How to research on Google what your potential customers need and look for, in context of product development? 

Introduction

Product development can be a fun process, when it comes to the things that you, as an operator, are excited or passionate about. It is always easier to work with products and services that live in the extension of your interests, but it is also important to take customers’ needs, interests and “digital search-power” into consideration when shaping your product.

In this short article, I would like to come up with a few ideas on how you can easily research what it is that your potential customers would like to experience. Dive in with me into Google’s sea of opportunities.

Before you start – make sure that you changed the language and area on Google, so that the answers are relating to the target market that you are interested in.

“Related searches”

This one is probably the easiest way to see what people are looking for. Let’s take for example hiking as a general activity, which covers the product area that you’re trying to develop (in case if you are considering offering guided hiking, but not sure when and where to offer it as a product and whether or not this activity should include other types of experiences).

Your research would start with typing hiking + “in [area]” as your keyword in Google. Once you wrote it in Google Search – wait with hitting enter. You will get the list of the things people have been looking for before you:

The 8 suggestions inform you already at the stage, that people are mostly looking for hiking in Greenland in June and August. You also get to know that people are interested in hiking in East Greenland and Arctic Circle. They would also like to know which places in Greenland it is possible to hike and what are good spots for doing so.

If you scroll down to the bottom of a page like that, you will  get even more suggestions:

They give you even more information on the interests of potential tourists. Tip: If you are planning on creating a “hiking”- related product in Arctic Circle, it might be a good idea to mention on your page polar bears, since it is something people are eager to know more about.

If you go back to the top of the page, in the case of some destinations, you will also get suggested hiking places in your country. The results here are delivered by Google Algorithm and it’s possible to explore them further (by clicking on them) in Google Travel Guide.

It’s a good idea to search for relevant keywords that have something to do with your desired product in the location of your choice.

“People also ask”

Quite often you can find the “People also ask” section of the Google Result Page when you look for something. You can find a lot of useful information from your potential customers, by going through the questions. If there are many similar ones, it might show you the potential in the subject, that can be researched even further.

The more questions you click on, the more new ones will pop up! Some more relevant than others.

“Google Trends”

Google Trends is Google’s free-of-charge feature that focuses on how frequently a given search term is entered into Google’s search engine relative to the site’s total search volume over a given period.

You can use Google Trends to shape up your product or tell a story around it that is relevant for your target market and target audience.

You can choose if you’re looking for data for specific terms or a topic (which is broader). You can also choose the country and the timespan:

Google Trends makes it useful to see the new tendencies and interests that appear locally (within the country you’ve chosen). You can investigate which regions (or cities) within the country are more active (search-wise) and what are the related topics and queries from people looking for this specific term:

For more useful tips on how to make the most of Google Trends check out this website.

Conclusion

Google and its features make it easier to research what is it people are interested in or looking for. It will not give you the perfect answer right away, but as soon as you dedicate a little bit of time to explore its possibilities – you will get a better idea of how your product can be shaped and angled to better suit the digital demand.

Written by:

Filip Gielda

Head of Digital at Visit Greenland

Filip works in a position of Head of Digital at Visit Greenland and specializes in digital visibility, user experience and strategy. Filip has worked within the digital field for the last 12 years – mostly with marketing, digitalization, digital consulting, but also art direction and visual production. 

Filip would like to help local operators in Greenland increase their digital competencies, through the use of this platform. He would also like DTN to become a bridge between Greenland and the rest of the Nordics, so the operators can meet each other digitally, and discuss some of the digital difficulties they recognize from everyday work within tourism.

 

 

Authored By

Halldór Arinbjarnarson
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