How To Use Facebooks Graph Search To Supercharge Your Professional Network - CareerEnlightenment.com

So if you are targeting a company to work for and want to know if people in your network (friends or friends of friends) work there, you can. And with  Facebook’s pay-to-message feature, you can pay to have your messages delivered to their inboxes.Try some of these Graph Search ideas to advance your own job-search networking:People who work at (company) who live in (location)People who work at (company) who went to (school)Friends of my friends who work at (company)Companies my friends like who live in (location)It Doesn’t Have to Be Job Search, Either … Try UkulelesAnything that Facebook records is fair game, including schools people went to and books people read, to find commonalities.When I traveled to Nashville, Tenn., for a speech for Belmont University, I used Graph Search to see what restaurants my friends liked in the area by  searching “restaurants in Nashville my friends like.”It’s Not Totally Perfect, Results Aren’t Always AccurateGraph Search isn’t perfect . For example, I don’t Facebook like every  restaurant I actually like, and I don’t like every restaurant I Facebook like. And I’m sure it won’t be long before some businesses try to game the system  by getting artificial likes, thus skewing your search results.Also, not everyone does a very good job filling out their about me sections with complete work and education histories. Still, I think you’ll be surprised  at the kinds of information you can gather from this tool.People say Facebook isn’t for professional networking. However, since when in human history did people not rely on their friends and family for career  opportunities?Readers: Will you consider using Facebook for your career advancement (and not just cute cat pictures)?Joshua Waldman is author of  Job Searching with Social Media for Dummies  and creator of award-winning career blog Career Enlightenment. Watch this 20-minute video to learn  how to find a job using social media.