How to Do Advanced Boolean Searches to Find Your Targeted Audience on LinkedIn?
If you are a B2B marketer and you have been ignoring Boolean searches, you’ve been missing out on a secret pool of the most qualified prospects.
Many marketers who have been doing it correctly, have access to a whole new world of ideal prospects and useful insights.
While searching prospects on LinkedIn, basic LinkedIn filters are not enough. They give you very limited outcomes as basic search has only limited filters. Very often, this is not useful, especially for B2B marketers and salespersons who need highly qualified and relevant leads for their business. They want to find relevant leads too in a short time.
What Exactly is Boolean Search?
A Boolean search is an advanced audience segmentation and searching tool that enables you to include and exclude specific types of relevant and irrelevant people. It is often used by B2B marketers to find their ideal prospects on LinkedIn, a monstrous database containing in-depth details about the ideal prospects.
It is very useful and gives you a more accurate way of searching than any other way. Boolean search operators are available in LinkedIn Sales Navigator and all the other best LinkedIn automation tools. You can use these filters altogether or combine them with other filters of the latest LinkedIn automation tools to get the best outcomes.
Are Boolean Operators More Efficient Than Filtering Options?
When you use LinkedIn automation tools with basic filters, it will extract profiles and you still need to check which ones are relevant to you. With Boolean search operators based on the specific keywords and ‘yes’ ‘no’ ‘or’ options that you specify. These operators can get complex and there are so many ways you can use the combinators to find exactly what you have been looking for.
How to Combine Filters With Boolean Search LinkedIn
If you are using Sales Navigator or any other advanced LinkedIn automation tool, you’d see they also include Boolean operators to make your searches more precise and help you reach and target ONLY the right people.
When using a LinkedIn automation tool to filter out your audience, you’ll find a more advanced method of searching relevant prospects and exclude those people who are less likely to fall into the category of your potential customers.
Boolean Search Operators:
Boolean Search Operators consist of certain modifiers which are as follow:
AND:
This operator is used when you want to add a certain criterion to your search. Using this command, you will reach profiles with specific multiple keywords of your choice.
Example:
You want to find a marketing analyst who lives in New York, you’ll need to combine these two keywords into one search. This is where the ‘AND’ operator comes in and you can use it to combine
“B2B Marketing Analyst” and New York.
This will bring in very specific results in that particular role and location. The more you use this Boolean operator, the more targeted your results will be. However, don’t try to be super targeted, you will find a few or no results at all and this is something you don’t want at all.
OR:
Sometimes, it’s better to widen your searches, and that’s where this Boolean operator works great for you.
Why do we need this command when we have ‘AND?’
Well, let’s consider this: You’re looking for a person in a particular role with a particular keyword, what’s the likelihood that person has the exact same keyword as his job title? Pretty slim, right? You might be looking for a person in a particular function, and to get desired results, you must include as many keywords as possible to ensure you’re covering all bases.
This is where the ‘OR’ operator works.
Let’s take the above example again. If you want to expand your searches and get better results, you can use ‘OR’ to include other possible titles.
Example:
“B2B Marketing Analyst” OR “B2B Growth Hacker” OR “Head of B2B Marketing”
NOT:
There will be times when you want to exclude specific people from your searches and audience segmentation, that’s where this command comes in.
This Boolean operator is very useful for refining the target audience as it really filters out and excludes people that you don’t want in your results. Using NOT is all about making your searches more relevant, creating results that are easier and cleaner to use.
For example, if you’re looking for a B2B marketing analyst in New York, but you don’t want any beginner or someone other than New York, so use this command to get results.
However, when using this operator, make sure NOT is followed by any keywords related to prospects as it will block your results.
Other Operators
Many LinkedIn automation tools also use ‘Quotation Marks’ and ‘Parentheses’ to help you reach exactly those profiles that you have been looking for.
Useful Tips for LinkedIn Boolean Search
1. Target the right keywords and phrases
You can use the Boolean operator to target highly specific prospects.
2. Check out prospects profiles
See your prospects’ profiles to get an idea of what type of keywords they are using. Add those keywords to Boolean search operators.
3. Save your searches
Whether you’re using the Boolean operator in a LinkedIn automation tool or Sales Navigator, make sure you save your results for later use.
Conclusion
LinkedIn Boolean search operators might sound intimidating in the beginning but once you get a hand on them, you can open gates to a new world of the best LinkedIn leads. When you get a targeted list of ideal prospects, you can use any best LinkedIn automation tool to run a targeted campaign. Make sure your LinkedIn automation campaign is highly personalized because no matter how relevant prospects you find, they won’t reply to you if you approach them with templated notes and messages.
Go for a LinkedIn automation tool that not only provides Boolean search operators but also has features to run highly personalized campaigns.
