What was important to Australians in 2019 on the world's largest search engine?

It’s that time of year again where Google release their top searched for terms across the globe and in individual countries. Understanding trending searches helps us identify what is important to not only our country but the world. Although we are unable to get demographic data, it allows us to find a common thread between our entire audiences, whether that be for our alcohol brand clients or our shopping mall clients. Each trend helps us know what is important to the majority of the population and therefore some of our target. We use Google Trends on a weekly basis to spot any interesting topics or people that we might be able to align our clients' brands with or start conversations that are topical or meaningful.

So what did people search for in the last year of the decade? With the devastation of the Australian bushfires in 2019 and now in 2020, it’s no surprise that 'Fires near me’ was the number one search for Australians in 2019. What is surprising is that our bushfire season started only 3 months ago, so the total number of searches for fires near me, which may I add is NSW related only, overtook any other search term in 2019 in just 3 short months. Number 5 on the most searched for terms was for Disney Actor 'Cameron Boyce', who I must admit, neither me nor the entire office had ever heard of! After some research, searches for this 20 year old who died suddenly from epilepsy is a clear indication of the amount of impact that Gen Zs have on Google Searches.

Without bringing the vibe down too much and talking about news trends (an obvious ‘Election' and 'Christchurch shooting’ were both #1 and #2 hits), I’m proud to say that the #1 most searched for an Aussie public figure was Ash Barty, the legendary tennis player aged 23 who is now ranked No. 1 in the world. It’s inspiring and hopeful to see Barty outranked the #3 most searched for. I’ll let you find out who that was…..

To food trends, interestingly and surprisingly, the #1 most searched for recipe in 2019 was ‘Plant based recipes’. With the rise of vegetarianism and vegan foods, I'm now well aware that this 'fad' trend is not so fad, rather one that was going to stick. I did expect, however, the culinary-interested Australians to be searching for something a bit more broad. Last year food giants like Hungry Jacks announced their vegan range which, although a good marketing play, was obviously catering for a market they knew had exponential size.

A scary trend this year was the category of 'How to..?’ with the #1 most searched for term ‘How to vote’ followed by #3 with ‘How to vote labor 2019’ and #4 ‘How to vote liberal’. With an election year in 2019, it’s no surprise politics is on the list but the fact that so many people didn’t know how to vote is slightly worrying. Again, perhaps an indication of Gen Zs researching as they reach legal voting age. 

The last and somewhat most worthy trend in 2019 was related to the ‘Why is..?’ category of which #1 was ‘Why is instagram not working’. Back in March 2019, Instagram and Facebook had their most severe breakdown in the history of breakdowns. The influencers all went nuts and the outrage was significantly damaging to the company, a loss in revenue of $89 BILLION, according to this article. The breakdown caused many business to re think budgets and even employers internally to re evaluate the use of the platform as they relied on places like Facebook Workplace to communicate with global teams that were no longer reachable. 

So what are you searching for on Google?

If it's

chances are, New Beach Co will be on page one of your search results. We offer a full scope of media and marketing services, including SEO and what's trending. Get in touch to find out how we can help your business or brand get in front of searchers.