LinkedIn is the world’s largest professional network with over 660 million users worldwide. With so many profiles on LinkedIn, finding the right people can be challenging. That’s where LinkedIn’s advanced search features come in handy. LinkedIn’s advanced search allows you to refine your search using multiple parameters to find the most relevant profiles.
Use Boolean Search Operators
One of the most powerful ways to refine your search on LinkedIn is to use Boolean operators like AND, OR, and NOT. Using AND narrows your search results to only profiles that match both keywords. For example, searching for “product manager AND London” will return profiles of product managers based in London. Using OR broadens your search to profiles matching either keyword. Searching for “marketing OR sales” will return profiles with marketing or sales in their title or description. Finally, NOT excludes profiles containing that keyword. Searching for “engineer NOT software” will exclude software engineers from your results.
Search by Name
Searching by name is a common way to find someone’s LinkedIn profile. You can search by first name, last name or both. LinkedIn’s search algorithm will return results based on closest matches to the name you entered. To get more targeted results, add in the person’s company name or location. For example: “John Smith Acme Inc.” This will prioritize profiles for John Smiths who have worked at Acme Inc. Pro tip: Search by full name instead of first name only for less common names. Searching for “Robert Smith” will give you more relevant results than just searching for “Robert”.
Use Advanced Filters
LinkedIn’s advanced filters allow you to narrow your search results based on profile attributes like company, title, location and more. Here are some of the top filters to use:
- Company – Search by current or past company names.
- Title – Filter by job title keywords like “manager”, “director” etc.
- Location – Search within a specific city, state or country.
- Industry – Find people working in a certain industry like tech, finance, healthcare.
- School – Search by university names.
- Connections – See 1st, 2nd and 3rd degree connections.
- Relationship – Find colleagues, classmates, group members etc.
You can apply multiple filters at once to drill down your search. For example, you can search for “product managers in London working at FinTech startups”. The more filters you add, the more targeted your search results will become.
Leverage LinkedIn’s Search Syntax
In addition to filters, LinkedIn supports special search syntax that gives you more control over your search query. Here are some examples:
- “John Smith” – Search for an exact name or phrase by using quotes.
- title:(manager OR director) – Search just within the title field.
- location:(London OR “United Kingdom”) – Search multiple locations.
- company:(“Amazon” OR “Google”) – Search across multiple companies.
- school:(Yale OR “UC Berkeley”) – Match profiles by university.
- connections:>500 – Search for profiles with 500+ connections.
Learning LinkedIn’s advanced search syntax takes your searching skills to the next level. Refer to LinkedIn’s help docs for more examples and tips.
Search Within Groups
LinkedIn Groups contain over 10 million specialized professional communities. You can search within specific groups to find targeted prospects and connections. Navigating to a group and using the search bar will only return members of that group. This is a great way to reach professionals within a certain industry, interest area or networking circle. For example, you could search for product managers within the Product Management group.
Use Search Alerts
You can save custom searches as alerts to get notified when new profiles matching your search criteria appear. Here’s how to set up alerts:
- Construct your search using the advanced filters and syntax mentioned above.
- Click “Save this search” next to the search bar.
- Name your search alert and choose how often you want to be notified daily or weekly.
Search alerts are a handy way to stay on top of your most important searches and get real-time notifications when new prospects pop up.
Search by Email or Phone Number
You can search for LinkedIn members by email address or phone number if you have that contact information but not their name. Simply enter the email address or phone number in the main search bar. If a member has added that contact info to their profile, their profile will show up. This can be useful for tracking down people you’ve emailed or talked to on the phone but are not yet connected with.
Upgrade to a Premium Account
LinkedIn Premium subscribers gain access to advanced features like searching member profiles by work email address, seeing unlimited search results and customized search recommendations. Premium accounts start at $29.99/month. Key premium search benefits include:
- Work Email search – Find members by their work email.
- Unlimited search results – See beyond the 500 profile cap.
- Saved search analytics – See who’s viewed your search alerts.
- Search recommendations – Discover most relevant results.
Premium also unlocks profile views so you can see who’s been looking at your profile. Consider upgrading if you do a high volume of searching and prospecting on LinkedIn.
Use the Boolean Search Tool
LinkedIn’s Boolean search tool makes it easy to construct complex Boolean searches without having to memorize search syntax. The tool provides a simple interface for selecting search criteria and combining them with AND/OR operators. After entering your search, it will automatically format it into proper Boolean search syntax. This is invaluable for creating targeted searches leveraging multiple search filters and parameters. You can access the Boolean search builder from the main search dropdown.
Conclusion
Mastering LinkedIn’s advanced search techniques is invaluable for sales, recruiting and business development. Boolean operators, filters, search syntax and premium tools provide precise control over your search experience. Start applying these advanced tactics to extract maximum value out of LinkedIn’s massive member database.
Here are some key takeaways:
- Use Boolean operators like AND, OR and NOT to refine searches.
- Leverage filters to search by company, title, location and more.
- Apply special search syntax like “quotes” and connectors.
- Search within specific LinkedIn groups.
- Set up search alerts for real-time notifications.
- Upgrade to premium for unlimited results and email searching.
- Use the Boolean search builder to construct complex queries.
With over 660 million members and growing, LinkedIn is a goldmine for sales leads, talent recruitment and industry research. Master these advanced search techniques to unlock its full potential.