How to Use Google Trends: The Ultimate Guide to Market Research?    

Regardless of business type and size, market research is fundamental. For eCommerce stores and online businesses, this holds more significance because understanding consumer behavior on the web can be tricky. However, by using the right tools, businesses can discover:

•What people are searching for
•What’s trending on search
•Where your target audiences are spending most of their time
•Consumer search patterns

and much more

Google Trends is one such powerful tool that provides valuable insights based on real-time Google search data. It is not just any average SEO tool – Google Trends lets you identify the seasonal trends shaping the demand for products or services in your niche. It is also effective in outsmarting your competitors by tracking their positions & monitoring their strategies.

So, what is Google Trends?

Google Trends is a search trends tool that helps monitor the frequency of a search term in Google and the website’s total search volume during a specific time period. Businesses can use this data for keyword research and identify seasonal trends in keyword search volume.

It provides valuable data related to keywords, such as the search volume index or the search engine users’ geographical information. It is highly effective if you are finding a new niche market. Track the trends over the past few years and related keywords in that niche.   

How to Use Google Trends 2023?

Here are 5 ways you can use Google Trends to boost your online marketing efforts:

1. Find Popular Topics in Your Niche or Industry

Google Trends is one of the best search tools that enable you to discover popular trends and topics currently prevailing in your industry or niche. This may help you understand what your target audiences are looking for and ways to optimize your marketing campaign, catering to what’s driving the industry. Here is an example of how to discover popular search queries, topics, and trends in your industry:

• Visit https://trends.google.com/
• From the top left corner of the page, navigate to the option “Explore”

• Now add a search term related to your niche or industry and choose the Region that you want to explore

• Next, choose the Time Range that you want to research. For newer search queries and topics, pick a shorter time frame

• Based on the industry you are in, pick the right category

• Explore different search queries and topics related to the search term. The Rising category may show several unrelated things but these show what people are also searching for in addition to the search term you provided. You can change it to Top category to find related topic ideas and search terms

Your content marketing strategy can be focused on these topics and related search terms.

2. Use Google Trends for Keyword Research

There are several keyword research tools that only report a keyword’s monthly search volume. It is difficult to track if the topic or search term is trending or not unless you scour through the data month-by-month. So, how to use Google Trends for keyword research? Google Trends provides directional data that you can pair with monthly search volume to get more precise keyword research data.

When monitoring your keyword trends, you can also use Google Trends report to find related search terms that are presently trending. These can be added to your keyword set. Filter the Related queries by Top queries and find different search terms.

3. Leverage Google Trends for Market Research

Considering launching your product or service in a new market? Or perhaps you want to test the market before introducing a product or service for the first time?

Know how to use Google Trends for market research.

Through this powerful tool, you can identify how location and seasonality may affect your product or service.

Suppose, you are launching electric cars and want to test the market before you hit the market. In Google Trends, you can identify the “interest” in electric cars by time range and region or subregion. For instance, you want to launch cars in the United States in specific regions such as California, Arizona, Washington, etc. 

Google Trends allows you to research the market interest and trends for a certain time period and get valuable insights. You can use this data to understand whether the market for electric cars is lucrative for your business or not.

4. Competitor Research

Competitor analysis is an integral component of your market research campaign. Google Trends can help streamline this process and provide in-depth data. For instance, you can identify popular search queries or topics your competitors are using to rank on Google.

Take, for example, you are an electronics company and Samsung is your toughest competitor. Using this, you can identify popular market trends, interests, topics, and search terms related to Samsung. This will give you an idea of potential marketing strategies they are leveraging and search terms they are getting ranked for.

It also allows you to track seasonal trends for your competitors to understand if they are using similar offers year after year. Finding these patterns and competitor trends can be extremely beneficial when planning your promotional or advertising activities.

5. Discover Related Product Categories

Suppose, you have a niche store that focuses on hair extensions. Once you gain a strong foothold in this field, you might consider expanding your business into other verticals. So, you need to identify similar product categories that might be of interest to your target audiences. Wondering how to use Google Trends for product research?

In Google Trends, type “hair extensions” in the box written “Enter a search term or a topic.” Depending on the latest trends during that time, you may come up with related topics or search terms such as eyelash extensions, eye shadow, hair straighteners, nails, etc.

While these topics may not be directly related to your niche, they can make sense as product categories you are considering in your industry. People who wear or look for hair extensions may also be interested in hair straighteners, nail products, or eyelash extensions. So, you can strategically devise your product research based on the insights you get from Google Trends.

Conclusion

Google Trends is a valuable tool that can provide excellent search marketing insights. Using this data can help discover market trends & consumer behavior, and optimize your content or marketing strategy for higher website traffic and better conversions. To understand how to use Google Trends in 2023, consult an expert digital marketing agency that can leverage these insights to build successful marketing campaigns.