Power User Tips: Common Search Mistakes and How to Fix Them

Censia Talent Intelligence is a powerful search tool that can help you search millions of professional profiles to find the ideal candidates in a matter of minutes. Our system uses neural networks to uncover and infer employee data across more than 15 categories.

Because we provide an exceptional amount of talent data and insight and provide numerous ways to filter and search, there are times when certain toggles can create a limited search slate. Here are the most common search mistakes, and how to solve them.

Common Search Mistakes and How to Fix Them

1. Contact Information is not appearing in the CSV downloads, even though it showed in the enriched slate after clicking the Get Contact button.
2. After enriching a candidate’s profile with contact information, a dot appears next to their name. What do these mean?
3. Why does my slate show people with different roles and titles?
4. I am not finding candidates with the right level of experience. Why is this happening?
5. My Search Model is not producing the right candidates. What can I do?
6. I am not finding enough diverse candidates.
7. My Skills toggle is not delivering enough candidates in my industry.
8. I am trying to find candidates from big companies, but when I type in the company name I don’t get good results.
9. For some reason, my slate candidates aren’t in the correct positions or there are fewer candidates than I’d hoped for.

1. Contact Information is not appearing in the CSV downloads, even though it showed in the enriched slate after clicking the Get Contact button.

This error may happen when the user exceeds the contact information limit (2,500 contact enrichments per month in the basic package). Once this is exceeded, you won’t be able to export contact information until you either buy more contact information credits. Alternatively, you can wait until the first day of the next month, when the 2,500 contact information credits renew.

2. After enriching a candidate’s profile with contact information, a dot appears next to their name. What do these mean?

These dots are contact detail verification indicators that show how much contact information could be obtained and verified.

• Solid Green Dot: Valid contact details were found.
• Outlined Green Dot: Inconclusive or incomplete contact details were found.
• Gray Dot: No contact information was found.
• Red Dot: Contact information could not be verified.

3. Why does my slate show people with different roles and titles?

This error is most likely triggered by not spelling out the full name of the role in the Position Titles section. For positions, all roles titles must be spelled out.

For instance: the VP of Marketing should be spelled out as Vice President of Marketing.

Additionally, you can use the dropdown (black circle with downward-facing arrow) to further toggle search results to place greater importance on job titles.  

*HINT: Get more role title suggestions by clicking on the black drop-down arrow next to ‘All Terms in the Model’ to get the more specific role by role suggestions.

4. I am not finding candidates with the right level of experience. Why is this happening?

Censia’s Seniority category can help you find candidates with a certain level of experience. As you can see in the system, there are several categories that are similar or closely related. If your search is not producing enough candidates with the right level of experience, we highly recommend selecting multiple Seniority tags to broaden your search.

5. My Search Model is not producing the right candidates. What can I do?

In most instances, this error happens when people over-refine the search model. Go back to the left-hand side and carefully evaluate the filters you have chosen.

In addition, you’ll also want to do the following:

1. Make sure you have the correct position titles types in, in long-form (Vice President vs. VP).
2. Include additional Seniority search parameters, since many of them have a slight overlap. This will also help you identify more diverse candidates who often were passed for promotion but have the right roles.
3. Focus less on adding more Skills, and more on refinding Sector/Vertical/Industry.
4. Use “North America” as your default location in your search, and then filter the location from the search menu above your slate.

6. I am not finding enough diverse candidates.

At the moment, Censia’s Diversity is an AND search.

This means that when you click on Military/Veteran, Female, and Black/African American, it will filter to candidates who meet all three criteria, not any one of the criteria.

Instead of clicking all three, we recommend searching each desired Diversity category individually.

7. My Skills toggle is not delivering enough candidates in my industry.

The best way to find candidates optimally qualified for your industry is to do an industry search.

In the left-hand search drawer, go to Sector/Industry/Vertical. Here you can add relevant Sector/Industry/Vertical selections, and toggle their importance (Must Have/Important/Useful/Exclude) using the green drop-down arrow located to the left of the Sector/Industry/Vertical, or next to the section title (black down arrow).

Additionally, you can filter an existing slate by Industries to narrow down your search.

Please note that once you’ve disposed of a certain skill or industry, it will no longer appear in the search. It will appear grayed out in a section underneath the input area. You can click on it to add it back to the slate.

8. I am trying to find candidates from big companies, but when I type in the company name I don’t get good results.

Rather than searching by company, we highly recommend you use the filters at the top of the slate to refine your search. Revenue and Number of Employees are a good place to start but may not reveal every company that meets those parameters.

To broaden the search and find companies who may not share all of that information publicly, use Company Size, which is a broader search filter.  

9. For some reason, my slate candidates aren’t in the correct positions or there are fewer candidates than I’d hoped for.

Most likely, you’ve set your recency toggle to a narrow field under position titles, or any of the other ideal search model inputs available to you. Go through the drawer left-hand side of the screen, and check to see if you have recently toggled to a certain time.

Under Position Titles, for instance, you’ll want to make sure you’re not over-toggling for the following: Position Titles Recency and Experience by Position Titles (yrs).