Understanding market trends is crucial for eCommerce startups. Google Trends is one of the most powerful tools available today that provides insights into search patterns. Doing so helps you analyze a niche popularity gives you the concrete evidence to predict future trends.

Let’s say you want to see if starting an online sustainable fashion brand is a good idea or not. Here’s a step-by-step guide to effectively using Google Trends for your eCommerce business:

Step 1: Access Google Trends

Visit Google Trends. You can start by entering a broad keyword related to your niche in the search bar, here we’ll enter ‘Sustainable Fashion’.

Step 2: Explore the Interest Over Time

After entering your keyword, Google Trends will display a graph showing the interest over time. This helps you understand whether interest in your niche is growing, stable, or declining. Look for consistent upward trends as a positive indicator. In the graph below you can see that over the last 2 decades, interest ‘sustainable fashion’ has consistently been growing. This is a green signal to proceed further

Step 3: Compare Keywords

Use the “Compare” feature to analyze multiple keywords. This helps you identify which terms are more popular and allows you to choose the best-performing keywords for your niche. On “sustainable fashion” with “eco-friendly fashion”, we see that eco-friendly fashion, while very closely related to sustainable fashion, has almost negligible interest.

Step 4: Analyze Regional Interest

Check the “Interest by region” section to see where your keyword is most popular. This can guide your marketing efforts and help you target specific geographical areas where demand is higher. As seen below, the interest was highest in New York, followed by Vermont. On the map you can also see the east coast and west coast are relatively darker, indicating a higher interest. Thus, marketing campaigns and SEO should be targeted specifically to these audiences more.

Step 5: Examine Related Topics and Queries

Google Trends provides related topics and queries that are rising in popularity. These can offer additional insights into what people are searching for and help you expand your product offerings or content strategy. In our search, we see that some of the more established brands show up. These can be considered current market leaders of sustainable fashion. Studying these brands product offerings, marketing strategies and product placing, can help guide initial brand building strategies.

Step 6: Use Filters for Specific Insights

Apply filters to narrow down your search data by categories, locations, time ranges, and search types (e.g., Web Search, Image Search, News Search). This granular view helps you tailor your analysis to specific aspects of your niche.

Step 7: Identify Seasonal Trends

Look for seasonal patterns in the data. Some niches may have periodic spikes in interest, which can help you plan your inventory and marketing campaigns more effectively. We see a spike in interest every April, indicating the start of summer season, usually when people go on vacations and are looking to buy new pieces of clothing. You could potentially establish your niche as a sustainable resort wear and establish your brand as a strong advocate of reducing ocean pollution by garment industry.

Google Trends is a good starting point in your niche research and can provide invaluable insights into niche popularity and future trends, helping you make informed decisions for your eCommerce business. It can help ensure that your business remains relevant for longer and meet the ever changing consumer needs.