What’s the secret to success in any industry? In business, it’s often finding people who share your passion for what you do. The same holds true for the information industry, where knowing someone with similar interests can help you find new opportunities and clients.
LinkedIn is a great way to meet people who share your professional interests and goals, especially if you know how to look.
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It’s important to do both informational searches and people searches to find quality connections on LinkedIn.
When you search for people in your industry, it’s important to do both informational searches and people searches on LinkedIn. Informational searches are good for finding experts in the industries that you work with or want to work with. You can find them using keywords like “experts,” “leadership,” “entrepreneurship,” and so on.
People searches are good for finding other people who might be interested in similar things as you, or who have similar educational backgrounds as yours (such as colleges or programs).
Search for people who share characteristics with you that you’d like to meet.
Searching for people with similar skills, experience, and education can help you find people who might have useful information or can be helpful to you in your job search.
If you’re looking for a job in software development, for example, you might want to search for people who are also looking for jobs in software development.
So if you’re looking for people who work in sales but don’t know what kind of sales they do (are they B2B? B2C? Inside sales? Outside sales?), search for “sales” and then filter based on title, industry, or other factors that make sense to you.
Top industries on LinkedIn
Let’s take a look at the top industries on LinkedIn per category. Use these to help you shortlist the candidates or decision-makers you want to explore on the platform.
Industries with the highest number of companies on LinkedIn
- Real Estate
- Medical Practice
- Construction
- Retail
- Management Consulting
Industries with the highest number of leads
- Professional Services
- Manufacturing
- Technology, Information, Media
- Financial Services
- Government Administration
Conclusion
Hopefully, this gives you a better idea of what to look for when searching for potential industry contacts. LinkedIn’s Advanced Search is a powerful tool for finding leads and networking opportunities, so take advantage of it by pairing it with an automation tool like LinkedProspect!