To Find People, Think Before You Click
What is the biggest mistake people make in trying to use the Internet to find people or do research on someone?
Not having a strategy. Instead of blindly punching in keywords into your favorite search engine - and for most people, that means Google - here's a piece of advice: Before your first click, think.
I have been training people for ten years in mastering the web as an investigative tool - from the newsrooms of CNN and BBC to librarians and law enforcement. And what always surprises me is how people throw out basic logic and common sense when they plop themselves in front of a computer.
Here's a typical scenario. Let's say someone in your company is trying to find an expert on children with attention-deficit disorder and at the same time, you are trying to locate a long-lost friend from high school. Inevitably you both rush to Google and start rifling through the results. And, if you're lucky you might get some decent results. But why rely just on luck?
Now imagine you tried to the same searches 20 years ago before he web existed. Would you run out to the street and start asking anyone you bumped into if they know an ADD expert or heard of your long-lost friend? No. But that's what you're doing by relying on a blind search with Google.
In the real world, a seasoned investigator would plot a strategy and make a list. Where am I likely to find this person or information about them? Should I consult the local library, the newspaper archives, the yellow pages or a private detective? Who can help me narrow down my search? In other words, you use special tools for specific tasks.
Well, the Internet is not a virtual world, it has become our real world. So you should apply the same basic strategy to finding people on the web. Plot your strategy, figure out where the person is likely to be found (or who would know) and then use special web tools for specific tasks.
Find Ordinary People
Who you are looking for will determine where you will look. Is this person an expert or a well-known personality (our ADD specialist) or just an ordinary person (your former high school sweetheart.)
Let's start with ordinary people. The next question is: is this person hiding (or at least trying not to be found) or just unknown to you. For some basic clues to finding someone who is making it hard, check http://www.reporter.org/desktop/tips/johndoe.htm
Here's another trick. If someone you are looking for had a personal or business web page, but then removed it you can use the Wayback machine at www.archive.org. It tries to archive cached version of millions of sites - quite random, but useful when you luck in.
Many people have Facebook or MySpace pages - or their friends do. One search engine called Yoname checks out many social networking at once. Has somebody on MySpace set their profile to private? You can still get in through the back door by doing a Google site search. Type in site: profile.myspace.com and the keywords you want. Often cached versions of personal pages belonging to your subject or his or he friends come up.
Find Experts
If it's an expert you're looking for, there are plenty of specialized sites to help you out.
A good place to start is Google News. You can search 45,000 newspapers. Use the advanced search section to narrow it down by country, state or city and date. Hey, if the expert is good enough to be quoted by the New York Times or CNN, that's at least a first indication of credibility. And chances are if he or she doesn't fit your bill, they will know someone who does.
Next, use some of Google's other, lesser known branches.
Google Scholar gives you academic papers and higher-level commentaries than you find on the general web.
Google Books allows you to search not just for authors and titles but keywords - and you can read large excerpts of the books to see if the author is the kind of person you need to talk to. (See below as well for a tip on how to change the "format" result in your Google search to look for slide shows and other reports by Google.)
Mastering Google
Alright. After - and only after - you have mapped out your strategy and you have deployed the appropriate specialized tools above should you throw yourself at the mercy of Google.
But even then, don't waste much time on the basic Google site. Basic Google is fine when you already know what you're looking for - for example, you already know the name of the professor and his university and you just want to find a web page with his or her publications.
Instead, move on to Advanced Google to use the more powerful tools there. For starters, do a domain search to narrow your search by country or even to use the power of Google to search one site. (See how in People Search Pro's Professional Tips Article Search By Domain) For example, you want to search the entire State Department website for the latest reports on Darfur or you want to hunt through CNN's website for an obscure report on soccer equipment. Use Google, not those web sites own search tools.
And while you're at it, try out some of Google's competitors. Microsoft's new Bing is trying to do a better job of sorting our results by suggesting connected people or themes. Clusty was one of the first to try to build "clusters" of your results and group them by theme.
All these tricks and tools will not guarantee that you'll find the person you're looking for. But they will guarantee you won't waste your time during the search.
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