People search on VM0
Find the right person for a professional conversation, with the public source behind every profile.
Web data · No setup · Managed credits per successful call
People search answers questions like who runs platform engineering at a company, or which compliance leaders work in a given city. It returns up to twenty profiles and the public sources each claim came from.
The details are pulled out of public professional pages by a model, so they are leads to check rather than verified facts, and the sources travel with every profile precisely so you can check them. It is for legitimate professional research, and it deliberately stops short of contact details.
What People search is
Recruiting, partnerships and sales research all start with the same question: who is the right person, and where does that claim come from. Answering it normally means a data vendor contract, a seat for everyone who needs it, and a key.
Here an agent asks in plain language, for a role, an employer, a skill or a place, and gets back up to twenty profiles with the public sources behind them.
Two limits are stated plainly because they change how you use it. The details are read out of public pages by a model, so a title or an employer can be out of date. And it does not find email addresses or phone numbers, message anyone, or reach anything that requires signing in to LinkedIn.
It covers the research half of what people call B2B prospecting, lead research or sourcing: working out who the right person is and being able to show where that came from. It deliberately stops before the contact database part, so it is not a replacement for a tool you buy in order to get email addresses.
What People search can do
What an agent can do with it, and what comes back when it does.
Coverage and limits
What it does not do, said up front, so nobody plans a workflow around something that is out of scope.
Public professional sources only
No signed-in LinkedIn, no private databases, no reading profile pages that are closed to the public. What comes back is drawn from pages anyone can see.
Read out, not verified
A model pulls the details out of those pages, so a job title or an employer can be out of date. The source comes with each profile so anything that matters can be checked before someone acts on it.
No contact details
It does not return email addresses or phone numbers and it does not message anyone. Reaching out is a separate, deliberate step through a channel you control.
A search that finds nobody still costs
A search that completes but matches nobody still uses credits, so a broad sweep costs the same as a precise one. It pays to be specific.
What People search costs
Web services are billed in credits per call, not per token. There is no separate vendor bill to reconcile.
zero people-searchEach completed search costs credits, including one that returns no matches. Specific questions and a sensible number of profiles are the two things that keep a research sweep predictable.
Setup and access
Nothing to set up
Nothing to connect. No data vendor contract, no seat licence, no key. An agent can run a professional research question on its first run.
Who can use it
This is the one service here that looks up information about individuals, so it is worth granting narrowly: to the people actually doing the research, for a bounded time, and to nobody else. It is a permission of its own, so taking it back leaves everything else the agent can do untouched.
What teams use People search for
Finding the people behind an account
Before a partnership or a sales conversation, find who owns the relevant part of the business, with a source for each name, so the first email goes to the right person.
Building a shortlist for a role
Search by skill, seniority and location and keep the sources, so whoever reviews the list can check it instead of taking it on trust.
Deciding who to invite
For an event, a panel or a research interview, find people with the relevant background and confirm the claim against the public page before reaching out.
When not to use People search
Do not use it for harassment, for exposing someone's private information, or for stalking. Do not use it for background checks nobody agreed to, or for hiring, housing, credit or similar decisions where the law requires a regulated source. Do not treat what it returns as verified, and do not treat it as a contact list: it returns no emails or phone numbers on purpose.
What this is called elsewhere
The same thing goes by several names in the market. If you have shopped for one of these, this is how it maps to what you get here.
B2B prospecting research
Finding who owns the relevant part of a business before anyone writes an email. That is what this does. It does not hand you their contact details, which is the part prospecting tools sell.
People search API
Search whose results are people rather than pages, with roles, employers and public sources attached. Here it is a capability your agents have rather than a service you integrate.
An Apollo or ZoomInfo style lookup
Those are contact databases sold per seat, and they include emails and phone numbers. This is public professional research paid for per search, with sources attached and no contact details.
Sourcing or talent research
Building a shortlist by skill, seniority and location, with a public source for every name so whoever reviews it can check the list instead of trusting it.
Account or stakeholder mapping
Working out who sits where inside a company you are about to deal with, so the first conversation starts with the person who can actually have it.
People search compared
People search vs a contact database subscription
A data vendor sells contact details behind a seat licence and an annual contract. This is research with sources attached, paid for per search, with no contract, and it stops short of contact details deliberately.
People search vs searching the web yourself
General search finds pages. This returns people, with the roles and employers you asked about, which is the difference between twenty open tabs and a shortlist.
People search vs the LinkedIn products
This never touches signed-in LinkedIn and does not read closed profile pages. It works from public professional sources, which is narrower and much easier to justify to whoever asks.
The short version
Use it to find the right person and show where the claim came from, not to build a contact list. Every profile carries its source, anything that matters needs checking before someone acts on it, and access is worth granting narrowly.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need a data vendor account?
No. VM0 runs the search on your behalf and charges it in credits, with no contract or seat licence on your side.
Does it return email addresses or phone numbers?
No. It does not find contact details and it does not message anyone. Reaching out happens separately, through a channel you control.
How reliable are the details?
They are read out of public professional pages by a model, so treat them as leads. Every profile carries its sources so anything important can be verified.
How many people can one search return?
Between one and twenty, five unless the agent asks for more.
Am I charged if nothing matches?
Yes. A search that completes uses credits even when it finds nobody, which is a good reason to be specific.
What is it not allowed to be used for?
Harassment, exposing private information, stalking, background checks nobody agreed to, and unlawful hiring or privacy decisions. It is for legitimate professional research.
Is this a B2B prospecting tool?
It does the research half. It finds the right people and shows the public source for each one, and it deliberately returns no email addresses or phone numbers, so it is not a replacement for a contact database.
Is it an alternative to Apollo or ZoomInfo?
Only for the research. Those are contact databases with seats and contracts. This is public professional research per search, with sources, and no contact details at all.
Can I use it for recruiting or sourcing?
Yes, for finding and evidencing candidates for a role. Anything that decides whether someone gets hired needs verified information from a source meant for that purpose, not extracted profile fields.
How is this different from a general web search?
A web search returns pages you have to read. This returns people, with the roles and employers you asked about already pulled out, which is the difference between twenty open tabs and a shortlist.
How you ask for People search
You describe what you want in plain language. The agent works out which service it needs and makes the calls.
“Who leads platform engineering at Notion, and where does that come from?”
“Find ten fintech compliance leaders in New York and keep the source for each one.”
“Confirm this person is still in the role our draft assumes, and show me the page that says so.”