Trends of 2018

Whilst we saw some scary things happen this year, we also saw England make it to the quarters of the World Cup, we celebrated a royal wedding, got confused over what exactly GDPR is, and thank god - we were graced with another Spice Girl reunion.

As the year is almost over, we’re taking a look back at the emerging search trends we saw growing across a number of markets in 2018 using Pi Market Intelligence.

Here’s a sneak peak of what we’ll be covering:

• Electric cars
• Fake nails
• Gin
• Plastic waste
• Smart voice tech
• Fixed mortgages
• Cyber security

Baby you can drive my (electric) car

Earlier this year we published an automotive report that showed the prominence of Tesla and other electric cars in this market.

We’ve continued to track this and in October 2018 ‘Electric’ car terms became the most searched car type in the UK, beating SUV. These two categories have been fighting for dominance for the last three years; it’s impressive for electric cars to even be able to compete with well known car models, but to be at the top of the pile is astounding.

Search gives us scaled insight into these shifting consumer preferences. You may be seeing more electric cars on the road in 2019...

Getting your nails did

There’ve been a number of beauty trends this year, but the most glaring is the increased interest in fake nails.

Other nail styles come in and out of fashion but acrylic nails just keep on coming back, and in the last three years searches for fake nails have been growing steadily, seeing particular peaks in July and December - gotta look fresh for summer and Christmas.

Make mine a gin

You may already know about this trend - unable to escape the new and exciting flavours of gin your favourite bar now stocks. But the growth of Gin online is crazy:

Christmas in particular is seeing a huge uplift for gin terms - even rivalling prosecco for our tipple of choice.

[icon-cta-banner colour='jazzberry-jam' headline="Food and Beverage report" icon='/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/food_beverages.svg' cta_action='/resources/market-performance-reports/food-beverages/' cta_text='View now']

[/icon-cta-banner]

Plastic is out, eco is in

There’s been A LOT of news coverage about plastic waste this year, all sparked by Blue Planet II where David showed us the ugly truth of the devastating effects plastic is having on the environment.

Since then, searches for the effects of plastic have skyrocketed. We’ve also seen a huge rise in consumers searching for eco products - alternatives to plastic straws, cups and bottles.

This is only set to increase as further worrying climate reports are published and consumers become more eco conscious.

The (smart) walls have ears

Voice search has been on our radar for some time, but due to 2018's popularity of voice assisted smart tech, this year in particular we’ve seen industries having to think about their voice search SEO strategy.

For example, voice search shopping has begun taking off in the UK with Argos leading the way and becoming the first mainstream retailer to fully embrace it.

Here we can see how smart home devices have been growing - the large peak in December 2017 is set to be beaten this Christmas with even more devices on the market.

Changing your mortgage

With worries surrounding how Brexit may affect the housing market, homeowners are searching for ‘Fixed rate’ and ‘Remortgage’ terms.

Staying safe on the web

Over the last few years we’ve heard (or been affected by) online hacking and leaks from major companies. It’s no surprise that people are searching for ‘Cyber security’ terms more and more.

In fact just this week Google+ (Googles less than popular social network) reported a security issue that affected 52.5 million users.

Have a happy new year!

Like the insights from this post? Want to see your own data in Pi Market Intelligence? Get in touch for a demo.

[icon-cta-banner colour='jazzberry-jam' headline="Food and Beverage report" icon='/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/food_beverages.svg' cta_action='/resources/market-performance-reports/food-beverages/' cta_text='View now']

[/icon-cta-banner]