What Is Google Trends?
Google Trends is a tool Google offers to show you what’s hot and what’s not in searches both on the engine and YouTube. You enter a keyword you want to use in your content, and Trends allows you to see how it is trending.
For example, if you were to enter the keyword “coffee drinks,” you would see it is pretty much always trending. It is a little more prevalent in some states, such as Hawaii, Washington, and Kansas. It is a bit less popular in places like New York.
What about “specialty coffee flavors”? That might seem like a good choice, but Trends tells you it gets almost no searches. If you enter “Mocha coffee bean,” it has had a surge just recently.
Google Trends allows you to fine-tune your SEO to ensure you drive the right kind of traffic to your web pages.
Navigating Google Trends Interface
You don’t need a Masterclass to understand Google trends. Here are some facts that will help you define how it works:
- It does not show search volume. It provides a scale from 0 to 100 that shows a search term’s relevance. Zero is no relevance, and 100 is the highest.
- Trends pull data from five places to create the scale rating: web searches, image searches, Google News, Google Shopping, and YouTube. You can narrow the search down to just one of these using the dropdown menu at the top of the results page.
- You can also narrow down the location, time frame, and categories using a dropdown menu. Categories refer to industries such as entertainment or beauty.
How to Use Google Trends
Simply type the keyword you are researching into the search bar and hit enter. Google Trends will show you search results in two ways.
First, you see a graph of the scale rating from 0 to 100. It is easy to see if the keyword is blowing up right now. Hover over the lines on the graph to determine the specific rating for a particular date.
If you scroll down, it will show you how the keyword faired in each state. Hover over the states to get specific information.
Most people stop at the visuals, but it’s worth digging around for context. Quite often, you’ll notice a spike on a graph and immediately wonder what caused it—maybe a viral tweet, maybe a new product drop, or sometimes, just random internet chaos. Either way, don’t be afraid to check the dates of relevant industry news or events. That curiosity tends to pay off when you’re crafting content that doesn’t feel out of touch or stale. In a way, Google Trends works best when you treat it less like a crystal ball and more like a flashlight—you see where things are moving, even if you can’t predict exactly what’s next.
One little detail I like is comparing multiple keywords side by side, especially if you’re battling indecision about phrasing. For instance, “iced coffee recipes” versus “cold brew ideas”—they might sound similar, but you can watch how their popularity crosses or diverges over a year. This is handy for anyone managing seasonal content or working in a niche that gets a lot of buzz all at once (think: fitness trends every January). There’s something kind of satisfying about seeing that line creep upwards, even if it’s just a small surge; it gives you a nudge in the right direction without overthinking it.
Scroll down further to find related topics and queries and their ratings. This gives you an idea of what keywords you might pair with your search or even replace them to get better results.
How to Use Google Trends for SEO Strategy
There is a lot to unpack in a Google Trends search. It takes you beyond just trending keywords. You’ll want to spend some time and figure out how it can help you develop your SEO strategy. Here are some of the best uses for Google Trends.
Topic Ideation
The most potent section on Google Trends’s search page is the list of related topics and queries.
Let’s go back to the search for “coffee drinks.” The related topics show:
- Flat white – drink
- Batida – Cocktail
- Constipation – Syndrome
- Sugar-free drinks – Drink
- Rum – Liquor
These are all listed as “Breakout.” That means the search term grew by 5,000%, according to Google News Initiative. You can use that information for topic ideation.
For instance, a flat white drink is a popular coffee option in specialty shops. It is a blend of micro-foamed milk over a shot of espresso. If your brand sells gourmet coffee to consumers or coffee shops, this could be a blog topic that moves you to the top of the search ratings.
If you click on Flat white – Drink, it will search that term for you. The related topics sections show that the flat white recipe is up 70%. You could add that to your product page or even labels.
Related Keywords
You can add one or two of those breakout terms to your content to move that page up in the search ratings. Be careful relying too heavily on breakout terms, though. They can be fads and unstable. Flat white might start to drop in a week.
Look for consistency. Use the time selections option to understand how stable the trend might be.
Break Big Topics Down
Google Trends is a practical tool to use when you need to whittle down a large topic. Creating a blog on just coffee drinks isn’t going to help your SEO much.
You can use Trends to find out what people are interested in regarding that large topic. That takes you from one blog to several or even a series.
Use the Category Option
Using the category option gives you even more topic ideas. It can also help you target your audience. If you switch to the “health” category in the coffee drinks search, the related topics and queries change to best suit that industry.
Using the various dropdown menus can add context to your searches. That will allow you to understand their relevance better. Remember that every other brand gets this data for that keyword search. Using the dropdown menus is how you make it unique for your needs.
Google Trends is a tool that can help you improve your SEO and costs you nothing but time. It shouldn’t be the only tool you use, though. You’ll need quality content and to practice good overall SEO to see results.
