While I was writing last week’s post in which I explored using Google to X-Ray search within specific LinkedIn groups, I decided to perform some general X-Ray search syntax testing to challenge some assumptions, as well as to compare X-Ray results to LinkedIn Recruiter results. I notice quite a few folks seem to use the “people you know” phrase … Read More
Using Google to Search for People in Specific LinkedIn Groups
In this post, I am going to share with you the journey I took and the discoveries I made while investigating the answer to a Boolean search request for help I recently came across online about using -dir in a Google X-Ray search of LinkedIn. Some of you may enjoy and appreciate seeing my methodology, others will likely learn a thing or … Read More
50 Google Search Tips & Tricks
If you haven’t already, you should definitely check out Google’s Inside Search site, where you can explore a cool interactive graphic explaining how Google search works. What I found especially cool is that Google decided to put all of their search tips and tricks in one place – 50 of them to be exact. While many of you are probably familiar … Read More
100+ Free Sourcing & Recruiting Tools, Guides, and Resources
It’s been a LONG time coming, but I finally got around to updating my free sourcing & recruiting tools, guides and resources page where I now keep a current list of the best of my work all in one place for easy bookmarking and reference. You can find it here on my main page: Additionally, I thought … Read More
Bing’s Semantic Search, Phonetics and Undocumented Operator
I was recently performing some searches on Bing and came across something curious that I had never noticed before. I’m not exactly sure if what I found is new or simply something I’ve overlooked in the past. I updated Twitter with “Did you know that Bing supports the + query modifier?” on November 10th, wondering if it was something that other people … Read More
Bing Beats Google for the Best Way to X-Ray Search LinkedIn
11/13/11 Note: I’ve provided some updated LinkedIn X-Ray search string syntax examples at the end of this post. I recently received a message via LinkedIn from Gary Cozin, an accomplished, well known player and knowledge sharer in sourcing circles, asking me a question: “You know when we xray Google for LI profiles we can insert “current * financial advisor” in … Read More
Why is Google Missing Available Search Results?
When you’re searching the Internet for potential candidates, it’s quite common (and practical) to search for resumes of people who are likely to be local to your opportunity. The two main ways of doing this are searching by area code and searching by zip code range. While there are limitations of both approaches (not everyone includes a phone number or … Read More
Searching LinkedIn with Google and Yahoo for Free
When it comes to searching LinkedIn using Internet search engines such as Google or Yahoo, there are many different ways to construct your search string (“X-Ray” or otherwise) and get results. Ultimately, the goal of any good sourcer or recruiter is to find all of the best available potential candidates that a particular source has to offer. A short while … Read More
What to do if Google Thinks You’re Not Human
Have you ever been searching the Internet with Google to find resumes or LinkedIn profiles, and instead of getting your search results, you get a nice apology from Google saying that your computer or network might be sending automated queries and can’t process your request? In the past week alone I have received a number of inquiries from curious sourcers … Read More
Google Search: The Asterisk Wildcard and Punctuation
Think you know all there is to know about Google search? I was recently asked a question regarding the use of the asterisk when searching on Google, specifically in conjunction with certain punctuation. This person was under the impression that if you used the equal sign on either side of an asterisk when searching Google, it would function as a multiple word wildcard operator. For example, searching … Read More
Challenging Google Resume Search Assumptions
This post is second in a series focused on using Google to search for resumes on the Internet. In the first post I left some unanswered questions, such as why: I didn’t talk about searching for CV’s I didn’t suggest using the tilde ~ operator in conjuntion with the word “resume” I didn’t use -~job when trying to eliminate false positive results I didn’t … Read More
How to Find Resumes on the Internet with Google
Want to learn how to find resumes on the Internet using Google? You’ve come to the right place! Whether you are new to searching the Internet for resumes or you are a veteran Interent sourcer, I’ve included some tips, tricks, and observations for the novice and expert alike. Targeting Resumes When using Google to search specifically for resumes, it’s a good … Read More
The Internet has Free Resumes – SO WHAT?
BEWARE: This post takes a contrarian (yet fact-based!) view of the Internet as a sourcing tool that may be unsuitable to some readers. If you don’t want to hear anything other than how awesome the Internet is for sourcing and recruiting, please stop reading now. The Internet has Free Resumes – SO WHAT? Okay, so you can find free resumes on the … Read More
Resumes on the Internet: Monster vs. Google Round 2
In response to my post of Resumes on the Internet: Monster vs. Google one of my readers commented that “While it may be true that Monster has more resumes than Google, using a zip code search is not a fair comparison for Google. People who post their resumes on Monster are required to enter their zip code, while people who resumes are … Read More
Searching Facebook for Candidates
I recently received a request from a reader to come up with some example Boolean Strings for finding software engineers on Facebook who are from Top 10 schools (Stanford, Berkeley, MIT, CMU, etc) and live in the Silicon Valley. ***Quick disclaimer*** I am definitely not a Facebook sourcing guru – I don’t see it as a high yield source for … Read More
Resumes on the Internet: Monster vs. Google
If you are a sourcer or recruiter I am sure that at some point in your career you’ve read somewhere or heard someone say how the Internet has 10X the number of candidates that can be found on the online job boards. I’ve always taken that for face value because, to be honest, it’s really tough to prove or disprove … Read More
Targeting PAST experience on LinkedIn – can it be done?
I recently had a recruiter ask me if there were any way to be able to search LinkedIn for people who have worked at a specific company in the past, but who are NOT currently working for that company. I can see why some Sourcers and Recruiters would want to specifically target people who are not currently at a company, … Read More