A trend is something that is popular, interesting or catching people’s attention at a particular time. They can be in fashion, pop culture and even politics. However, they don’t have to be a fad – there are some trends that have stayed around for years (think Myspace).

There are various tools available to check out what’s trending and it can be a good way to monitor the competition, see what people are searching for and also to gauge public opinion about a subject. One of the best is Google Trends. It is free to use and allows you to search for trends on a global scale as well as at a local level down to your own city.

It shows you what people are searching for on Google and compares that to the current popularity of certain topics and keywords. This can be useful for assessing what your competitors are doing and coming up with ideas for new keyword campaigns. You can compare up to five different topics or search terms at a time and see how they perform over the last few weeks and months.

The tool can be a little confusing and it takes some time to understand how the results are compiled. There are two main factors that govern what makes a topic or hashtag trend; the volume of tweets about it and how quickly that volume has grown. Generally speaking, it is more likely to be a trend if there has been a rapid increase in popularity rather than a gradual growth over time.

Using a specific hashtag is important if you want your campaign to go trending. However, it is also important to have a call to action that is concise and clear so people know what to do. Make sure to specify what the hashtag is, when to post it and maybe provide some examples of how they might compose their tweet. Providing some guidance will help encourage them to participate and give your campaign the boost it needs to become a trending topic.

YouTube also has a ‘Trending’ tab and it is worth looking at to see what people are interested in and sharing. However, it’s not curated by humans. There are algorithms that determine what is featured but it would be a huge task to have a team of employees keeping an eye on all the trends globally and at a local level.

It is worth bearing in mind that what might be a trend in one country may not be a trend in another and the results can be different depending on how a particular search term is phrased. Also, you can only use the Trending feature if you have a Google account and you are logged into it. Otherwise, you will not be able to see the results. To get the most out of this tool it is worth logging in to your Google Analytics account and linking them so you can compare data on a global basis.