Google Search Trends Expert Sarah Armstrong

In this live interview, the Google search trends expert, Sarah Armstrong, discusses the top search trends for the month of June. Taylor Swift, movies like Spider-Man, social causes like Juneteenth and Pride Month, air quality due to Canadian wildfire smoke, miscellaneous trends like camping and housing market searches, sports championships, and Fourth of July barbecue recipes were among the popular search topics. The interview concludes with a discussion about Fourth of July plans and trending red, white, and blue foods. Joining me now live here at the RNJ Morning Program for a look back at what you and I were googling for the month of June. We have Google search trends expert Sarah Armstrong who was with us here at RNJ. Sarah, good morning and no surprise I'm sure Taylor Swift probably 12 months a year gets a lot of action on Google. Good morning, absolutely. Taylor Swift is always trending. I think I am a big part of those searches, but especially with her tour we're seeing a lot of I didn't get a ticket so I'm a little sulky about it. Alright, well she came through Jersey Memorial Day weekend and we haven't been the same since, that's for sure. So let's take a look at what the top words were and let's start with entertainment. Taylor Swift I'm sure might have been one of the top search terms for January. I'm thinking it's been a big month for movies. We haven't had the big Indiana Jones one yet, hasn't come out yet. Sarah, I'm looking forward to that one. We had The Flash, we had Transformers, we had Spider-Man. Was it something movie related that was leading the way there? Right, so Spider-Man is one of those big trends we saw in the entertainment category with Across the Spider-Verse coming out. Lots of search interest in post-credit scene. That was a big surge in searches because this movie actually didn't have a post-credit scene where we usually see that. I'm expecting a lot of movie trends next month too as you said. I'm very excited about the Barbie movie. I know Oppenheimer is coming out. So we're also seeing some preemptive interest there. No post-movie scene in the Spider-Man? You mean I can leave as soon as the credits start this time? You can. I think a lot of folks sat there waiting for it. I would. All these Marvel movies, I sit through the credits hoping there's going to be a scene. That's interesting, good to know. Category of culture for the month of June. Very active socially. Typically the month of June, of course, we had Juneteenth. Pride Month is winding down. Just a couple days left there. Was it something along the terms of social causes that led the way, Sarah, for June searches? Absolutely. Both of those were trending this month. We see a lot of interest in historical figures around these days. So Harvey Milk spikes every June. Organizations like the Trevor Project for Pride. Of course, lots of interest in the Pride parade. And then around Juneteenth, we still see a lot of, like, what is Juneteenth? This holiday feels newer for a lot of folks since it became a federal holiday in 2021. So lots of people looking to answer those questions. We also saw searches around Opal Lee, who is considered the grandmother of Juneteenth and helped usher this there as a national holiday. So I'm not sure if you got it off, but a lot of folks got that day off and celebrated. Yeah, very cool. We mark it here in New Jersey on, Sarah, the third Friday of every June, and then we get the national celebration on the 19th itself. So we actually get to mark Juneteenth a couple different times in the month of June. Category of science. You know, not long ago, we had such a bad day here with this Canadian wildfire smoke. And we're actually watching again today, Sarah, for more smoke to move into our area here of New Jersey and have an impact on our air quality. It had to be. I'm never good at the science category, but air quality and wildfire smoke had to be among the top science searches. You are absolutely right. I'm actually located in New York, and I could not believe how bad the air quality was earlier this month. I'm looking out the window because I know it's supposed to get pretty bad today. I don't think as bad as we saw earlier. But yes, what does hazardous air quality mean for the quadrupled in search interest? We got questions like, do masks help with air quality? Do air purifiers help with wildfire smoke? So lots of folks curious about that. And hopefully the smoke from Canada doesn't hit us too hard this time. Yeah, oh my goodness. Wasn't that crazy earlier this month, right? My guest is Google search trends expert Sarah Armstrong. I'm doing very well. I'm three for three. The category of odd news, which I always struggle with, and I really couldn't come up with anything. There was a story about someone recently, Sarah, maybe you saw this, went into a restaurant and just started throwing Skittles candy at people for some reason and got arrested for doing so. I thought that was kind of odd, but I don't know if that would have led to the search trends. What did you have for odd news for June? Well, that is odd. I guess if someone's going to throw something at you, Skittles wouldn't be the worst thing, but they're pretty hard. You know, some of our trends in this category, it's really more miscellaneous than odd, but we see a lot of, you know, kind of summer trends here around camping and hiking. A lot of people looking at scary stories to tell in the dark or chords that play around the campfire. So we're seeing take me home country road, American pie, wagon wheel, that's all pretty fun. And then we're also seeing a lot of searches in the housing market. Folks want to know, will those housing prices go down? When are they going to drop? We're seeing searches like quiet quitting the housing market and how to stay there. So kind of all over the place there, but gives you an indication on what folks are thinking about. Very good. And sports, yeah, they're really big highlights for June for the the sports world. I know we had the PGA championship. This college world series has really gotten popular in recent years. Maybe WNBA, I'm not really sure. Sports, we did have a perfect game thrown last night by a pitcher of the Yankees and maybe today that's going to really see a big spike, but probably for the month, I would think that wouldn't be one of the top ones. What were people looking at for sports for June? Yeah, I saw that for the Yankees. I'm sure that is spiking right now. We had a lot of championships in June, so the Stanley Cup, the NBA Finals, a lot of interest around the Denver Nuggets. I liked seeing that the search, how heavy is the Stanley Cup, was trending. That actually spiked over 5,000 percent after the biggest school of the night won. We also saw National Hockey League championship doubling in search interest. So lots of winners in sports this month. I can't believe how quickly I forgot about the Nuggets and the Stanley Cup Finals. And by the way, that thing is very heavy, by the way, the Stanley Cup. If you ever get a chance to pick it up. Last one is food. I'm trying to think. Boy, June, it's a difficult one for food. You know, we didn't have a lot of specialty kind of food or beverage celebrations. I don't know. Were we finishing up maybe Memorial Day recipes for June or just straight up barbecue recipes? I'm not really sure what would be the big thing for June. Well, I'm sort of tricking you with this one because a spike we're seeing right now actually is around 4th of July barbecue. In June, you did cheat me. You cheated me on that one. Yeah, folks are already starting to plan for the upcoming weekend. So do you have any plans for the 4th of July? Let's see. I want to go and there's this little place in the town I live in called Rambo's, a little country store. I want to get a steak the size of like a woman's handbag and just sit down and enjoy that one day on the 4th. How about you? That sounds fantastic. We're not seeing steak in the top searches actually, but it should be cheesecake salad is a trending search. I had to look up what that was. For reals? Cheesecake, dessert for real, trifle, cookies, rice krispies. So lots of sweets as people prepare. These are specifically red, white, and blue foods that folks are looking for. So you'll see charcuterie pork, fruit salad, pasta salad. So I'm getting ready to eat. All right. We'll be sure to check that out. And thanks so much for your patience this morning, Sarah. Really appreciate it. And we'll get together again at the end of July and see how wrong I can be once again. But thank you again for the time this morning. All right. Have a great day. Thank you. All right. 721 Northwest