Twitter’s search tool is a fantastic way to find mentions of your company, products, brand, competition, and other insights. For example, if you run a business called “XYZ Enterprises,” you could enter your business’s name into Twitter’s search box and see the latest tweets mentioning your company. Likewise, you could do the same for your competition. The possibilities are endless, but it gets even more powerful when you use Twitter’s advanced search feature.
In order to use Twitter’s advanced search feature, you’ll first need to search for something. Once you do, you’ll be presented with search results along with a new menu containing various search options such as: Everything, People, Photos, Videos, News, and Advanced Search.
For example, if you’re interested in finding tweets with photos related to your original search, click on Photos. This will filter the search results to show only those with photos. The same is true if you click on Videos or News.
If these default categories don’t quite deliver the results you’re looking for, click on Advanced Search. Advanced Search opens up a blank entry form with several categories: Words, People, Places, Dates, and Other.
- Words – Here you can specify the exact words you want to search for including hashtags if desired. You can specify “all of these words,” “this exact phrase,” “any of these
words,” “none of these words,” and “these hashtags.” You can also choose a language. For example, if you’re interested in finding tweets that mention “Catahoula leopard dogs,” “Catahoula curs,” and “Catahoula hound dogs” but the search results are loaded with tweets related to Catahoula Parrish, you could exclude tweets containing the word “Parrish.”
- People – Only want to see tweets from a specific person or group of people? You can specify each user in the “from this account” field. Prefer to see results that are directed to a specific person or group of people? Enter their usernames in the “to this account” field.
- Places – Want to see local search results based on your specific location? You’ll need to turn location on if you haven’t already. Click on Add Location and then click the Search button. You’ll see relevant search results from people near you.
- Dates – Whether you want to see only the most current tweets possible or prefer to see tweets from a specific date range, you can specify the date range of your results. For example, if you remember that your product launch generated a lot of buzz last year and would like to find some testimonial-like tweets to showcase on your website, you could enter the date of your product launch to look at tweets that mentioned your brand.
- Other – This field contains four options: Positive, Negative, Question, and Include Retweets. Click the Positive button if you want to restrict search results to include only positive results (such as in our testimonial example above). If you’re looking for opportunities, you may want to try searching for your competitor and restrict results to negative tweets. Want to be helpful? Look for recent tweets about products and services in your niche and restrict results to those that are questions.
Use these advanced Twitter search tips alone or in conjunction with one another and get better search results!
