• by Laurie Sullivan , Staff Writer @lauriesullivan, December 11, 2023

Questions identify what people care about and what inspires them, and those questions help brands answer them.

Marketers allocate ad budgets for specific media, regions, countries and topics. Now along with artificial intelligence (AI), those questions have become a way to provide deeper insights into how people think and dig into the minds of shoppers, moviegoers and restaurant seekers  and travelers.

Google has published this annual list for at least 25 years, but this year with the ability to run it thorough AI algorithms, it will give brands many more insights without people actually revealing personal identifiable information (PII). 

Search cannot determine ad budgets, but marketers can use this search and trend data to understand what consumers are interested in right now, and identify areas of opportunity.

This could mean increasing advertising investment in specific categories of interest, those featured as trending, expanding their assortment into new product categories or offerings and complementing this with advertising to generate awareness. They could also identify trends to incorporate into creative or website landing pages.

The annual search-trend data list identifies the things that people care about, how they see the world, and what is important in their lives. The trend data is categorized by people, movies, television shows, video games, news and more.

When I asked Google Bard why shirts were the top apparel item in Google search results in 2023, the AI replied with several reasons including versatility, expanding trends, growing awareness of sustainable fashion, seasonal shopping patterns, an increase in online shopping.

“Besides t-shirts, searches for other types of shirts, such as dress shirts, polo shirts, and button-down shirts, could have significantly contributed to the overall trend,” according to Google Bard.

Damar Hamlin was Google's top trending person on search this year. The Buffalo Bills safety experienced a near-death cardiac arrest on the field during a January game, but has since made a celebrated comeback.

Actor Jeremy Renner, who survived a serious snowplow accident at the start of 2023, followed.

The late Matthew Perry and Tina Turner led search trends among notable individuals who passed away.

In entertainment, “Barbie” dominated Google search's movie trends, followed by Barbenheimer co-pilot “Oppenheimer” and "Jawan." “The Last of Us,” “Wednesday” and “Ginny and Georgia” were the top three trending shows in 2023 in TV.

Yoasobi’s “Idol” was Google's top trending song on search. Jason Aldean's “Try That In A Small Town,” which soared in the charts after controversy this summer, and Shakira and Bizarrap's “Bzrp Music Sessions, Vol. 53” followed.

More country-specific lists and trends from years past is available on Google's “Year in Search” archive. 

Google says it collected its 2023 search results from January 1 through November 27 of this year.

The search trends cannot determine the ad budgets for marketers, but it can provide deeper insights when fed into AI platforms, assisting in strategies for 2024, based on what people search for in 2023. Exciting times for technology and search.

For those in search of entertainment and a few non-predictions based on insights from Insider Intelligence analysts, here are a few forecasts of what will not happen in 2024:

In a highly specific and highly unlikely prediction, Apple acquires Disney for its movie library or Warner Bros. Discovery. Apple could then bundle the streaming packages on every iPhone as more companies bundle services. Another includes Roblox buying AMC theaters to turn them into metaverse playgrounds, with streaming concerts that people cannot get tickets to see.