Tips to Use Google Trends for SEO

Keywords can dive into darkness as fast as they leap to popularity.

Marketers end up wasting thousands of hard-earned dollars on these. It happens a lot now that trends change with the speed of light.

Solution? Google trends.

Google has you covered with this awesome FREE tool for big data research that lets you fish for sensational topics and analyze their longevity.

11 Powerful Ways to Use Google Trends for SEO

1 Find Current Trends

Google Trends lets you see what’s trending around the world. This is brilliant for social media pages or bloggers who drop daily posts. It also offers real-time data on trending searches to keep you updated with trends.

How can you use current trends?

• Compare the Same Words for Different Countries: If you have a global website, you can focus more on the country where the topic is most popular.
• Compare Words With Similar Volume: Multiple words can be popular at once. In this case, you can use Google Trends to select the most relevant choice.
• See What’s Trending Near You:  You don’t need a search term to find what’s trending near you. Filter the city, and the topmost trends will be at your disposal.

2 Capitalize On Seasonal Trends

Google Trends has monstrous benefits when it comes to picking seasonal trends. Suppose your business sells sports equipment. So, you begin by analyzing data about sports goods.

This result is for the term ‘Outdoor Christmas Lights’ in 2025. See that the interest pick-ups during October – are courtesy of the Christmas season.

Here’s how you can put this data to work:

• Start Content Creation Before the Peak Time: The batch creates content in July to prepare it for September.
• Build the Hype: Now that you’re certain this will blow up, start publishing related content to boost the hype.
• Optimize Your Ads And Pages: Start optimizing pages and links. You can target keywords like ‘Christmas Decoration’.

3 Avoid Falling For The Hype

Have you ever heard about unicorn keywords?

The term ‘Wireless Headphone’ is one of them. It has a search volume of 110,000.

If you sell Wireless Headphones’, this keyword can be your goldmine. Right?

Wrong.

Search for this term on Google Trends, and you’ll see that the craze for fidget spinners has declined to oblivion.

Here’s what you can do in this case:

• Take Search Volume With A Grain Of Salt: Check the popularity of a unicorn keyword on Google Trends to confirm if people are still rooting for it.
• Go For Related Keywords: If a unicorn keyword loses popularity, go for similar words with the same search intent.
• Use Long-Tail Keywords: Sometimes, short terms are replaced with ‘how-to’ phrases as people love asking questions.

4 Tap Into A Trending Opportunity

Who doesn’t like viral action?

Keywords go viral all the time. A good SEO specialist must keep his eyes and ears open for these opportunities. But remember this, such trends fall just after the big event. So, if you’re late to the bandwagon, it’s better to leave it. You can try next year.

Make viral content in 4 easy steps:

• Filter your time range to “last five years” and analyze trends for a keyword.
• See what months it hypes in.
• Batch creates content ahead of the time
• Set a range of months to publish the content. (For instance, 15 Jan – 5 Feb seems like a good range for a keyword that’s likely to rise to fame at the end of January.)

5 Find Related Keywords

People don’t always search for one term. There are several versions of each search query. Google Trends gives you access to these via related queries.

Different ways to use related keywords:

• Target User Intent: By seeing how people search, you get a broader picture of the user’s search intent. Use this to create more targeted content.
• Rising and Top Queries: Filter these terms for ‘Rising’ and ‘Top,’ and find upcoming chartbusters.
• Create Comparison Posts: Find search terms with your competitors’ names and use them to create comparison posts. For instance, “Tom Hardy’s diet” is a related query for the “Keto diet”. So, a keto website can post a blog titled “Tom Hardy vs. Keto Diet”. Their page will also come up when people search for their competitors.

6 Localize Your Campaign

Google Trends lets you filter your searches based on location. This is the trend for “Golf equipment” in the United States.

As you can see, more people are searching for this term in South Dakota, Kansas, and Hawaii than in Maryland and Washington. You can use this data to laser-focus your efforts on states with more search volume. This helps you target the local audience by creating content catered to their needs.

Here’s how:

• PPC: Use pay-per-click in Alabama. You know that people are actively searching for your product, so they’re more likely to buy.
• Specified Content: Curate relatable blog topics like “Best Football Shoes for course Alabama grounds” to increase clickability.

7 Find Keywords For Your Next YouTube Video

Do you know that YouTube is the second most popular search engine?

Cataleya Waller of The Los Angeles SEO says “Your video can rank in the top 3 for the most competitive keywords if it does well in the first 24 hours.”

Google Trends lets you see what people are searching for on YouTube.

Do this to make viral YouTube videos for a keyword:

• Find A Keyword: Search for a keyword, and replace the “web search” button with “YouTube search”.
• Analyze Trends: Filter time for the last five years to identify seasonal trends. Prepare your content beforehand, and publish it during peak time to get maximum results.
• Engagement: Push your video on notification – with tools like Subscribers and on e-mails – with tools like Convertkit. Share the video in your social groups and make sure people drop engaging comments.

8 Predict Keyword Volume Trends

Search terms show substantial spikes during specific times in a year. Trends that rise and fall with festivals are easy to detect, but others are more difficult to track. Google Trends lets you see trend reports for keywords in all niches.

Prepare a calendar with Google trends:

• Pin-Point the Hype: Compare 3-4 elements of your website, see, and which hypes when. Then, schedule content for each month.
• Tweak Older Posts: If you don’t want to create new content every time a keyword becomes popular, you can tweak your old content and make it relevant to the present.

9 Get Ideas For Blog Posts And Social Media Campaigns

Everybody goes through a dry spell once in a while. Marketers need to churn up ideas for every campaign, which can get hard. With Google Trends, you can find topics your target audience is searching for.

Here’s how to get trending ideas forever:

• Long-Tail Keywords: Long-tail keywords in the related queries are more detailed versions of your keyword. Use these for blog posts.
• Events: In the related query section, you will also see upcoming events or festivals across the globe. This helps you pre-plan social media campaigns for that region.

10 Look For “Breakout” Keywords

For some related queries, Google Trends sometimes replaces the percentage growth with “breakout.” According to Google, it shows this word when it doesn’t have enough data to perform a ‘before and after, comparison. These keywords have a percentage growth of more than 5000%.

Use breakout keywords to rank on the first page:

• More Popularity, Less Difficulty: The lack of attention to these keywords makes them easier to rank for.
• First Come, First Serve: You have the early bird advantage, making it hard for your competitors to overtake you.
• Rank Without Backlinks: You don’t need many backlinks to rank before they go mainstream.

11 Compare Keywords To Find The Best Topic

Suppose you’re a crypto writer who wants to craft an educational blog. What will you write about – Solana or Tether?

You should use Google Trends to compare the two keywords and see which is more popular.

This is the comparison result between ‘Solana’ and ‘Tether’. Here, it’s clear that ‘bitcoin’ takes the cake.

Comparing two keywords helps you

• Avoid Temporarily Popular Keywords: You can see what’s relevant by comparing them in the ocean of keywords.
• Compare Two Regions: You can compare data for different cities or countries. It helps you see where your product is wanted most.
• Go Beyond The Search Volume: Search volume is the average number of searches for the term and does not promise relevancy. Trends help you look above the search volume.

Key Takeaways

1. Keep an eye on what’s trending across the globe.
2. Predict seasonal trends even before they happen by observing seasonal hikes over the last five years.  
3. Hunt high-volume keywords to create viral content by preparing before peak time.
4. Target sub-regions with location filters to create a laser-focused marketing strategy that converts.
5. Use popular breakout keywords to rank on the first page without tons of backlinks.
6. Curate relatable blog topics and social media campaigns to build an emotional connection.
7. Skip keyword unicorns and focus only on what’s relevant.