For Business (and Dating) — Peek Inside a Person’s Mind — with LinkedIn and Facebook

Before you meet someone, it’s amazing how much you can learn about them online, in surprising ways that can really make a difference.

I know a girl who won’t date a guy until she checks him out online, starting with his LinkedIn profile, and then his Facebook page.

First, LinkedIn.

Many people forget that, if a person has a LinkedIn profile, there can be so much valuable information, even for people who are otherwise hard to reach — possibly simplifying your ability to reach them, work with them, or even, become socially or even romantically involved with them.

And it doesn’t matter what kind of job they have, or if they even have a job. Entertainment, finance, aerospace, unemployed. They or people they associate with, can almost always be found on LinkedIn.

It’s surprising how many people have detailed LinkedIn profiles.

Beyond their schooling and jobs, there’s so much to learn… about their likes and dislikes, books they’ve read, historical details about their interests and preferences, what groups and organizations they are most interested in, what they care about and more.

Reading through someone’s LinkedIn page can sometimes be like peeking inside their personal diary.

Of course, most people use LinkedIn to learn about people in their network who may already know that hard-to-reach person or celebrity they’re trying to get a meeting with. But there’s so much more you can use it for… like peering inside a person’s mind and understanding how they make decisions!

An associate of mine used LinkedIn to help get introductions to hard-to-reach celebrities and famous athletes, by scouring their LinkedIn profiles or those of their managers, handlers and associates… names they discover through articles on the web.

It’s amazing how little effort it can take — especially with the help of the Internet — to network and connect with just about anyone you could imagine.

It can dramatically improve your ability to better understand a person’s decision process while simplifying your ability to do business or have a relation with them.

Try it.

Identify someone you’d like to meet or understand better. Do they have a LinkedIn page? Do the people they know have LinkedIn pages? What do those profiles really say about them?

Next, Facebook, and Twitter.

It’s amazing how much you can learn about almost anybody, if they have a Facebook page or Twitter account.

To my surprise, an Investment Banker I was trying to meet, actually had a Facebook page, and it was loaded with personal stuff I never could have gotten anywhere else.

An agent to some of Hollywood’s biggest stars, has a Facebook page that reveals much about his interests, his character and his friends.

With famous people, my friends and I play a game, where we challenge people to guess whether they’re Republican or Democrat, just based on their posts and SHARES. Often it’s pretty easy, but not always.

Remember, if you’re trying to meet with just about any person or company, I challenge you to FIRST use LinkedIn and Facebook (and Twitter, if they’re a celebrity).

You may be surprised at how much you can learn, and how much easier it can be, to establish relationships with people you suddenly know, at least a little.