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"  Your smart tweets, clever video resume and even your connections aren&amp;#039;t going to get your next job. No pressure, but a lot is riding on your interview.  Nail it next time with 16 tips from our panel of experts: Lauren Berger, CEO of Internqueen.com and author of All Work, No Pay: Finding an Internship, Building Your Resume, Making Connections, and Gaining Job Experience; Cynthia Shapiro, author of What Does Somebody Have To Do To Get A Job Around Here?; and Caroline Dowd-Higgins, author of This is Not the Career I Ordered. 1. Think savvy, not superfan Walk the line between being a nervous nelly and a fan girl, says Berger. Make sure your passion doesn&amp;#039;t come across as too obsessive. Come across as confident but also appropriate and reserved when needed. 2. In fact, play a little hard to get Aggressiveness is pass\u00E9, says Shapiro. Unless you&amp;#039;re in certain fields (you know if you&amp;#039;re in them, such as the media industry) being super aggressive will make you appear desperate. Instead act as if you have five different offers. After you submit an application, respond, don&amp;#039;t initiate. And if you absolutely must follow up, send your resume using another method\u2014like by snail mail if you sent it by email initially. 3. Do a social media cleanse Before you start interviewing, give yourself a few weeks to do a social media cleanse. Treat yourself as if you&amp;#039;re running for president. Anything you&amp;#039;re hesitant about, take it down. Even when you&amp;#039;ve changed your settings to private\u2014which you should\u2014assume anyone can see what you&amp;#039;re posting. 4. Practice makes perfect Practice doing an interview with friends, family or with a counselor at a career center. If you find yourself particularly nervous being outgoing, Berger suggests pushing yourself to talk to a stranger every day. Making small talk at the grocery in the check out line is a great start. 5. No tweeting allowed Do not even consider tweeting about your job search, particularly if it indicates you&amp;#039;re having trouble getting a job. 6. Judge your own blog Everyone has a blog. Even your dog has a blog. But that doesn&amp;#039;t mean your blog isn&amp;#039;t worthwhile including on our application; it shows personality. But make sure you&amp;#039;ve committed to updating it regularly and it&amp;#039;s an apt reflection of your personal brand. 7. Dress professionally A lot of companies go for casual dress these days. But always dress professionally for an interview. Berger recommends a take on a black suit\u2014whether it skinny black pants and a blazer for an interview with a creative brand or a traditional black pants suit for a more conservative company. Show your personality with a statement necklace, and never ever show up in sky-high (a.k.a. stripper) heels. 8. Get ready for the coffee shop interview The new interview is the Starbucks interview\u2014a meeting with a start-up at a coffee shop. You know everyone is going to be listening to your interview, but get over it\u2014it&amp;#039;s you moment to shine. Get there 45 minutes early so you can nab a table in corner and buy your own coffee to prevent the awkward situation with an employer figuring out who&amp;#039;s paying. And don&amp;#039;t let the Starbucks aspect affect the way you look or dress. Keep it just as professional as you would for a regular office meeting. 9. Ask smart questions Have two to three questions prepared, including &amp;quot;Describe a day at the job.&amp;quot; And always make sure the questions are extremely relevant to the company and position, says Berger. A lot of people make the mistake asking the interviewer for personal advice, like &amp;quot;I saw you used to work at William Morris. Can you tell me what it was like?&amp;quot; Bad move. 10. Tell stories, not lists When you&amp;#039;re talking about your experience to a company, a lot of people get in the habit of running through a resume-like list. Instead, talk in about how you specifically effected company, says Dowd-Higgins, like how you took a company&amp;#039;s Twitter following from 10 to 10,000. 11. Know the lingo Read and reread the job posting. Highlight key buzz words they&amp;#039;re using, and then organically incorporate those words into your interview spiel. 12. Consider everything a test Your interviewer is texting, talking to co-workers walking in and out of the office\u2014basically ignoring you. Consider any difficult scenario during your interview a test, says Shapiro. Stay positive, focused and act like everything&amp;#039;s normal. 13. The correct answer to when you can start is\u2026. Immediately. 14. Say thanks with a handwritten letter Always send a handwritten thank you. A lot of employers use it as tie-breaker when they&amp;#039;re deciding between two candidates. 15. Don&amp;#039;t be a stalker Follow-up is especially important when you&amp;#039;re going for an entry or midlevel position, which is not necessarily the top priority\u2014or top of mind\u2014for hiring managers, says Berger. At the end of the interview, ask if there&amp;#039;s a timeline in which you should expect to hear from them. If they give you a time, don&amp;#039;t follow up before that time frame, and don&amp;#039;t follow up on the exact deadline either. Wait two days and send a quick follow-up, thanking them for sitting down with you and asking if there&amp;#039;s any other information you can send over. Then follow up exactly a week later if you haven&amp;#039;t heard a peep, and after that, game over. 16. Turn a rejection into a learning experience Let a rejection propel you forward. As soon as you receive rejection, ask the hiring manager for feedback regarding the skills and experience you&amp;#039;ll need next time a position opens up. You can even ask whomever you connected with during the interview process if you can take them out for coffee to pick their brain for tips for the future (but NEVER ask why you didn&amp;#039;t get the job). Then stay in touch, and apply again. Want more from Jessica? Follow her on Twitter. Image: Getty "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
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