On August 19, 2008 I wrote the post titled Gravatar: How To Get Your Picture With Your Comment In This Blog.

I love this simple post for two reasons… one is because it has over 50 comments, and the other is because it helps me and my readers get to know a bit more about you, because of your picture.

I love to see pictures of my contacts… if you have any inclination of using blog comments as a networking tactic I suggest you follow the super-easy instructions on the post:

Gravatar: How To Get Your Picture With Your Comment In This Blog

I didn’t do it earlier because I had simply run out of creativity.  But recently I started doing video recordings again and I thought “I CAN DO THIS.”

And so I did.

Thanks to Julie Walraven, resume writer and career coach, for being the first person to put this on a website (even before I put it up!).

Enjoy!

Man, just typing the title of this post makes me cringe with boredom.

However, I have used this technique many times over my career, and just recently the issue came up from a JibberJobber user who imported his Contacts.

His problem was that the first name and last name were in the same column, but we want that broken out when you do the import.

Fixing this is actually really simple. In my user webinars I talk about opening a csv file in Excel, so you can see the pretty columns and rows… but for this little exercise I recommend you open it up in Notepad.

I know, I know: opening it in Notepad will make it really, really ugly.  Almost unreadable.  Especially files that have a lot of “columns.”  Just remember, csv stands for “comma separated values,” which means that each “field” is separated by a comma.  The comma tells Excel to put the next thing in a new column.  For example, this csv content:

First Name, Last Name, Email Address, Phone Number
Jason, Alba, Jason@Jason.com, 801.800.8123

Will look like this when opened in Excel:

What if your file is formatted like this, instead? Notice the name is ONE column (not broken out)?

Name, Email Address, Phone Number
Jason Alba, Jason@Jason.com, 801.800.8123
John Doe, John@Doe.com, 555.555.1234
Sally Jesse, Sally@Jesse.com, 800.123.4567

Right now we aren’t parsing this for you – the best and easiest thing to do is to fix it in the file.  Again, go to Notepad, open the CSV file, and then make these very simple changes:

1. In the first row, which is the header row, change Name to First Name, Last Name.  This will make TWO columns instead of ONE (make sure to put the comma between the column names).
2. In all the other rows, simply put a comma between the first and last name.

That’s it – it is very simple. I’m guessing if I had a file with 100 records (names) I could put the comma inbetween the first and last name in about 4 or 5 minutes, or less…

This might seem like a pain, and when we redo the import we might accommodate for one name field, but for now this is really quite easy.  And YOU are empowered with the knowledge to manipulate your csv files!

Now when you import it will import the name values into the right fields (first, last).

I wanted to let you know that I’m only backing away from the premium subscription for a little while.  I start a new job tomorrow, one that I was able to land in no small part because of your JibberJobber career management software.  I was able to track several submissions I’d made to this particular employer, giving me a valuable history of my interactions with them.  That history allowed me to connect a few dots and that gave me an advantage I needed during the interview process.

This is the response he gave me when he downgraded from Premium to Regular.  I love it – last week I’ve had three JibberJobber users change their status from unemployed to I FOUND MY DREAM JOB!

That really thrills me.

JC ended his message to me with this:

[JibberJobber is] a great tool that I’d be proud to help plug for.

Thanks for sharing JC, and best wishes at your new gig!

Not on JibberJobber yet?  Sign up here.  Get on our next user webinar tomorrow morning (register here).

I find myself regularly pointing people to three of my most favorite features in JibberJobber.  In this post I want to share how JibberJobber interfaces with five outside tools:

1. LinkedIn – in various places in the JibberJobber experience you can tap into your LinkedIn network.  You can do a quick search on LinkedIn for companies or names, or you can see who is in your LinkedIn network by company.  I want to do LOTS MORE with LinkedIn, but their terms of service is too restrictive (sorry, talk to them about it). Need LinkedIn help?  Check out my LinkedIn DVD.
2. Twitter – I mentioned in that things I love post about how you can quickly add a contact by putting their Twitter handle in.  There is MORE coming… super cool stuff!
3. Skype – I use Skype for my business phone… when I’m in JibberJobber I can easily click an icon and initiate a phone call through my headset.  It’s one-click easy.  I can also click an icon and initiate a chat message through skype.
4. Google – just like I can do a quick search on LinkedIn, I can also do a quick search on Google. I thought this was just a cute “we did it because we could” feature, but I have used it more than I thought I would recently!
5. Anagram - people continually thank me for this feature – you can copy-and-paste contact information into a box, click a button, and then the information (names, phone #’s, etc.) is parsed into the correct boxes on the form.  It’s really quite brilliant (you can buy it for your PC, if you want, but you don’t have to have that to use the feature built into JibberJobber).

We would love to do more interfacing with other systems – send me a message and let me know what you’d like to see us interface with (and how the interface would work).

In this post I’m asking you to take a few minutes to recommend JibberJobber to the U.S. Department of Labor.

This is like “voting” for JibberJobber, but it’s not for a web award, or to be listed on a blog… I’m guessing the implecations of this recommendation will be that JibberJobber will be recognized by the government and broadcast as a job seeker resource to many workforce service departments.

In short, I think this can be the think that legitimizes JibberJobber to the US Government, which will be a big win not only for us but for the people who need something like JibberJobber.

I’ve had many talks with government people, but the problem always comes back to one thing: since there is an OPTION to upgrade, they say they can’t recommend it.  I think this is either a super-lame policy, or a misunderstanding of policy.  Nonetheless, many government people I talk to say something like (I really heard this):

I LOVE this!  I’m going to tell my daughter, who is just graduating from college, to get on and use JibberJobber.  But I can’t mention it at my office because there is a fee (NO, there is an OPTIONAL fee).  And we can’t endorse anything that is for-profit.

Oh. My. Gosh.  Choke me now.

Guess what… LinkedIn has an optional upgrade.  Monster has optional upgrades (or levels).

A major disappointment when I first started JibberJobber was seeing a great divide between the government trying to create their own stuff, and not promoting anything else, and private industry creating really strong, powerful tools.

Guess who lost? Anyone who went to a workforce services office who wasn’t told about what they really should have been using as a resource.

Okay, didn’t mean for this to be a rant… let me get back on track.

I think, I hope, that if JibberJobber gets enough recommendations then we’ll finally get that quasi-endorsement from the government that will help hundreds thousands millions know about this very useful tool.

Here’s a quote from a comment from yesterday’s post – I found this to be really powerful:

I just “stumbled” across JJ today. After 9 months in the job search, talking with “career coaches” and recruiters as well as other job seekers and this is the first I’ve heard of it. This should be the first place a job seeker is led to.

Thank you, Gary Donnelly, for sharing that (see his entire comment here). It is a damned shame (says Steve Gallison) that he had not been pointed to it earlier.

We have tens of thousands of signups, but with last year’s economy we should have had millions.

Please recommend JibberJobber to the DOL and hopefully we’ll get the respect we deserve, and job seekers won’t have to waffle around for almost a year before they “stumble upon” this very helpful resource.

To recommend JibberJobber simply:

1. Click on this link (or any link on this page, they all go to the same place)
2. Click on the Recommend Tool Image on the DOL page
3. Click Signup on the top of the popup window
4. Apparently you have to click the Recommend image again (thanks @ecaron for the heads up on this fourth step)

Follow the process from there. I’m guessing it will take you all of three minutes.

Thank you, thank you, thank you!

In my Google Alerts I found a link to a blog that mentioned JibberJobber (titled: What’s Wrong?).  In fact, the blogger wrote “newfangled jibberjobber”… hm, now my curiousity is piqued!

The blog post is something I’ve been thinking about for a long time… the blogger talks about all of the widgets and gadgets and tools that are supposed to make our lives easier, but in fact, don’t.  I think we all have at least one thing we’ve purchased that was supposed to make our lives easier, but just sat around unused?

The blog author talks about stuff from infomercials, kitchen utensils, phone accessories, etc.

And they threw JibberJobber into the conversation with this question:

“After all whats wrong with the OLD way of doing whatever the newfangled jibberjobber is supposed to replace?”

Let’s talk about that…

The OLD way of doing a job search is, well, old.  It’s outdated.  It doesn’t necessarily work.

Remember, the OLD way of doing a job search was in a different environment.  Back in the olden days (a few years ago) you could use job boards, apply to jobs, and it was a numbers game (how many resumes could you send in?  Someone was BOUND to hire you if you sent enough resumes).

The NEW way is, well, new.  It’s not so much a numbers game.  It might just be more about managing relationships.  And managing relationships is HARD.  Keeping track of relationships you manage is HARD, also, especially the more you network.

Try tracking hundreds of companies you are looking at.  Hundreds of resumes that you use to apply to hundreds of jobs.  And hundreds of people you network into (online and offline).

What OLD way would really help you manage that information?  3×5 cards not good enough?  Well, buy 4×6 cards then :p  Or wait, how about a spreadsheet?  Been there, done that, didn’t do the job after a while because there was TOO MUCH data to manage.

There are only so many tools that will really, really cut an onion the right way.  And usually my favorite cutting tool is the knife. I can’t image a tool that will replace my set of Cutco knives.  They are the best tools in my kitchen.

In a job search, there never really was a knife (that super tool).  There still isn’t … finding a job and managing your career is more complex than cutting an onion.  So you might need multiple tools.  But if your OLD tools were paper-based, or a spreadsheet, and you are getting ready for a new job search, I’d suggest you seriously check out some newfangled tools… like JibberJobber.com and LinkedIn.  These are the closest knife-like tools you’ll find for your job search.

Twitter is … weird.  Yeah, weird.  I currently have 11,409 followers, and I wonder how many of those followers are spam and fake accounts. I rarely look at the home page to see what people are writing about (I used to, all the time) because it’s so NOISY.  Too much crap to wade through.

Having said that, I’ve gotten immense value out of Twitter. I put up a LinkedIn Question a few weeks ago asking: Twitter in the job search? I say: not yet. What do you think? I got some passionate replies telling me that YES, Twitter is all that, and other replies saying no way, pick up the phone instead.  Terrific responses.

The irony, for those so passionate about how Twitter is the best things since sliced bread, is that I’m not a Twitter hater… I even did an awesome video on Twitter in the job search. I think it’s a terrific tool for job seekers…

Let me share one of the coolest stories I’ve heard in a long time on how people are getting value out of Twitter (this isn’t a job search story, but it is a networking story).  It’s a terrific story about two ladies who really want to meet celebrity author Keith Ferrazzi in Guatemala… you can read the entire story here, on Keith’s blog.  Here’s the short of it:

Keith was in Guatemala to look at some charity opportunities (read more about Keith Ferrazzi’s charity work here) and let his readers/audience/fans know (Keith’s Twitter account). Sara and Suzette found out and were using Keith’s tweets to try and figure out where he was, hoping to run into him.  Finally, Susette tweeted to Keith asking if she could buy him a drink.

Keith saw that, replied, and the rest is history!  (read his post to see how cool the dinner was)

This worked because Keith was (a) on Twitter, (b) using Twitter, and (c) comfortable with Twitter.  There’s something about communicating with someone through a channel that they are comfortable with.

What’s interesting is that neither Susette nor Sara have done “all the right things,” as far as what others are saying you have to do.  They don’t have many followers, they don’t have bios or websites or links so you can learn more about them… they haven’t tweeted that much.  But they still hit grand slams… just by using the tool.

Not all of your target contacts are on, or use, Twitter.  However, I would check to see if they are.  I’ve communicated with other untouchables through Twitter and gotten further than if I would have just sent an email.

Don’t discount Twitter as a networking tool.  I don’t suggest you go crazy with it (my video shows you how to get value out of it – whether you have a Twitter account or not), but use it like all of the other networking tools you have access to.

I just got information from my JibberJobber Partner, Beverly Harvey, about a telesminar she is hosting on Friday called “How To Conduct a Highly Successful Job Acquisition Campaign and Land Your Next Position ASAP”

The call is this Friday, Dec 18, at 1pm EST.  She says you’ll learn:

• Why the job acquisition techniques you used a few years ago aren’t working
• What decision makers and recruiters are really looking for
• Why you may not be getting called for interviews
• Why you can’t take any short cuts when it comes to your job acquisition campaign
• Why you need a well-though-out strategy, plan and system
• Why you must treat a job acquisition campaign like a marketing campaign
• Why a haphazard, trial-and-error approach won’t work in today’s market

You can register here (affiliate link – she’s introducing her Platinum Job Acquisition Progam on that call).

A little about Beverly: I have met Beverly a number of times at career conferences and have found her to be well-respected, and in fact she is involved in coaching and training job search coaches.  She is definitely current on job search (or, as she says, acquisition) strategies and techniques, and passionate about helping professionals move on.  Her reputation alone is well worth your time on her call on Friday…!

I recently read an article (in a newsletter, sorry, no link) about how to use Twitter in a job search. In short, the suggestions were:

1. Get on Twitter,
2. Tweet and get your brand out there, and
3. follow key job people, including coaches, recruiters, etc.

I absolutely, fundamentally disagree.

Not to sound like a pessimist, but the people who usually listen to me are (a) busy, (b) not necessarily early adopters to technology, and (c) busy.  Because of (b) I have to be careful when I recommend any technology.

I’m not opposed to technology, but telling a job seeker to do the three steps above, I think, will give them a false sense of “I’m doing the right thing in my job search!”  I bet I can come up with 20 (non-twitter) activities that are more important than those three steps. I would not put this as a top priority.

But I do tell job seekers to include Twitter as part of their job search strategy.  In a nutshell, I suggest:

• Use Twitter to find people who you can/should network with.  Best place to do this?  Twellow.com.  You don’t have to have a Twitter account to do this.
• Once you find a key contact, see if they have any lists, or are listed in any lists… if so, look for other key contacts to contact.  You don’t have to have a Twitter account to do this.
• IF you want to contact people, consider doing it through Twitter.  Now you need to get an account, but you can do this in a way that gets you in front of key people who you are targeting (instead of throwing twitter-mud on the wall).  Be onbrand and realize the purpose of this is to get a discussion with that person, not to do a general branding tweet.

Addressing point 2 above, I don’t think it’s a bad idea to use Twitter as a branding tool – in fact, it has been quite a tool for me.  But I have resources allocated to branding and marketing, and this fits into that.  Job seekers, like I said, could have at least 20 other activities that are more productive.

Addressing point 3 above, I don’t think there is as much value in following recruiters and those posting jobs on Twitter… no offense to @tweetmyjobs and such services, but if you are spending a considerable amount of time looking at job postings anywhere, there is something wrong with your job search.

Active job seekers should be as wary of posted jobs as recruiters are of active job seekers.

(if you didn’t get that last line, read it again – it might be one of the most important sentences I’ve written on this blog, ever)

I would suggest you follow job search coaches, resume writers, etc…. because they will throw out tips and advice… but if you find yourself reading and reading and reading most of the day, I’d tell you to stop your Twitter activity and go do some of the hard stuff in the job search.

Thoughts?