If you’re a B2B brand and just getting started on Twitter, you may feel a little overwhelmed. You want to engage customers and provide useful info to them, but where are they and what are they talking about? 

Search Twitter to gain a real-time window into who your potential customers and partners are, and what they say and need. Using that info, you can create ongoing and robust relationships with them, glean insights, and help provide them with useful products and services.

To really begin to use Twitter as a data mining tool, head over to Twitter advanced search. This is where the fun really starts.  Search on exact phrases, hashtags, or different languages. Search tweets to and from specific people. You can even search tweets by places, dates, links, positive attitude :) or negative attitude :(.  Most intriguing of all, search tweets that ask a question by simply adding a “?”.

Here are several example B2B searches to show what’s possible with Twitter advanced search:

Work for a business that consults with companies about how to optimize their use of Salesforce.com?  Search questions about Salesforce to find conversations where you can provide answers and demonstrate your expertise

Offer business planning advice in New York? Search questions about business plans within 50 miles of New York city.

Want to see the B2B search marketing-related posts from Business.com’s @B2BOnlineMktg Twitter account? Here’s how to search for Twitter posts by B2BOnlineMktg about search marketing.

Looking for social media case studies involving B2B companies? Search Twitter for B2B social media case studies (singular and plural)

If you’d prefer to write your own detailed searches rather than using Twitters advanced search interface, here’s a list of Twitter search operators.

Have any other great examples of advanced Twitter searches useful for B2B marketers? Please share below.