July 2 (Bloomberg) -- Best Buy Co., the world’s largest electronics retailer, is building a customer-service team that will use Twitter Inc. to answer questions about products to help increase sales.

Starting July 19, Best Buy’s “Twelpforce” will search Twitter posts to find people seeking information about flat- panel televisions and other electronics, Chief Marketing Officer Barry Judge said in a telephone interview today. More than 500 employees at stores and at the company’s Richfield, Minnesota headquarters are signed up to participate, he said.

“The old paradigm is you open your doors and hope someone comes in,” Judge said. “In the new world, you can go out and find people that are talking about technology and what they’re interested in buying, and be generous with your knowledge. And hopefully if you’re generous and knowledgeable, people will come and buy.”

Consumers are spending less on digital cameras and appliances in the second year of the worst U.S. economic slump since the Great Depression. Best Buy and Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the world’s biggest retailer, are vying for the former customers of Circuit City Stores Inc., which closed in March.

“This is a fairly inexpensive way to reach out to customers and leverage the downtime of people in the stores,” Scott Tilghman, an analyst with New York-based Hudson Square Research, said in a telephone interview.

The retailer will run TV advertisements for the Twelpforce, Judge said.

Best Buy fell $1.78, or 5.3 percent, to $32.08 at 4:16 p.m. today. The shares have gained 14 percent this year.

To contact the reporter on this story: Mark Clothier in Atlanta at mclothier@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: July 2, 2009 17:46 EDT