Is Blogs a recruiting tool???

At present the topic blogs posts has risen to new levels and people are trying to utilize its benefits in different ways. Now people are trying to use blogs as a recruiting tool. The recruiting processes have evolved over the years; it is being carried out at present by many different means. For example online recruiting websites, social business networking sites, career websites managed by the firms and the trusted employee referral and advertising. To me there are so many different recruiting tools but very few of them are quite reliable. There are tools which attract many people but out of which only a few are actually a good match for the job. Recruting the right candidate has become a difficult process today.

Are blogs the right tool for recruiting??? Well I guess the answer is a Yes, the blogs offer something’s that the other recruiting methods don’t, like giving a personal touch to it. But just blogging in the blogosphere will not provide fruitful results. The recruiters who maintain the recruiting blogs should spend some quality time on it. And by putting the right information they will be able to attract many readers to their blogs. The blogs are different in the sense that it is done in a very informal manner and also it allows the users to discuss with the blogger (recruiter) about the job profile. All the interactions in the blogs can be very informal which helps in dicussing things that may not be possible in other recruiting methods.

One of the biggest drawbacks of using blogs as a recruiting tool is the recruiters are not able to realize its potentials and are not able to accept it as a recruiting tools. They feel that it would be a waste of time and not spending enough time on it.

I feel that blogs would be a great tool for recruiting if it is used in the right way. What do you feel??? Feel free to share your views on it.

Is Second Life turning into Real life???

So whats Second Life?? It is something about reincarnation? nop, it is a virtual world where one leads a life that he/she dreamt off. I was really suprised when I read about it, it was something different and I wanted to try it out immediately(check it out).

In the late 90's there was a toy called Tamagotchi (tamagotchi), it was a digital pet. It took the world by strom and was in high demand. I had one of it and it was a great experience owning one. It was a good invention and I feel that Second Life though it is much more advanced it uses the same concept of virtuality.

Second Life was initally introduced as a virtual game but has now turned into a world by itself. People lead another life in it and some are even making a living out of it. I feel that though it started as a something to pass time is now turning into serious business. To me it is something where you can do things that you can't do in the real life and one can spend time on it to relax from today's hectic life. But now Second Life has turned into a world where life has become as hectic as the life in the real world.

My question to everyone is it worth having a second life which is becoming as hectic as the real life??? I hope that Second Life remains a place where people can enjoy their life as they have always dreamt off.

Is User Generated Content(UGC) heading the right way???

User Generated Content (UGC), is it something new??? Well it's a big no!!! It's been there for quite sometime but it only in the recent past few years that people have started to take a serious notice of its benefits. With the development of the new tools used for posting information it has become much easier to post contents.

I am a big fan of UGC as it has led to the creation of online social communites, video sharing and blogs. It has brought about a revoultion in the way the web is being used. I recently read an atricle which says that UGC has started to take hold in the advertising industry (http://www.iht.com/). The article talks about a 19 year old wining a contest for creating user generated ads for Sony which was conducted by a cable tv network, Current TV. It is very interesting to see how the people have started to leverage the benefits of UGC.

I am facinated by the fact that users have started to use the UGC as hobby and how the firms are trying to cash in on it by utilizing the users to their benefit. Lets consider user review blogs which is a part of UGC and it has become famous among the users as it was a honest way of getting news and reviews. Now the big firms are taking a notice of the strong marketing benefits the blogs provide and are trying to cash in on it. But however question that arises out of this is how geniune the reviews will be, are the firms paying people to post positive reviews???

Also many bloggers have started to blog just for the sake of blogging. This has led to many unwanted blogs being posted. The biggest question would be how the users are going to determine whether the blogger is posting content honestly or not??? And will the users start to loose their interest in reading blogs???

Sean has some very interesting blogs who is a member of my blog cirlce.

http://kaze656.blogspot.com/

Leveraging new technologies - Road to Success!!!

I read two articles, one that talks about citizen journalism and the other about Nike's new public design studio. These two articles were distinctly unique in their own ways.

Citizen journalism gives the volunteers an opportunity to contribute to articles their view of the story in the newsroom blog created and maintained by Wired.com. The project was named Assignment zero (zero.newassignment.net). This allows Assignment Zero to gather information from different angles which sometimes cannot be achieved by their correspondents. This concept is called Crowdsourcing which is a form of Outsourcing. I would love to be a citizen journalist and contribute my view to a story. It would be a great experience for me since I am not professional journalist.

The official definition for Crowdsourcing from the term’s originator, Jeff Howe, is "the act of a company or institution taking a function once performed by employees and outsourcing it to an undefined (and generally large) network of people in the form of an open call." This concept this being widely used in many businesses today as knowledge of a group of people is always better than one. The secert of success lies in how the concept of crowdsourcing is managed and developed. The following blog gives an idea of different businesses that are using this concept (readwriteweb.com).

Nike's design studio the concept of designing your own shoes, is something that really fascinated me. Just imagine wearing a custom made Nike shoes that you designed!!! This new business strategy by Nike has opened doors to a innovative marketing. Nike uses a similar concept online on its website nikeid.com, which I decided to check out and it was a great experience. I just can't wait to go to NY and get shoes that are designed by me.

I feel that the above two concepts were possible due to the advancements made in technology. Technology plays a vital role in both these concepts. As more and more of these new concepts come up everyday, it would help people to create new business lines or enhance their business. However the questions that I feel still remains is how the new technology will be leveraged to create new concepts??? and how it is going to be sustanied for a longer duration??? Since the investment that goes into new concepts is going to be quite large, they need it to be sustanied for a longer period of time in order to reap in the benefits.