When a topic or hashtag gains momentum on social media, it is often considered to be trending. Trends are a reflection of a specific community’s interests, discussions, and collective attention at a given time, and can originate from current events or news stories, viral content, holidays, popular culture, and even online campaigns and challenges.

Trending topics are featured prominently on platforms, increasing their visibility and potential reach. They can also help raise awareness of important issues or events, encourage discussion, and generate engagement. However, it’s important to carefully consider the impact of participating in a trending topic before jumping on board, as mishandled posts can have negative consequences for brands.

In this article, we’ll explore the origins of trends, how they are determined by social media platforms, and how to best use them for your brand. We’ll also examine a few different strategies for engaging with trends and how to avoid some common pitfalls.

The word trending is most commonly associated with social media and digital platforms. The trends displayed on a platform’s homepage or search page are a reflection of the most popular topics being discussed, shared, and engaged with at that moment. Social media algorithms take into account a variety of factors when determining what is trending, including velocity (how quickly something is growing), user engagement (likes, comments, and retweets), and other contextual information such as location.

Twitter users can find trends in a few areas of the platform, including the For You and Trends sections of the sidebar, as well as on an Explore page. In general, trends are catered to a user’s location, though this can be adjusted on Twitter’s website. Facebook’s Trending feature is a little more robust, with options for browsing trends by category and seeing public and in-network posts related to each topic.

One of the most reliable sources of trends is Google Trends, which provides data on interest in a keyword or topic based on searches across various devices and locations. Google Trends also allows you to see how much a topic or keywords have grown over the past few years, which is useful for predicting whether they might continue to grow in the future.

Other free tools for finding trending topics include Exploding Topics and Trend Hunter. Both of these websites are a great way to discover new trends that might be relevant to your business, and they offer a variety of filters to narrow down results based on topic, location, and other criteria.

YouTube trending videos are another great resource to find inspiration for your marketing efforts. Over 80%of businesses use video as a form of marketing, and it’s a very effective way to reach your target audience. When creating a marketing video, it’s important to understand your audience and create content that resonates with them.

To increase your chances of having your YouTube video trend, be sure to include some type of call to action in the description. This will prompt viewers to engage with your video and possibly share it on their own social channels, which can help drive additional views.