Google Trends as Market Research Tool
November 15, 2008Example 1. Google Trends: “homeland security”
From Google Trends page: “Google Trends analyzes a portion of Google web searches to compute how many searches have been done for the terms you enter, relative to the total number of searches done on Google over time.”
Trend in “homeland security” - search index falls from 2.0 in 2004 to 0.7 at present. While any conclusions derived from Google Trends are definitely subject to many interpretation and doubts, downtrend in “homeland security” can be explained to a large extent by corporate fatigue and disappointment in homeland security market. The market perception has changed.
Example 2. Google Trends: “market research”
Pay attention to regular drop in number of “market research” searches at the December, either Christmas phenomenon, or spent budgets or both.
Trend in “market research” - search index falls from 1.5 in 2004 to 0.6 at present, probably result of overflow of information available online.
Example 3. Google Trends: Does it represent reality?
One may argue that Google Trend charts do not represent any meaningful market information. This is chart of searches for “flowers”. Chart clearly shows two peaks of demand for flowers – Valentine’s and Mother’s days.
Another example – searches for “wine” or “digital camera” show peaks on Christmas.
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