One of the biggest problems we have as talent acquisition professionals is getting contact information. At times, we may even feel this desperate…
Every sourcer has their “go to” sites and tried and true techniques to complete certain tasks. Every sourcer also knows that there are many ways to do what we do. In an effort to start a conversation about cool techniques and what we try to get from different sources, I’m going to highlight a couple of my favorite sites and what I try to learn from them.
There are dozens of sites to find people’s personal contact details. Some of them include Pipl, Peekyou, Radaris, Zabasearch, Whitepages, Veromi, Argali, Anywho, Intelius, mylife, Spokeo, and Peoplesearch (this list is by no means comprehensive). While I have tried most of these sites at some point, there are only a few I use regularly. In addition, the last few only seem to show you the bare minimum of information. Instead, they try to entice you to purchase public information or sign up to become a paid member. I have no idea how effective they are, as I have never tried them. How do you know which site to use? Which sites give you the best and most accurate information? What information can you combine from different sites?
My two go to sites are Pipl & Radaris. The most common reason I tend to use these sites are to find information that assists me in figuring out someone’s email address. The information I may try to find are their middle initial, perhaps a woman’s maiden name for example. I also use these sites to find current or former home addresses so I can cross reference with Melissadata to find possible current or past email addresses or phone numbers (past email address can be helpful too! Some people use the same screen name with a different mail service). I have found that both of these sites reveal the most information about an individual including:
- Possible addresses where they live or have lived
- Current or past phone numbers (try using Truecaller that Kameron Swinton mentioned in his video blog to see if the number is registered to that person)
- Other people in their immediate family (siblings, parents, children and/or spouse)
- Alternate names they may have gone by (great way to find someone’s maiden name or random nick names!)
In addition to what I mentioned above, Pipl also finds and/or suggests other possible social media profiles. Sometimes these are confirmed profiles, other times they are just suggestions based on the individual’s name. Of all the sites that try to aggregate people information or match up an individual’s social media footprint, I find Pipl does it the best. In addition to what I mentioned above, Pipl also will show you:
- Known User names
- Possible profiles from social media sites (most common places they suggest are from Facebook, Linkedin, Myspace, Google+, twitter) They pull from 300 sources.
I will have a follow-up post next week that will exlain how I get by in the Post-Facebook-Graph world. I’d love to know what some of your favorite sites are to accomplish similar tasks. Be sure to comment below or on the SourceCon Facebook page!