It is amazing how we plays up a tragedy, and to see the way we recover and get back to our normal every day life usually takes less than a week. Monitoring the way users respond to a particular subject is known as “trends”.

Twitter is a great way to find out how people react to certain stories or events and thanks to one of my favourite trend tools  Twist we can see the reaction on a day to day basis. I have been watching the Twitter trends for Michael Jackson which were phenomenal as the news of his death came out. Michael Jackson was tweeted far and wide and even managed to crash a few servers but as the weekend arrived it was back to watching your favourite tennis player and back to everyday life.

So what is the point of monitoring trends

It is always beneficial to us if we can get our information a second earlier that our competitors, if we can find our what the majority of people on the internet are in demand for,  then we can very quickly benefit from this, but don’t go out and start selling Michael Jackson bobble dolls too quickly, because most trends fade just as fast as they rise, it is the slow rising trends we want to try benefit from.

How can I monitor trends

UPDATE: TrendsMap: This amazing tool is the best for South Africa showing local trends over a map. Great way to see what is trending in SA.

Twist: The ultimate Twitter trend keyword analysis tool, simply input a couple keywords separated by a comma and see which keyword most tweeters are talking about.

Google Trends: Very much the same as Twist, this tool allows you to easily find out industry trends and if the market you are in is rising in interest or falling. You can also view a list of the hottest trends being searched on Google as we speak.

Google Insights: This trend analysis tool allows you to target a particular region, category of date. View trends as far back as 2004 or see what related keywords in your industry are on the rise. These trends are also based on Google search.

xRank: [link removed: Page no longer exists - My guess, it is another Microsoft failure] This is Bing’s latest interest in trends. xRank is very limited at the moment as it only shows important people at the moment but it shows promise and I am sure it will display a wider variety of trends at a later stage.

There is no reason to not know what your visitors are searching for. More tools will come and go and I am sure we will be able to monitor human reaction and interaction more accurately as better analysis tools come out. As an SEO strategist we will be able to bring you more accurate market statistics that pinpoint the interests of the user  to the mark.