Search Trends

What this page is for

  • The Search Trends page shows, month by month, how many people search in Google for each keyword — each phrase people type into Google — that matters to your business. The keywords are the ones in your keyword list (the same list as on Market › Keyword Universe); the volumes are Google's own monthly estimates for your market, the figures Google shows advertisers when they plan campaigns.
  • Why you need it: a single monthly volume tells you how big a market is; the history tells you where it is going. Without this page you learn a season started when your competitors' ads are already running, and you keep writing pages for keywords people search less and less. With it you see which keywords grow, which fall and in which month each one peaks, and you prepare in time.
  • What you gain concretely by using this page monthly: (1) the keywords whose demand is growing, where a page or a Google Ads keyword pays off most; (2) the month each seasonal keyword peaks, so you publish pages and start campaigns before it; (3) the keywords whose demand is falling, where you stop investing; (4) the keywords with real demand and few advertisers, the cheapest to enter in Google Ads.
  • One point on the chart = one keyword in one month; one table row = one keyword, with its history condensed into averages and the latest month's change. The history covers the last 24 months; volumes are Google's estimates, refreshed monthly.

The filters at the top

The filters narrow the chart, the table and the two numbers above them to the rows you care about. Combine as many as you like; to get the full list back, clear them all with the Reset button.

  • keyword_type — the keyword's type: client_brand (your brand name or the names of brands you own), competitor_brand (a competitor's name or the brands it owns), product_brand (a brand you or a competitor sell), generic (any other keyword — this is usually where the volume is biggest and most of the work is).
  • competition — how many companies bid on this keyword in Google Ads: LOW (few), MEDIUM, HIGH (many), UNSPECIFIED (Google gave no figure, usually a keyword with very few searches). It tells you how expensive it is to enter on it in Ads, not how hard it is to rank organically. In the table and in the numbers at the top a keyword carries its latest month's value; in the chart the filter keeps the months in which the keyword had that value.
  • trend_category — how the keyword's searches moved against the previous month: rising (more than 10 % up), declining (more than 10 % down), stable (in between). Same reading as for competition: the table and the numbers use the latest month, the chart uses each month.
  • location_name — the market (country or region) the volumes were measured for. You normally have one market, so one value.
  • The month (the date box on the right) — the most recent month present in the data. Google publishes a month's volumes after the month ends and our refresh runs on the 15th, so the last complete month is normally the one before the current month.
  • keyword — the search box: type a word or part of a word and the chart and the table keep only the keywords containing it.

The numbers at the top

  • avg_monthly_volume — the average monthly searches of all keywords in the table added up, or of your selection if filters are active: the monthly size of the market your list covers. Each keyword's average is taken over the months it has in the history (see the column of the same name below). Example: filter competition = LOW and the number becomes the monthly demand you could enter and that has few advertisers; filter trend_category = rising and it becomes the demand that grew last month.
  • keyword — how many keywords are in the table, or in your selection: with no filter, every keyword in your list. Use it to see how big each list you build with the filters is.

The "Top 10 keywords by Month" chart

The chart answers: how does consumer interest move, month by month, and in which month does each keyword peak? Each line is one keyword and each point its searches in one month, from the oldest month in the history (left) to the latest (right). The ten keywords with the most searches over the whole period get a line each; to see another keyword, type it in the keyword box or narrow the filters until it is among the ten. The legend above the chart scrolls with the arrows at its right end; hover a point to read the exact figure.

  • Use the filters to choose what the chart compares: filter keyword_type = client_brand and the lines are the searches for your brand names, month by month; type a word in the keyword box and the chart shows the ten biggest keywords containing it.
  • What you can find out: a keyword that peaks in the same month every year (a season you can prepare for); a keyword whose peak this year is lower than last year's (a market that shrinks); a keyword that was flat and starts to climb (a new demand to cover before competitors do).

The "Search trends" table, column by column

One row per keyword, with its history condensed. The table is sorted by keyword_rank when you open the page, so the keywords with the most searches come first; click a column name to sort by it (a second click reverses the order; hold SHIFT and click a second or third column to sort by several columns). The table scrolls to the right; the columns are in screen order.

  • keyword — the keyword, as people search for it.
  • keyword_type, trend_category, competition — the same values as the filters above. trend_category and competition are the latest month's: a keyword reads rising when its latest month had more than 10 % more searches than the month before.
  • avg_monthly_volume — the keyword's average monthly searches over the months it has in the history (up to 24). A keyword added to your list recently is averaged over fewer months; compare such a keyword with the chart, not with this column alone.
  • latest_month_volume — the searches in the keyword's most recent month in the history. Against avg_monthly_volume it tells you where the keyword is in its year: 150 on an average of 9,000 is a keyword out of season; 2,400 on an average of 2,600 is one in its usual months.
  • peak_monthly_volume — the highest monthly searches in the history. Peak against average tells you how seasonal the keyword is: a peak of 30,000 on an average of 3,000 is a keyword that lives one or two months a year.
  • keyword_rank — the keyword's rank by average monthly searches: 1 is the biggest market in your list. A reading order, not a verdict.
  • avg_competition_index — Google's competition index for the keyword, from 0 (nobody bids on it in Google Ads) to 100 (everybody does), averaged over the months. A low value means cheap entry in Ads, not few searches.
  • latest_trend_mom_pct — the change of the latest month against the previous one, in percent: 27.27 means 27 % more searches than the month before, −40 means 40 % fewer. Empty when the keyword has no previous month. This is one month's change, so always check the chart before acting on it.
  • latest_trend_yoy_pct — the change of the latest month against the same month a year earlier, in percent. It removes the season: a −90 on a keyword with a year in it ("holiday 2026" after the holiday) or on a product that went out of fashion is a market that disappeared; a +50 is a market that grew in a year. Empty when the keyword has no data for the month a year earlier.
  • avg_opportunity_score — a score we compute every month from three things: more searches raise it, a month-over-month increase raises it, and more competition lowers it; the column shows the average over the months. It has no unit: use it to decide which keywords to read first, not what to do.

The monthly routine: what to look for and what to do

Go through the steps below once a month, after the 15th, when the latest month has been updated. Each step tells you how to find the relevant rows (what to filter, what to sort by) and what to do with them. Write the chosen keywords down in a document or export them (see "Notes"); at the end you should have a short list of tasks, not a long list of keywords.

  1. Start from the top. How to find: clear the filters with the Reset button and read the first 20 rows of the table, sorted by keyword_rank. These are the biggest markets around your business.

    • For each keyword, check on Market › Keyword Universe whether your site has a page for it (on_site_status) and whether it is in your Google Ads account (in_ads). A keyword from the top 20 with no page and no ad is the first gap to close.
    • If peak_monthly_volume is many times avg_monthly_volume, note the keyword for step 3: it is seasonal.

  2. Find the keywords whose demand is growing. How to find: filter trend_category = rising and sort by avg_monthly_volume descending. These keywords had at least 10 % more searches in the latest month than in the month before.

    • If latest_trend_yoy_pct is also positive, the growth is not only seasonal: this is a market that grows. If your site has no page for the keyword, write one (see Keyword Universe for how); if it is in Google Ads, give it room to spend by raising its budget or bid by about a fifth, and check after 30 days whether the clicks and the conversions followed.
    • If latest_trend_yoy_pct is negative, the keyword is recovering from a low, not growing: open the chart with the keyword typed in the search box and act only if the line climbs for two or three months in a row.
    • If competition = LOW on a rising keyword, it is the cheapest moment to enter it in Google Ads: add the keyword with a modest bid before the advertisers follow the demand.

  3. Prepare for the season. How to find: type a product family in the keyword box (for example "sandals"), read the chart and find the month where the lines peak; the previous year's peak tells you when the next one comes.

    • Publish or update the page for the keyword one to two months before the peak: Google needs a few weeks to index a new page, and a campaign needs its first weeks to learn. A page published in the peak month arrives too late.
    • Start the Google Ads campaign for the keyword as the line starts to climb, not at the top, and plan its budget on the peak month's searches, not the average.
    • After the peak, lower the budget as the line falls: paying peak bids on falling demand is where seasonal budgets are lost.

  4. Find the keywords whose demand is falling. How to find: filter trend_category = declining and sort by avg_monthly_volume descending. These keywords had at least 10 % fewer searches in the latest month than in the month before.

    • If latest_trend_yoy_pct is also negative, check the chart: a line lower than a year ago for several months is a market that shrinks. Do not write new pages for it and do not raise bids on it; if a good part of your traffic depends on it, look in step 2 for the keywords that replace it.
    • If latest_trend_yoy_pct is positive, it is the normal drop after a season: nothing to do until it returns.

  5. Find the cheap entries in Google Ads. How to find: filter competition = LOW and sort by avg_monthly_volume descending. These are keywords people search for and few advertisers pay for.

    • If avg_monthly_volume is above 100 (a rule of thumb; in a small market, lower the bar) and the keyword is not yet in your Google Ads account (in_ads = FALSE on Keyword Universe), add it with a low bid and check after 30 days whether it brought clicks and conversions.
    • If competition = HIGH and avg_monthly_volume is high, the keyword is expensive to buy: cover it first with an SEO-optimised page, and pay for it only where the page is not on Google's first page yet.
    • If competition = UNSPECIFIED, Google has too little data on the keyword; treat it as a small market until the chart shows otherwise.

  6. Monitor your brand and your competitors. How to find: filter keyword_type = client_brand and read the chart; then filter keyword_type = competitor_brand.

    • If the searches for your name fall two months in a row while a competitor's rise, the signal is about awareness (advertising, PR, word of mouth), not about the site: it is the brief for your next communication, not for a page.
    • If a competitor's name peaks in a month, look at what they did that month (a campaign, a launch); their season is probably yours too.

Notes

  • Export the table. Hover over the table, click the three dots in its top-right corner and choose Export → Google Sheets with "Keep value formatting" ticked, or CSV. The export contains exactly the rows you see (with your filters and sorting), so you can mark in a spreadsheet which keywords get a page, which go into Google Ads and which you drop — and pass the list on.
  • How the data updates. The volumes come from Google Ads for your market, in all languages, for every keyword in your list; we refresh them once a month, on the 15th, early in the morning, taking the months Google has published since the previous refresh. The history keeps the last 24 months; an older month drops out at the next refresh. A keyword added to your list gets its full history at the next refresh. The page has no date-range control; the month box shows the most recent month in the data.
  • What the numbers don't say. A volume is Google's estimate, rounded to steps (10, 20, 50, 100 …), not a count of visits, and not your traffic: what you get of it is on Keyword Universe and Organic Search. A 0 on a phrase people clearly type usually means Google merged it with a close variant. competition and avg_competition_index measure advertisers, not how hard it is to rank organically. The trend columns are the latest month's change only; the chart shows whether it is a season or a direction.
  • What the page leaves out. Nothing about your own site: no positions, clicks or costs. The same keywords with your Search Console and Google Ads figures, and which ones have a page on your site, are on Market › Keyword Universe.
  • Related pages. For the monthly routine on the whole keyword list, with your own figures per keyword, go to Market › Keyword Universe. For the daily organic position and clicks of a keyword, go to Organic Search › Queries; for the daily performance of your paid keywords, by campaign, go to Paid Search › Keywords. If your plan includes Opportunity Gap (Insights menu), it reads these volumes too and gives you the tasks ready formulated, with the evidence attached.

Remember!

  • Demand is the market, not your traffic. The volumes say how many people search; how many of them reach you is on Keyword Universe and Organic Search.
  • One month is a change, two years is a trend. Read a rising or declining label together with the chart before you act: a season repeats, a direction does not.
  • Prepare before the peak, not during it. A page or a campaign started when the searches are already at the top arrives too late.