monster forever (and maybe, circa 1997, they even worked), it doesn’t automatically mean that the decision to continue using pay-to-post job boards is a good one or makes any sense in today’s environment. As people used to say about the daily newspaper, no one ever got fired for placing an employment classified in the daily newspaper. That is, until someone else eventually looked at the recruitment advertising budget, questioned why the company was spending $750 or more per week for a black and white liner ad that no one saw, and decided that it was time to bring in some fresh thinking regarding talent acquisition strategies. The same thing is happening now with the job boards.

Only 3% of jobs are filled by ‘mega’ job boards such as Monster, Careerbuilder, and HotJobs. They are not only expensive and bloated, but they simply do not deliver quality candidates. Equally as detrimental for employers, the pay-to-post job boards are filled with old, outdated job listings, work-at-home scams, phishing jobs, scam jobs, identity theft postings, and other garbage listings which seriously erode the user experience and potentially a company’s employment branding. This means, as well, that aggregators such as Indeed and Simplyhired that do nothing more than mash all of those bloated, polluted databases into a giant pile of garbage are equally as counter-productive.

There are better, cheaper, more efficient, more effective, and more transparent ways to advertise for jobs. And job search engines such as LinkUp, which only indexes jobs from company websites, offer a performance-based, per-click model so employers only pay for those job seekers that are delivered straight to the company’s career portal on their company website.

3) In the same way that Google and search engine marketing have driven greater transparency and data into the world of advertising, the same is happening in recruitment advertising. Employers must not only critically analyze where quality candidates are coming from and determine which strategies and advertising channels are delivering those quality candidates, but then also allocate resources accordingly. Companies that neglect to do so will simply not be as competitive as those that are.

In other words, certain techniques can be employed to help the search engines find your website more easily.  There appears to be a real seience to these techniques. Or, for the more cynical amongst us—it’s a bunch of experts who know how to “game the system” to fool Google et al to find your site.

At LINKUP, our job search engine, we have already built SEO into the product…as it should be.  No games.  All we do is search for jobs ONLY at company websites, never another job board where SImply Hired and Indeed go to get their jobs for their site.  Think about it for a second.

Where better to look for a job than the company’s own website?  Companies post jobs there first.  Most of the time, these jobs are never even posted elsewhere.  Companies more and more are refusing to pay Monster et al to list their jobs….and this is where SImply Hired and Indeed go to get their jobs. As any job seeker can tell you, saerching through a job board is hard work and generally not productive.  Read what Nick Corcodilos of AskTheHeadhunter has to say about these typical job boards and how they treat the job seeker.  And it is not just the cough-crooks-cough Ladders, either. Garbage in-garbage out.

Think of LinkUp as the only job search engine with SEO built right in…but for the job seeker.  We have optimized our site to make it easier and faster for millions of people to find their next job.

Pass it along.

By Toby Dayton

As a continuation to yesterday’s post about Indeed, I wanted to highlight in further detail a portion of the interview with Indeed’s CEO, Paul Forster. Later in the same interview, a question was asked by Jason Alba of JibberJobber regarding Indeed’s revenue model. By far the most discerning question of the day, Jason asked, “I am curious to know about the differences in business models….Indeed isn’t making the $400 or whatever per job posting like the traditional job boards. How really do these aggregators monetize and how sustainable is this business model?”
Paul gave the following reply:

“Our model, Jason is quite correct, is not pay-per-posting. It’s actually pay-for-performance, pay-per-click. So it’s similar to the general search engines. When you advertise using Google AdWords, you’re paying per click, You’re also specifying a maximum price that you’re willing to pay per click and that’s the same with Indeed as well. So our main product is sponsored jobs and it’s a very easy product for job advertisers to use. All you have to do is specify a budget and the maximum price you’re willing to pay and that’s literally all you have to do because we’ve already got your jobs in our index and when you do that, when you sponsor them, they will appear above the organic results, highlighted in blue at the top of the results. They’ll get a tremendous boost in traffic and you don’t have to pick key words and you don’t have to post jobs because we’ve already got your jobs from your website. It’s very, very simple to do. It’s actually much easier to do than keyword advertising on the general search engines and we drive the traffic directly to the jobs on your site so it’s quite good from a branding point of view and from a cost-effectiveness point of view it’s also very, very good. So that’s our revenue model and basically all of our revenue comes from pay-per-click advertising on our site.”

While of course the answer is absolutely correct (as one would expect from a CEO), it is also extremely misleading. In reading it, it would be entirely understandable if you came away with the impression that it is employers themselves who are paying Indeed for clicks. Paul refers to his clients as ‘job advertisers,’ and one would certainly be excused for thinking that this means employers who are advertising jobs. Indeed certainly has a few employers that are running paid search campaigns directly, but this portion of Indeed’s customer base represents a tiny, tiny fraction of their customers. The vast, vast majority of advertisers running paid search campaigns on Indeed are the job boards who feed their jobs to Indeed and pay for the traffic or job seeker clicks that Indeed delivers to those job boards. The job advertisers that Paul speaks of in his answer are JOB BOARDS. Re-read Paul’s answer again with that in mind and it becomes apparent how brilliant his answer is in being truthful but entirely misleading. He has definitely got a future career in politics should he decide at some point in life to pursue one.
I am highlighting this element of Indeed’s business model not because it is wrong or flawed. The site does offer a slight benefit to some job seekers by allowing them to search hundreds of job boards through a single site. For job seekers that want to search Monster, Careerbuilder, and TheLadders, for example, and all of the other pay-to-post job boards that are filled with both real and garbage job listings, Indeed most definitely offers some convenience. And for job boards, Indeed can be a terrifically effective, less costly way for job boards to generate traffic to their site. As the traditional job boards continue to fall out of favor with both job seekers and employers, they are increasingly desperate to buy traffic wherever they can get it, and Indeed absolutely fulfills that need.
What I take issue with is the fact that both Indeed and Simplyhired pretend to be serving job seekers and employers, when in fact they are primarily serving job boards. Again, this is a perfectly acceptable and most likely a highly lucrative business model. I also believe that Indeed and Simplyhired are extremely smart to embrace a pay-per-click transaction model. Paid search is, without question, migrating into recruitment advertising faster than most would have predicted (as well it should be), and those two job search engines are certainly helping accelerate that trend. But I believe strongly that players in the recruitment advertising space, regardless of their business model, have an obligation towards the largest and most important stakeholders in the space – job seekers and employers.
By serving up scam jobs, phishing jobs, work-at-home scams, and other garbage listings, Indeed is failing to meet their obligation to job seekers. And by publishing duplicate job listings from the hundreds of job board customers that feed their jobs to Indeed, Indeed is failing to meet their obligation to both job seekers and employers. I certainly understand that few businesses can execute their vision flawlessly, and some amount of leeway should always given, especially to start-ups that are helping, to some degree, transform an industry.
I’d grant that leeway to Indeed were it not for the fact that they are appallingly disingenuous about their business model and who their real customers are.
LinkUp Growing Faster Than All Top 10 Job Sites
Posted on Tuesday 4 August 2009

Paul Forster, CEO of Indeed.com, was recently interviewed in a podcast and had some interesting things to say about their business, the Indeed job search engine, and the current environment for employers and job seekers. One of the questions posed to Paul centered around Indeed being inundated with garbage job listings including scam listings, spam jobs, work-at-home scams, and phishing/identity theft jobs. At first, Paul didn’t answer that part of a 2-part question, but he did later on in the interview which I commend him highly for. Paul responded to the question as follows:

“[bogus jobs] are something that we take very, very seriously. We take steps to remove jobs and sources of jobs that are low quality. We have a lot of aspects to our search algorithms that are designed to do exactly that. It’s a constant challenge. To some extent it’s a cat and mouse game because people are going to put up jobs that are low quality. That’s inevitable. Just on the web not everything is going to be good quality.
But we believe Indeed is better than the alternative services for actually filtering and getting rid of those low quality job listings. We try to be as responsive as possible to feedback so when people email us or contact us and say, look, this job source is not good quality or their’s spam in there, or some sort of phishing kinds of things that you occasionally see, we make sure to respond as quickly as we can to remove that kind of content. I think it’s a very good question and something that is a priority for us.”

Again, I applaud Paul for addressing the issue and being open and honest about what is unquestionably a huge problem for Indeed. Because they aggregate the vast majority of their job listings from other job boards that have all these ‘bogus’ jobs in them, Indeed’s service is plagued by those same garbage listings.
Having said that, I take issue with two of the points Paul makes. The first is that if Indeed were truly serious about addressing the issue of spam jobs, phishing jobs, work-at-home scams, etc., they could easily refuse to accept job feeds from any job board that delivered such jobs. That would eliminate the problem immediately and create a far better service for legitimate employers and job seekers alike. Of course, that would also eliminate almost all of Indeed’s revenue which is generated from job boards such as Monster, Careerbuilder, TheLadders, etc. that pay Indeed for the traffic Indeed delivers to their site.
Unfortunately like most job boards, especially in the current environment, it’s near impossible for Indeed to be serious about placing the job seeker and the quality of their user experience ahead of revenue. It’s especially difficult for Indeed, because their customers are not actually job seekers or employers but rather the job boards whose jobs Indeed publishes. These job board customers are the ones that pay Indeed for the traffic Indeed delivers to their sites. Indeed’s concern about quality job listings is genuine only to the extent that it impacts their ability to deliver and monetize the job seeker traffic that they send to their customers – the job boards that publish their job listings, bogus ones included, on Indeed.
The second issue I have is that Indeed is better than the alternatives in filtering out these ‘bogus’ jobs. Indeed may or may not be better than Simplyhired at filtering out garbage listings, but neither job search engine compares to LinkUp which ONLY indexes job listings from company websites. Because LinkUp does not publish jobs from other job boards, there are no scam jobs, phishing jobs, spam jobs, work-at-home scams, or ‘bogus’ jobs. Almost as important, there are no duplicate listings on LinkUp because our job search engine only aggregates jobs from a single source – the employer’s corporate career portal on their company website.
Those two factors, combined with a bunch of unique and sophisticated features that create an unparalleled user experience, are the reasons why LinkUp is growing at a far faster rate than both Indeed and Simplyhired. I guess job seekers have found a better alternative than Indeed.

by Chris Perry

Whether you are seeking career advice or job opportunities, developing your personal brand, taking the next step in your career or simply just want to keep track of news and updates from the career industry, Career Rocketeer has compiled and presents to you the ultimate, definitive list of who you should be following on Twitter, including authors and bloggers of and coaches and experts in personal branding and marketing, career and job searching, networking, social media, resume writing and more.

If you were not included on this list or there is something missing from your listing, don’t worry. We want to include you and/or feature you correctly. Just email me for additions and/or modifications to current listings.

Please also check out Where to Find Your Job on Twitter for companies, job sites and career resources posting job opportunities and career advice.

Please also follow me on Twitter.

1. Adrienne Waldo – @adriennewaldo – Marketing Expert
2. Alexandra Levit – @alevit – Author & Career Expert
3. Alison Doyle – @alisondoyle – Author, Consultant & Job Search Expert at About.com
4. Alison Green – @askamanager – Career Expert & Blogger
5. Allison Cheston – @allisoncheston – Career Change & Executive Search Expert
6. Amanda Hite – @sexythinker – Founder of Talent Revolution & Career Expert
7. Andrea Santiago – @AndreaSantiago – Recruiter & Healthcare Career Expert at About.com
8. Anita Bruzzese – @AnitaBruzzese – Career Columnist & Author
9. Anna Farmery – @engagingbrand – Social Media Coach
10. Anne Brown – @GradtoGreat – Author & Career Expert
11. Andy Beal – @andybeal – Personal Branding Expert
12. Andy Headworth – @andyheadworth – Social Media Expert
13. Andy Robinson – @andyinnaples – Executive Career Coach & Author
14. Anthony Fisher – @anthonyfisherpb – Personal Branding Expert
15. Barbara Safani – @barbarasafani – Career Expert & Resume Expert
16. Barbara Sher – @BarbaraSher – Author
17. Barry Deutsch – @Barry_at_IMPACT – Career Coach & Recruiter
18. Barry Moltz – @BarryMoltz – Author
19. Ben Casnocha – @bencasnocha – Start-Up Expert & Author
20. Ben Yoskovitz – @byosko – The CEO of Standout Jobs
21. Ben Eubanks – @beneubanks – Career Journalist & HR Professional
22. Beverly Harvey – @BeverlyHarvey – Career Coach & Personal Branding Expert
23. Beverly Macy – @BeverlyMacy – Career Expert
24. Billie Sucher – @billiesucher – Career Transition Consultant & Resume Writer
25. Blake Sunshine – @blakesunshine – Marketing Expert
26. Boni Candelario – @coachmupboni – Career & Empowerment Coach
27. Brad Federman – @bfederman – Personal Branding Expert & Entrepreneur
28. Brad Hogenmiller – @JavaSTL – Recruiter, Networking & Career Strategist
29. Bradley Will – @bradleywill – Personal Branding Expert & Entrepreneur
30. Brent Peterson – @InterviewAngel – CEO of Interview Angel & Career Expert
31. Brigitte van Tuijl – @brigittevanT – Personal & Career Coach
32. Carlos Hernandez – @CarlosHernandez – Social Media & Career Expert
33. Carol Fishman Cohen – @iRelaunch – Career Reentry Expert
34. Casey Quinlan – @mightycasey – Marketing Expert
35. Catherine Cliffard – @YourOnRamp – Founder of YourOnRamp & Career Expert
36. Chad A. Levitt – @ChadALevitt – Social Media Expert & Author
37. Chandlee Bryan – @chandlee – Career Coach & Resume Writer
38. Char Brown – @charbrown – Web Marketing Coach
39. Charlie O’Donnell – @ceonyc – CEO of Path101
40. Cheryl Palmer – @CherylPalmer – Executive Career Coach & Resume Writer
41. Chris Brogan – @ChrisBrogan – Social Media Expert & Blogger
42. Chris Perry – @CareerRocketeer – Career Rocketeer & Personal Branding Expert
43. Chris Russell – @chrisrussell – Job Search Expert & Entrepreneur
44. Chris Webster – @CJWebster – Career and Coaching Specialist
45. Cindy Kraft – @cfocoach – Personal Branding Expert & CFO Coach
46. Daisy Wright – @DaisyWright – Career Coach & Author
47. Dan Janal – @prleads – Publicity & Internet Marketing Expert
48. Dan Nelson – @careercampaigns – Consultant & Recruiter
49. Dan Schawbel – @danschawbel – Author, Blogger & Personal Branding Expert
50. Dan Thomas – @DanThomas – Marketing Expert
51. Daniel Pink – @danielpink – Author & Career Expert
52. Daulton West – @dwestjr – Web Marketing Coach & Social Media Expert
53. Dave Saunders – @madmain – Marketing & Social Media Expert
54. David Sandusky – @DavidSandusky – Entrepreneur & Personal Branding Expert
55. David Wright – @getajob – Author & Career Expert
56. Dawn Bugni – @dawnbugni – Resume Expert & Blogger
57. Deb Dib – @CEOCoach – Executive Coach
58. Debbie Weil – @debbieweil – Social Media Expert
59. Deborah James – @ohioresgal – Executive Resume Guru & Recruiter
60. Debra Wheatman – @debrawheatman – Writer & Career Expert
61. Diana Jennings – @DianaJennings – Personal Branding Expert
62. Dirk Spencer – @dirkindallas – Recruiter & Resume Psychologist
63. Drew Selman – @socialmediawonk – Social Media Evangelist
64. Elaine Basham – @resumesrevealed – Job Search Strategist & Resume Consultant
65. Emilie Ogez – @eogez – Social Media Expert
66. Eric Shannon – @internetinc – Entrepreneur, Job Board & Social Media Expert
67. Eve Tahmincioglu – @CareerDiva – Career Columnist & Blogger
68. Fadhila Brahimi – @fbrahimi – Career Coach & Personal Branding Expert
69. Gayle Howard – @GayleHoward – Resume & Career Expert
70. Gene Burnard – @WorkforceFifty – Career Expert
71. Gillian Kelly – @Gillian_Kelly – Personal Branding Expert & Resume Writer
72. Glenn Raines – @socialmoves – Personal Branding Strategist
73. GL Hoffman – @GLHoffman – Career Expert & Entrepreneur
74. Hajj Flemings – @HajjFlemings – Personal Branding Expert
75. Harold Mellor – @haroldmellor – Recruiter
76. Harp Arora – @harparora – Personal Branding Expert
77. Harry Urshel – @eExecutives – Job Search Coach & Recruiter
78. Heather Huhman – @heatherhuhman – Columnist & Career Expert
79. Heather McDonald – @mountflorida – Writer & Music Career Expert at About.com
80. Ilissa Suss Manes – @IlissaSmanes – Career Expert
81. Jacob Share – @jacobshare - Job Search Expert & Blogger
82. Jacqui Barrett-Poindexter – @valueintowords – Executive Resume Writer & Career Strategist
83. Janice Worthington – @execjobcoach – Resume Writer & Job Search Coach
84. Jan Melnik – @janmelnik – Job Search Expert & Resume Writer
85. Jann Watt – @jannwatt – Personal Branding Expert
86. Jason Alba – @jasonalba – Author, Founder of JibberJobber.com, Career & Social Media Expert
87. Jason Buss – @jjbuss – Talent Acquisition & Diversity Professional
88. Jason Lesher – @career_advisor – Career Advisor & Recruiter
89. Jason Seiden – @Seiden – Career Expert
90. Jeff Jarvis – @jeffjarvis – Author, Writer & Blogger
91. Jeffrey Blake – @jeffrey_blake – Social Media Evangelist & Personal Branding Expert
92. Jennifer Kushell – @ysnjen – Networking Expert & Author
93. Jeremy Worthington – @jobsearchcoach – Resume Writer & Job Search Coach
94. Joan Schramm – @joanschramm – Social Media Expert & Career Coach
95. Joe Noonan – @BostonRecruiter – Recruiter & Founder of Sourcing Machine
96. Joel Cheesman – @cheezhead – Online Recruiting Expert
97. John Jantsh – @ducttape – Author & Internet Marketing Expert
98. Jon Davidson – @theresumebay – Career Expert & Resume Writer
99. Jonathan Fields – @jonathanfields – Author & Career Expert
100. JT O’Donnell – @jtodonnell – Founder of Careerealism & Career Expert
101. Julia Erickson – @juliaerickson – Career Coach
102. Jun Loayza – @junloayza – Social Media Expert
103. Karen Batchelor – @midlifetrip – Career Transition Expert
104. Karen Burns – @workinggirl – Career Expert
105. Katie Konrath – @katiekonrath – Blogger & Creative
106. Keith Ferrazzi – @keithferrazzi – Author & Networking Expert
107. Kirsten Dixson – @kirstendixson – Author & Personal Branding Expert
108. Kirsten Grant – @kgrantcareers – Career Expert
109. Kris Plantrich – @KrisPlantrich – Resume Writer & Career Coach
110. Krishna De – @kirshnade – Personal Branding & Social Media Expert
111. Kristen Fischer – @KristenFischer – Author & Career Expert
112. Kristen Jacoway – @KristenJacoway – Career Coach & Personal Branding Expert
113. Kristen Kaleal – @kkaleal – Image Consultant & Personal Stylist
114. Laura Smith-Proulx – @resumeexpert – Personal Branding Expert & Resume Writer
115. Lauren Still – @laurenstill – Career & Life Coach
116. Laurence Shatkin – @LaurenceShatkin – Career Information Expert, Author & Blogger
117. Laurie Ruettimann – @lruettimann – HR Professional & Career Expert
118. Leonard Lang – @Leonard_Lang – Executive Career Coach & Creativity Consultant
119. Lesley Everett – @LesleyEverett – Personal Branding Expert
120. Lethia Owens – @LiveYourBrand – Personal Branding Expert
121. Lewis Lin – @InteviewCoach – Interview Coach
122. Linda Griffin – @lindagriffin – Reinvention Strategist & Blogger
123. Lindsay Olson – @PRjobs – Recruiter, Blogger & Entrepreneur
124. Lindsey Pollak – @lindseypollak – Author & Career Expert
125. Liz Lynch – @liz_lynch – Author & Networking Expert
126. Louise Fletcher – @louise_fletcher – Resume Writer, Author & Co-Founder of Career Hub
127. Louise Mowbray – @louisemowbray – Personal Branding Expert
128. Maria Elena Duron – @mariaduron – Chief Buzz Officer & Personal Expert
129. Mark Cummata – @TriumphCIO – CIO of JobAngels & Career Expert
130. Mark Richards – @CandidatesChair – Career & Networking Expert
131. Mark Stelzner – @stelzner – Founder of JobAngels & HR Professional
132. Martha Finney – @MarthaFinney – Author
133. Martin Buckland – @MartinBuckland – Executive Career Coach
134. Marty Weitzman – @resumepro – Personal Branding Expert & Resume Writer
135. Matthew Liptak – @mattliptak – Advanced Recruiter
136. Megan Fitzgerald – @ExpatCoachMegan – Career Coach
137. Meg Guiseppi – @megguiseppi – Executive Personal Branding Expert
138. Meghan M. Biro – @meghanmbiro – Founder of TalentCulture & Career Expert
139. Meg Montford – @KCCareerCoach – Career & Marketing Expert
140. Melissa Cassera – @casseracomm – Publicity Expert & Blogger
141. Melissa Wells – @MelissaWells – Executive Coach & Career Consultant
142. Mike Myatt – @MikeMyatt – Personal Branding Expert
143. Miriam Salpeter – @KeppieCareers – Career Coach & Resume Writer
144. Monica O’Brien – @monicaobrien – Marketing Expert
145. Nancy Branton – @LeadersCoach – Executive & Career Coach
146. Nancy Longo – @TheLongoReport – Job Search Advisor
147. Nick Armstrong – @imnickarmstrong – Marketing Expert
148. Ola Rynge – @Rynge – Personal Branding Expert
149. Pam Slim – @pamslim – Author & Career Coach
150. Paul Copcutt – @paulcopcutt – Personal Branding Expert
151. Peggy McKee – @Salesrecruiter – Sales & Marketing Recruiter
152. Penelope Trunk – @penelopetrunk – Author, Blogger & Entrepreneur
153. Pete Kistler – @Brandyourself – Personal Branding Expert
154. Phil Gerbyshak – @philgerb – Social Media Expert
155. Phil Rosenberg – @philrecareered – Career Expert & Blogger
156. Phyllis Shabad – @phyllisshabad – Personal Branding Expert
157. Rachel Gogos – @RachelGogos – Marketing & Personal Branding Expert
158. Rachel Gordon – @10GMRachel – Career Expert
159. Randi Bussin – @myreinventure – Personal Branding Expert
160. Rob Cuesta – @RobCuesta – Marketing & Personal Branding Expert
161. Roxanne Ravenel – @RoxanneRavenel – Job Search Coach & Career Expert
162. Sally Witzky – @sallywitzky – Personal Branding Expert
163. Sarah Evans – @PRsarahevans – Social Media Expert & Blogger
164. Scheherazade Mason – @sherryfm – Career Expert
165. Scott Allen – @scottallen – Author & Social Media Expert
166. Scot Herrick – @scotherrick – Owner of Cube Rules & Career Consultant
167. Scott Ginsberg – @nametagscott – Networking Expert
168. Sean Harry – @career20 – Career Expert
169. Selena Dehne – @SelenaDehne – Publicist
170. Shirley Ray – @JobSeekersEdge – HR Professional and Career Coach
171. Stephanie A. Lloyd – @StephanieALloyd – Columnist, Recruiter & Entrepreneur
172. Steven Rothberg – @StevenRothberg – Founder of CollegeRecruiter.com
173. Susan Heathfield – @SusanHeathfield – HR Expert
174. Susan Ireland – @SusanIreland – Author & Resume Expert
175. Susan Strayer – @DailyCareerTips – Career Coach & Recruiter
176. Teena Rose – @teenarose – Career Expert
177. Terry Del Percio – @WorkIntegrity – Work Behavior Researcher, Career Coach & Consultant
178. Tessa Faber – @MakingSense – Personal Branding Expert
179. Tiffany Monhollon – @tmonhollon – PR Specialist
180. Tim Ferriss – @tferriss – Author & Blogger
181. Tim Tyrell-Smith – @SpinStrategy – Marketing Professional & Career Expert
182. Tom Scholte – @TomScholte – Personal Branding Expert
183. Trace Cohen – @Brandyourself – Personal Branding Expert
184. Traci Thompson – @AResumes – Resume & Cover Letter Expert
185. Trevor Wilson – @gradversity – Job Search Strategist
186. Trina Spruance – @GetHiredGuru – Staffing Expert
187. Tyson Goodridge – @goodridge – Social Media Educator and Evangelist
188. Walter Akana – @WalterAkana – Life Strategist
189. Wendy Gelberg – @wendygelberg – Career Expert & Resume Writer
190. Wendy Marx – @wendymarx – Personal Branding Expert
191. Wendy Terwelp – @WendyTerwelp – Personal Branding Expert
192. William Arruda – @williamarruda – Career Coach, Author & Personal Branding Expert
193. Willy Franzen – @willyf - Career Expert & Entrepreneur
194. Yinka Olaito – @pathfindernig – Personal Branding Expert

Want to follow all of them? Do it quickly and easily with Ninjafollow.com.After typing in your Twitter username and password, write in the experts’ Twitter usernames into the correct field, making sure to separate each with a comma, and then click ”Ninja Follow!”
NinjaFollow will attempt to add these experts to your Twitter account (100 people at a time) letting you know whether each has been added successfully or whether you are already following them.

I have gone ahead and made it easier for you to follow all of them by putting together the comma-separated lists for you to copy, paste and edit in the appropriate field at NinjaFollow.com.

adriennewaldo,alevit,alisondoyle,askamanager,AndreaSantiago,AnitaBruzzese,engagingbrand,
GradtoGreat,andybeal,andyheadworth,andyinnaples,anthonyfisherpb,barbarasafani,BarbaraSher, Barry_at_IMPACT,BarryMoltz,bencasnocha,byosko,beneubanks,BeverlyHarvey,BeverlyMacy,
billiesucher,blakesunshine,bradleywill,InterviewAngel,CarlosHernandez,iRelaunch,mightycasey, YourOnRamp,ChadALevitt,chandlee,charbrown,ceonyc,CherylPalmer,ChrisBrogan, CareerRocketeer,chrisrussell,cfocoach,prleads,danschawbel,DanThomas,danielpink,dwestjr,
madmain,DavidSandusky,getajob,dawnbugni,CEOCoach,debbieweil,debrawheatman,
DianaJennings,resumesrevealed,eogez,CareerDiva,fbrahimi,GayleHoward,WorkforceFifty,
Gillian_Kelly,GLHoffman,HajjFlemings,haroldmellor,harparora,eExecutives,heatherhuhman,
mountflorida,IlissaSmanes,jacobshare,valueintowords,janmelnik,jannwatt,jasonalba,jjbuss,
career_advisor,Seiden,jeffjarvis,jeffrey_blake,ysnjen,joanschramm,cheezhead,ducttape,
theresumebay,jonathanfields,jtodonnell,juliaerickson,junloayza,midlifetrip,workinggirl,katiekonrath, kirstendixson,kgrantcareers,kirshnade,KristenFischer,KristenJacoway,kkaleal,Resumeexpert,
laurenstill,lruettimann,Leonard_Lang,LesleyEverett

LiveYourBrand,InteviewCoach,lindseypollak,liz_lynch,louise_fletcher,louisemowbray,mariaduron,CandidatesChair,
stelzner,MarthaFinney,MartinBuckland,resumepro,ExpatCoachMegan,megguiseppi,KCCareerCoach,casseracomm,
N2growth,KeppieCareers,monicaobrien,LeadersCoach,TheLongoReport,imnickarmstrong,Rynge,pamslim,
paulcopcutt,Salesrecruiter,philgerb,philrecareered,phyllisshabad,RachelGogos,10GMRachel,
myreinventure,RobCuesta,RoxanneRavenel,sallywitzky,PRsarahevans,sherryfm,scottallen,
scotherrick,nametagscott,career20,SelenaDehne,SusanHeathfield,SusanIreland,DailyCareerTips, teenarose,MakingSense,tmonhollon,tferriss,SpinStrategy,TomScholte,Brandyourself,AResumes,
gradversity,GetHiredGuru,WalterAkana,wendygelberg,wendymarx,WendyTerwelp,williamarruda, willyf,
pathfindernig,MeghanMBiro,careercampaigns,bfederman,daisywright,socialmoves,brigittevanT,
internetinc,keithferrazzi,dirkindallas,penelopetrunk,ohioresgal,StephanieALloyd, prjobs,coachmupboni,sexythinker,JavaSTL,TriumphCIO,lindagriffin,KrisPlantrich,execjobcoach,jobsearchcoach,
socialmediawonk,goodridge,JobSeekersEdge,CJWebster,MelissaWells,mattliptak,LaurenceShatkin,
WorkIntegrity,StevenRothberg,BostonRecruiter,allisoncheston

Chris Perry, MBA is a Gen Y brand and marketing “generator,” a career search and personal branding expert and the founder of Career Rocketeer.

Nearly every day, LINKUP is mentioned in some article like this one in the Chicago Tribune today, where LinkUp is mentioned in the same sentence as Simply Hired and Indeed (we’re first). All mentions are critical to a new product because one never knows just how high the hill is where you are pushing the rock up. At some point, the top is reached and bingo, shazam, everyone knows your name, product or service.

If you on a qwest for “mentions,” realize that they are both important and near-worthless. Far better to spend your time improving your product or service and communicating with real, live customers than chasing “mentions.” Years back, I pestered stalked Walter Mossberg, the technology guru at the Wall Street Journal, to write about our product (Varitronics). After some work, he finally gave us three or four sentences in his weekly column, B Section, Page 1. We had arrived. Literally, I made sure I was in the office that day, you know, so I could field the congratulatory phone calls from our 400 dealers. I didn’t get one. Zero. Zilch.

Even though we certainly appreciate being worthy of such a paper like the Chicago Tribune, none of us are hanging out by the phone, waiting for calls from appreciative and new LINKUP users.

But, if you are a reporter with a nice audience, please call us right away. Your article might be the “mention” we need as we get to the top of the hill.

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