Google Trends

Google Trends is a public web facility of Google Inc., based on Google Search, that shows how often a particular search-term is entered relative to the total search-volume across various regions of the world, and in various languages. The horizontal axis of the main graph represents time (starting from some time in 2004), and the vertical is how often a term is searched for relative to the total number of searches, globally.[1] Below the main graph, popularity is broken down by region, city and language. It is possible to refine the main graph by region and time period. On August 5, 2008, Google launched Google Insights for Search, a more sophisticated and advanced service displaying search trends data.

Contents

Background

Google Trends also allows the user to compare the volume of searches between two or more terms. An additional feature of Google Trends is in its ability to show news related to the search-term overlaid on the chart, showing how new events affect search popularity. 

Originally, Google neglected updating Google Trends on a regular basis. In March 2007, internet bloggers noticed that Google had not added new data since November 2006, and Trends was updated within a week. Google did not update Trends from March until July 30, and only after it was blogged about, again.[2] Google now claims to be "updating the information provided by Google Trends daily; Hot Trends is updated hourly."

On August 6, 2008, Google launched a free service called Insights for Search. Insights for Search is an extension of Google Trends and although the tool is meant for marketers, it can be utilized by any user. The tool allows for the tracking of various words and phrases that are typed into Google’s search-box. The tracking device provided a more-indepth analysis of results. It also has the ability to categorize and organize the data, with special attention given to the breakdown of information by geographical areas.[3]

Evidence is provided by Jeremy Ginsberg et al. that Google Trends data can be used to track influenza-like illness in a population.[4] Because the relative frequency of certain queries is highly correlated with the percentage of physician visits in which a patient presents with influenza-like symptoms, an estimate of weekly influenza activity can be reported. Furthermore, it was shown by Tobias Preis et al. that there is a correlation between Google Trends data of company names and transaction volumes of the corresponding stocks on a weekly time scale.[5][6]

Google Hot Trends

Google Hot Trends is an addition to Google Trends which displays the top 20 hot, i.e., fastest rising, searches (search-terms) of the past hour in the United States. This is for searches that have recently experienced a sudden surge in popularity.[7] For each of the search-terms, it provides a 24-hour search-volume graph as well as blog, news and web search results. Hot Trends has a history feature for those wishing to browse past hot searches. Hot Trends can be installed as an iGoogle Gadget. Hot Trends is also available as an hourly Atom web feed.

Google Trends for websites

Since 2008 there has been a sub-section of Google Trends which analyses traffic for websites, rather than traffic for search terms. This is a similar service to that provided by Alexa Internet.

Google Trends API

An API to accompany the Google Trends service was announced by Marissa Mayer, vice president of search-products at Google. This was announced in 2007, and so far has not been released.[8]

A few unofficial Google Trends API tools have been released, along with a wiki detailing them and simple access to Google Trends data.

Implications of data

A group of researchers at Wellesley College examined data from Google Trends and analyzed how effective a tool it could be in predicting U.S. Congressional elections in 2008 and 2010. In highly contested races where data for both candidates were available, the data successfully predicted the outcome in 33.3% of cases in 2008 and 39% in 2010. The authors conclude that, compared to the traditional methods of election forecasting, incumbency and New York Times polls, and even in comparison with random chance, Google Trends did not prove to be a good predictor of either the 2008 or 2010 elections.[9]

See also

Notes

  1. ^ "How does Google Trends work?". http://www.google.com/intl/en/trends/about.html#1. 
  2. ^ "Success! Google Trends Updated". InsideGoogle. July 30, 2007. http://google.blognewschannel.com/archives/2007/07/30/success-google-trends-updated/. 
  3. ^ Helft, Miguel (August 6, 2008). "Google’s New Tool Is Meant for Marketers". New York Times. http://www.nytimes.com/2008/08/06/business/media/06adco.html?ref=business. Retrieved August 6, 2008. 
  4. ^ Jeremy Ginsberg, Matthew H. Mohebbi, Rajan S. Patel, Lynnette Brammer, Mark S. Smolinski and Larry Brilliant (2009). "Detecting influenza epidemics using search engine query data". Nature 457 (7232): 1012–1014. doi:10.1038/nature07634. PMID 19020500. 
  5. ^ Tobias Preis, Daniel Reith and H. Eugene Stanley (2010). "Complex dynamics of our economic life on different scales: insights from search engine query data". Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A 368: 5707–5719. doi:10.1098/rsta.2010.0284. 
  6. ^ Catherine Mayer (November 15, 2010). "Study: Are Google Searches Affecting the Stock Market?". Time Magazine. http://newsfeed.time.com/2010/11/15/google-searches-and-financial-market-fluctuations-linked-and-worrying/. Retrieved January 12, 2011. 
  7. ^ How does Hot Searches work?, google.com
  8. ^ Elinor Mills (December 4, 2007). "Google Trends API coming soon". http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9828916-7.html. Retrieved October 17, 2010. 
  9. ^ ""On the Predictability of the U.S. Elections Through Search Volume Activity," at Journalist's Resource.org". http://journalistsresource.org/studies/government/politics/elections-search-volume/. 

External links