Google Trends is a public web facility of Google Inc., about 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. 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.
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. 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.
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.[4] 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 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.
A few unofficial Google Trends API tools have been released, along with a wiki detailing them and simple access to Google Trends data.
Attacks
On July 10, 2008, 4chan attacked Google Trends.[citation needed] The swastika symbol at the top of Google's Hot Trends list (a tally of the most popular search-terms in the United States) for several hours. It was later reported that the HTML numeric character reference for the symbol had been posted on /b/, with a request to perform a Google search for the string. A multitude of /b/ visitors followed the order and pushed the symbol to the top of the chart, though Google later removed the result.
Attacks
On July 10, 2008, 4chan attacked Google Trends.[citation needed] The swastika symbol (卐) appeared at the top of Google's Hot Trends list (a tally of the most popular search-terms in the United States) for several hours. It was later reported that the HTML numeric character reference for the symbol had been posted on /b/, with a request to perform a Google search for the string. A multitude of /b/ visitors followed the order and pushed the symbol to the top of the chart, though Google later removed the result.
Notes
- ^ http://www.google.com/intl/en/trends/about.html#1
- ^ Success! Google Trends Updated InsideGoogle, 30 July 2007.
- ^ Helft, Miguel (2008-08-06). ""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 2008-08-06.
- ^ How does Hot Searches work?, google.com
- ^ http://news.cnet.com/8301-10784_3-9828916-7.html
- ^ http://zoastertech.com/projects/googletrends/?page=Third+party+API+Tools
External links
- Google Trends
- Google Hot Trends - Webpage of top 20 search-terms, each linked to 24-hour graph & data.
- Hot Trends - Webpage of top 100 search-terms, each linked to the news source.
- Archive of Hourly Google Trends - Google trends archived every hour.
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