Marketers should know that Google Trends is a helpful tool for conducting keyword research, especially when it comes to finding out what searchers are interested at this very moment. On Wednesday, Google unveiled a neat new feature for Google Trends: Top Charts, which the company describes as “lists of real-world people, places and things ranked by search interest.” These lists are similar to the year-end Zeitgeist reports but are updated monthly and go as far back as 2004.
When a visitor to the Top Charts page hovers their cursor over a chart, they’ll see options to see a more detailed list; embed the chart on their own site; or share the chart via Google+, Facebook or Twitter.
Here’s the chart for “Basketball players” in April 2013:
“Top Charts is built on the Knowledge Graph, so the data shows interest in real-world things, not just keywords,” writes Roni Rabin, software engineer, in Google’s blog post introducing Top Charts. He adds that charts are generated based on different related keyword searches, not just single strings of keywords.
Google is also introducing a visually appealing live feed of trending searches, which is accessible by clicking on the box on the left side of the “Hot Searches” page. Users can choose the layout of this colorful live feed by hovering their cursor over the mini-matrix of nine squares in the top left corner of the page. They can also filter searches by a handful of regions by clicking on the link in the bottom left corner of the page.
Content marketers should see this as yet another free tool at their disposal, one that can help them write timely content about general or industry-specific trends.
There are also plenty of keyword-tracking tools and resources available. SheerSEO, SEMrush and WebCEO are some of the tools to help with tracking keywords. Mike Murray, founder of Online Marketing Coach, notes that friends, browser extensions and search engine spot checks are also resources that can help with this task. He recommends keeping keyword ranking analyses to a minimum.
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