You know your products, but what does the market think? This is when you need Google Trends, easily one of the most essential tools for every business.
You heard right, with over 15 years of Google search data at your fingertips, your marketing plan will never be the same. Whether you want to discover seasonal trends, expand your product line, or improve audience targeting, Google Trends is your one-stop shop for all of this and more.
What Is Google Trends
Simply enough, Google Trends shows you 15+ years of data from people searching on Google. You’ll be able to compare keyword search volume for seasonal and geographical results as well as find related terms and topics.
Terms: Words you search for in your query in the given language
Topics: Displayed below terms, shows terms or groups that share the same concept
Similar to Google Search Console, with a few tips you’ll be well on your way to learning what you need to improve your store traffic and performance. So, take a moment, consider how all that data might help you refine your keyword and product lists.
1. Use Punctuation
To filter search results, use punctuation as follows:
Search Term | Results |
---|---|
No marks: tennis shoes | Results will contain all search words in any order, for more general results. No misspellings, spelling variations, synonyms, plural, or singular, versions of your terms are included. |
Quotation marks:“tennis shoes” | Results include the exact phrase, for more specific results. Search results may include words before or after your phrase, yet always use the order of words used in your search. |
Plus Sign: tennis + squash | Results can include searches containing the words “tennis” OR “squash”, for more possible results. |
Minus Sign: tennis – shoes | Results include the word “tennis” and exclude the word “shoes”, for more specific results. |
2. Find Complementary Products & Categories
One of the best ways to increase profit margins is to find complementary products to bundle together or cross-sell.
Bundles: Two or more complementary products
Cross-sells: A product that complements an existing purchase but is from a different category (or vendor).
Google Trends helps you find products by showing related topics and queries that might help you discover additional products customers might want, including styles.
Below, you can see the results after searching for “fall sweater”.
3. Increase Your Website Ranking – Learn When Topics Trend
In the above image, you can also review the top 25 related topics to “fall sweater” searched for on Google. This list should be your inspiration as you adjust your products and content to match what interests people the most.
These topics can then be used to create, update or republish old content, further improving your SEO. And, with that in mind, it’s never too late to work on link building.
With just a few tweaks and a bit of elbow grease, your search rank will grow, helping you to guarantee that when people search for your products, you’ll be at the top of their results.
4. Check For Peak Seasons
With your search rankings under control, it’s time to see why Google Trends is gold for finding seasonal products. While Black Friday and similar shopping holidays have a significant uptick in sales volume, there are plenty of other times of the year when even your least likely items begin to trend.
Your low-performing products could turn into high-converting gold if you nail the timing of your advertising. That’s right, Google Trends will help you to find the best time of year to focus your budget and even create some timely ad copy (be sure to check out Chubbies in example #9!). But ‘seller’ beware, while some items might come up every season, some fads hit fast and then disappear. So know a fidget spinner when you see one; there’s a time and place for everything.
5. Find Your Target Audience
Now that you know your peak season, it’s time for one of the most valuable aspects of Google Trends, geographical targeting. Now while you might think you know your audience, it’s important to consider where and when each of your products might do best.
Remember, Summer in one hemisphere is Winter in another and that means considering which products should be advertised in which countries at which time. Compare May and June in Australia above with November and December in the USA below.
To take this a step further, here we searched for the top sales and found the top 51 regions, 210 metropolitan areas, and 22 cities for targeting the right people, further optimizing our ad targeting.
Google Trends: Big Data At Your Fingertips
Altogether, Google Trends is an essential tool for designing, developing, and refining your marketing plans. From locating new and complementary products to audience targeting, it’s one of the best tools on the market to help you achieve the results you deserve.
Best of all, it’s free. So why not dive in, give it a shot, and see what you learn. It could be the game-changer you’ve been looking for.