How to Find People on Facebook
If you want to learn how to find people online, look no further than Facebook. As the world’s largest social media platform with almost 3 billion monthly active users, if someone wants to be found, that’s where they’ll be.
The challenge with this many users is that finding a person by name only might bring up too many results.
Here’s a handy guide to successfully finding people on Facebook.
Standard Name Search
Typing a person’s name in the search bar at the top of any Facebook page will provide results. The less common the name, the fewer results. For example, Ignatius Wunderbar will be easier to find than John Smith.
When presented with the first page of results, you can apply filters from the bar on the left. Click on ‘people,’ and there’ll be a sub-menu:
- Friends of friends
- City
- Education
- Work
If any of these details are known, entering them in the filter section can further narrow down the results.
Education or Employment
If you don’t have the person’s full name but know where they went to school or college or one of their employers, Facebook can help.
First, search for the institution, then on the filter page, click ‘people.’ Anyone who has linked their profile to the place will appear in alphabetical order of first name.
It may take some scrolling, but if their photo is present, it may be the person you want.
Friends of Friends
An excellent way to find someone on Facebook is via a mutual friend. If you know or suspect they have something in common, go to your friend’s page and click on their friend list.
Another option is the ‘people you may know’ link. This page is formulated as friends of friends and may have the person you’re looking for.
The final way is to slide the button to ‘on’ next to the ‘friends of friends’ in the standard search filter (mentioned above).
If your friend has chosen not to display their friends due to privacy, none of these options will work.
Public Groups
If name searches have failed due to too many results, locating them via a Facebook group is another option.
Enter the name of the group in the Facebook search bar. Once the page appears, click on the people tab.
People are listed in name order, admin/moderators first, people on your friends list, and others the Facebook algorithm thinks you’re looking for.
There’s an additional ‘member search’ bar at the top of the page to narrow down the results.
Private groups are also an option. However, you’ll need to join them. Most will ask you to complete a short questionnaire stating why you want to join, so use the correct judgment here.
Use Facebook to Find Other Social Media Pages
Once you’ve located the person on Facebook, you may want to know what other social media presence they have.
Every Facebook profile has a unique user name at the end of the URL. Copy this and perform a Google or other search to see if it shows up elsewhere.
Another easy way to find them on other pages is to take one of their Facebook photos and perform a reverse image search. That image may appear on more than one of their accounts.
Can’t Find The Person?
There are several reasons why a person can’t be found on Facebook, including:
- Their settings are set to private
- They’ve blocked you
- You’ve blocked them previously
- Social media isn’t for them
Facebook For Finding People
There are numerous ways to locate a person on Facebook. Standard searches work well if the person has an uncommon name or a lot of information is available to enter into filters.
School and business searches are helpful if none or only part of the name is known. Profile photos aid here. The person you’re looking for could appear in one of your friends lists, so dig deeper here.
Public group searches can be successful if the person belongs to a mutual interest group. If the person doesn’t want to be found, they may have adjusted their settings to allow for this. In this case, they can’t be located in this way.
This article has been published in accordance with Socialnomics’ disclosure policy.
