Google Trends

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Have you checked out Google Trends yet?

This is the new service from Google, which allows you to see overall trends in usage of search terms, for regions, cities, languages – over a period of time.

Google Search, being what it is, an entry point to the world for most people online, is a powerful indicator of social trends. Meant for marketers, who can optimize their marketing campaigns [especially in terms of search engine marketing] – but this is a service which throws open an enormous possibility of social research. And, also, such things are also entertaining.

You can access the service at http://www.google.com/trends

Here are certain things that I learnt:

Searched on ‘Training’ and it seems most searches originate from Delhi, India.. trainers in Delhi, you seem to be a lucky lot.

‘University’ – 7 of top 10 places go to US cities, and the other three to India, Mumbai, Chennai and Delhi. Are you surprised?

‘Tower Bridge’ – I wanted to see how accurate this is, and 9 of top 10 places are in UK – quite understandably. Stuttgart stands on the 10th – made me wonder why – and my guess is that Stuttgart’s famous Television Tower and pedestrian bridges have something to do with this.

But, ‘Iraq’ has fewer subtleties – all the top 10 places searching for Iraq are in US, the top one being Washington. Mr. Bush is definitely having a busy time.


Things like this tell you a story, don’t they – a global story! Have a play, discover, it can be quite useful. It is wonderful for marketing too, I have now discovered that Online Learning is twice as popular a search term than elearning in UK, and trying to change a few things on our website. I am sure you will soon have your share of profound insights too.

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