Have you noticed anything different about LinkedIn recently – specifically with regard to viewing 3rd degree profiles, searching for headline phrases, searching by first and last name, and using Google and Bing to X-Ray search for public profiles? I have, and either I am encountering some serious and hopefully temporary errors, or LinkedIn may finally making serious moves to … Read More
How I Search LinkedIn to Find and Identify Talent
Would you like to know how I search LinkedIn when sourcing for talent? I don’t have a premium LinkedIn account, so you may be surprised to learn that I don’t X-Ray search LinkedIn all that often. I’ll tell you why in a moment, but first I would like to share my inspiration for this post. I recently read a great … Read More
Update Your LinkedIn X-Ray Searches for Location Names
A couple of weeks ago I stumbled across something on LinkedIn that I am surprised I never noticed before – I’m not even certain if/when LinkedIn made the change. Finally sitting down to write about it, I highly doubted that I could be the only person to have discovered this interesting little find, so I did some quick research and … Read More
LinkedIn Search: Controlling Years of Experience & Compensation
When searching any source for potential candidates, the ability to search by years of experience can be especially helpful in that years of experience can be correlated to current/desired compensation. If you are recruiting for a position that pays a maximum of $85,000 annually, being able to first source people who are highly likely to be qualified for the role … Read More
LinkedIn Sourcing Challenge – X-Ray Location False Positives
I was extremely pleased to receive many responses/solutions to the Ruby LinkedIn Sourcing Challenge I posted recently, including some from well-known online sourcing heavyweights, as well as a number from other talented folks who came out of the Internet ether from several continents to show off their skills and take a crack at solving the challenge. Kudos to those who … Read More
LinkedIn Makes Obvious Moves to Affect X-Ray Searching
If you happen to do quite a bit of LinkedIn X-Ray searching, you might be noticing that some people are taking control of how they appear in public search results. Or maybe you aren’t noticing it, because you can’t. Confused? Read on to learn more. LinkedIn Profile Changes I’m not exactly sure when this change was introduced (anyone?), but I … Read More
Update Your Bing X-Ray Searches of LinkedIn to Target Profiles
 Beginning early last week, I’ve had a few people reach out to me and ask about some changes LinkedIn is apparently making to the public profile listings. In the past, I’ve written about how Bing is easier and more effective at searching LinkedIn profiles than Google. One of my suggestions for targeting profiles an avoiding directory and job results … 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