If you have a product or service to sell or a message to spread, you must commit to consistently creating high-quality, engaging content that your clients want to see. But how do we ensure that we can keep up with our marketing goals and content strategy without our content going stale or feeling forced? Fortunately, thanks to the internet, there is almost a tool for everything! Let’s look at the top 3 content creation tools for trend spotting that will ensure that your content remains on subject and on-trend. Read on to find out more!
Google Trends: Explore what the world is searching
Another invaluable free tool from the world’s largest search engine provider, like Google Analytics, you can’t go past Google Trends. This free app allows you to ascertain not only what is trending right now, but the performance of the trending subject over time.
If you want to be seen as ‘having your finger on the pulse’ – this is for you. Google Trends will tell you what breaking news is, and you can then write your piece to incorporate this news to ride the wave of public interest (this is known as newsjacking).
Exploding Topics
There’s an old saying: “If you see a bandwagon, it’s too late.” And whilst this is not strictly true when it comes to content creation, it is always best to be ahead of the curve. So like Google Trends spots breakout trends, Exploding Topics aims to “discover trends before they’re trending” and then email them to your inbox. Not only does this make it super easy for you to manage, but it also allows you to identify and create innovative content before it becomes mainstream, showing that you are clearly an expert in your given area or field. Exploding Topics is free and comes with a paid-for Pro Version from $47 per month.
Brandwatch
So you now have two free tools to quickly discover what is trending and what is likely to trend soon (rising star content), so what else do you need? The answer is Brandwatch. Brandwatch has an extensive suite of tools that allow you to analyse, slice, dice and compute over a decade’s historical social and consumer data of brands you are interested in. Brandwatch says it will enable you to “track and benchmark conversation from leading brands and influencers, or your own competitors, to understand how others engage with and react to trends.”
Ultimately, Brandwatch is more than trendspotting; but aims to use analytics and large data sets to allow you to better understand and engage with your customers. Brandwatch is a premium service, starting from $800 per year, but it could be worth it for an established business with a strong content team.
If in doubt, look about
There is a tool for every job, and now you have three that are super easy to use – and primarily free. Having a comprehensive and relevant social media strategy is vital, but it’s no use if it takes you forever to settle on a topic to explore and discuss, or if your content is, well, old news. Save yourself time and hassle and supercharge your engagement by keeping tabs on the latest trends, both current and emerging!
