Tag Archives: trends

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Trend Tracker Is Free Help from Yelp

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Launched in 2014 at the platform’s 10th anniversary, Yelp’s Trend Tracker is receiving so much flattering business press of late that it feels like a relaunch (and I’m sure it is)! If you operate a small business and maintain an active Yelp account, whether or not you subscribe to Trend Tracker, Yelp is talking to you. If you’re a Freelance solopreneur who’s claimed your free Yelp listing and then dropped the subject, Yelp is talking to you, too. Or maybe you’re a self-employed professional, a Freelancer or SMB owner, who does not have an active Yelp account? Whatever the case, Yelp and Yelp’s Trend Tracker beckon with insightful and potentially actionable data that pertains to your industry and can support your mission to build a profitable and sustainable business entity.

What is Yelp’s Trend Tracker?

Trend Tracker is an AI-powered, cloud-based tool that monitors customer searches, reviews and interactions to identify trending topics in real time. Trend Tracker reveals and reports customer search patterns, behavior and emerging customer preferences across a broad array of industries. Trend Tracker harvests data from unique searches the Yelp platform receives each month (178 million in January 2025) and measures the frequency of specific phrases and topics used in those searches. This data sheds light on what you want to know, from customer purchasing trends to popular B2B and B2C services. Furthermore, Trend Tracker goes beyond search terms and also analyzes the text of customer reviews, to further clarify the picture.

It can literally pay to know this stuff because from time to time it may be worthwhile to respond to certain information. You may decide, for example, to update the key words in your content marketing material if Trend Tracker data indicates that target customers have begun to use certain terms when searching your product or service category.

Free market research for Freelancers and SMBs

Trend Tracker analytic insights are available free of charge—join the mailing list and you’ll receive data that is relevant and updated monthly and enables those who pay attention to access boots-on-the-ground marketing insights that can potentially help to promote your products and services more effectively. Supported by Trend Tracker, you’ll be positioned to detect and quickly respond to customer preferences, adjust marketing strategies and/or tactics to better align with shifting customer priorities and maybe even tweak your service or product line to reflect a significant shift in customer tastes.

When business decisions are guided by relevant, reliable data, decision-makers are more likely to achieve their intended outcomes. Decisions and actions that are guided by what matters to prospects and customers IRT will be immensely helpful to business owners. One of the biggest advantages of Trend Tracker is its ability to give you the heads-up on developing trends before they go mainstream and giving you time to update your position and be among the first providers to capitalize on emerging customer demand. Trend Tracker enables you to:

  • Identify emerging customer interests before they become mainstream
  • Adjust marketing strategies and tactics to respond to customer interests in a timely fashion
  • Create events and promotions that reflect developing trends
  • Improve your brand’s online visibility and search engine optimization with trending keywords
  • Stay ahead of competitors (who may not have access to reliable data-driven insights)

What else can Trend Tracker do for you?

So what’s trending that applies to you? Trustworthy intel is what’s trending and it applies to your entity in many ways. Trend Tracker data can even be a resource when you must conduct market research to evaluate your business planning, from the feasibility of scaling or expanding your venture to clarifying your decision-making as you verify, or rethink, a side hustle you hope to launch. News flash! Re: business planning, can we acknowledge that Freelancing does not exclusively pertain to B2B services such as marketing, website development, graphic arts and shooting and editing videos? Can we recognize that Freelance expertise can also be applied to a B2C service entity? In other words, could it be that upgrading home interiors is a more satisfying expression of your entrepreneurial talent than cybersecurity? That seems to be the case for the Property Brothers.

You may be interested to know that the Trend Tracker September 2024 issue reported that in 2024, home services produced record growth for business owners in that industry across the U.S. and drove an all-time revenue bonanza for the category. Trend Tracker data indicated that in 2024, home services were the fastest-growing segment of B2C services in every U.S. state plus Washington D.C. and was the top category for new business launches among all industry categories on Yelp as well. This still trending growth cycle is fueled by renter-friendly home upgrade projects. As many citizens come to recognize that attaining home ownership or trading up from starter house to a more spacious (and grand) residence is unaffordable, remaining in the current home for a longer period of time has become yet another New Normal reality.

As a way to make home feel more comfortable or look more stylish, people are investing in improvements that upgrade living spaces without upsetting the landlord. Another home services industry hot spot, this one pertaining to homeowners, is weatherproofing services that make homes more resilient to what seems like increasingly frequent extreme weather events. Trend Tracker data shows that Yelp users have increased searches for both renter-friendly and homeowner services—could responding to the growing demand become your side hustle or even your full-time Freelance or SMB enterprise? Aspiring business owners have set up shop as Freelance solopreneurs and SMBs to address those priorities, which resulted in big increases in Yelp searches in 2024 vs. 2023:

  • home organization (+362%),
  • peel and stick tile (+73%),
  • wallpapering (+41%),
  • snow removal (+36%)
  • home automation (+27%),
  • drapery installation (+11%)
  • waterproofing (+23%)

In sum, Trend Tracker can be a game-changer that might potentially have a direct impact on your ability to gain or maintain competitive advantage and monitor customer priorities—and maybe even launch a successful business or side hustle. Tara Lewis, who spent 15 years at Yelp helping businesses connect with their target customers and also served as its trend expert, advises that the best way to get started with Yelp’s Trend Tracker is to check out the latest trends noted in the monthly newsletter and pick one insight to test in your business this month. Lewis says that even a small adjustment can lead to noticeable improvements in brand visibility and sales revenue generated. She recommends the following:

  • Practice authenticity in trend-chasing. Don’t just follow trends; make them your own to help your business stand out.
  • Connect with valued customers through shared trending interests. Form meaningful connections with your community by creating events and social spaces that appeal to those who matter most.
  • Use Yelp Trend Tracker data to highlight what you already offer. Your business may be in tune with rising trends — adapt your marketing strategy to make these products or services more visible to customers.
  • Position your business for long-term trends, not just momentary fads. Some trends are fleeting; others reflect larger shifts in consumer behavior. Identify trends with staying power and incorporate them into your business vision.
  • Your brand’s unique personality is your trendiest asset. Lean into what makes your business distinctive to set yourself apart and keep customers coming back.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: © Freepik

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Trendspotting: 5 Sales and Marketing Benchmarks

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Your prospects are continuing to increase their control over the buyer’s journey, enabled by the internet and the work from home culture. That said, it makes sense for marketers to confirm our understanding of how buyers respond to your marketing activities. A few key data points, culled from a large and well-selected cohort, can provide to Freelancers and others who oversee marketing or sales functions valid insights into how buyers are responding to commonly used inbound and outbound marketing tactics in the post-COVID marketplace.

The content marketing company HubSpot, based near Boston, MA, began collecting marketing and sales outcomes data from its 100,000 + customers in January 2020 which was, as it turned out, a most interesting time to begin. Barely three months later the world would change radically. Billion dollar industries, most notably travel, hotel, restaurant and fitness, would crater. Those enterprises lucky enough to have survived, or thrived, have entered a changed business environment.

Benchmark data can provide guide posts that help you to get your bearings in the new business environment. The post-shutdown business climate demands a recalibrated understanding of customer expectations. How do prospects and customers want to experience the buyer’s journey now? How do they want to be sold? Find answers here in May 2021 data.

  • Sales meetings. The number of sales meetings in May 2021 (overwhelmingly made by videoconference call) was 21% higher than what was done last May and have risen 18% since March of this year. Knees were buckling in March 2020 and nearly every company was reeling, including those that were emerging as winners, such as grocery and liquor stores. Small business owners and leaders tended to reach out to customers sooner than larger companies. It is theorized that small business owners immediately realized that if they wanted their venture to survive, it was imperative that a plan to generate revenue had to be put into action, which usually meant figuring out a polite way to contact customers (I did the same). May 2020 was not the time to pursue new business, but rather to offer empathy and reinforce relationships that one hoped could be leveraged at some point, including relationships with those who cancelled contracts just 60 days previously.
  • Prospecting. Small business (1-25 employees) got busy prospecting at a frequency that was 31% higher in May 2021 compared to May 2020 and up 26% as compared to March 2021. Companies with 26-200 employees also saw an increase in prospecting activity of 18% as compared to May 2020, with a 17% increase as compared to March 2021.
  • Website traffic. Perfect your landing page! Website traffic was 34% higher in May 2021 than it was in May 2020. Further, website traffic increased by 25% between March and May 2021. Online shopping of various kinds, from home decor at Wayfair to the take-out dinner you’ll pick up in 20 minutes at a favorite local restaurant seems to have accounted for a big chunk of the increase. Software companies accounted for 51% of website traffic seen by HubSpot customers.
  • Chat bot. Speaking of your website’s landing page, a useful tool to add there would be a chat bot. Business moved online in a big way in March 2020, but the trend has been building for 20 years. Business owners and marketers are stepping up the functionality of company websites and adding a chat bot is a leading upgrade. Customers appreciate them because through chat, they’re able to get basic questions answered quickly and without paging through the website, which can be time-consuming. The volume of chat conversations rose 16% year-over-year May 2021 compared to May 2020.
  • Marketing emails. Reports of the death of email marketing have been greatly exaggerated and marketers are reinvesting in the genre (again!). Since the start of the pandemic shutdown in mid-March 2020, marketing email volume has increased 49% through May 2021 and is 52% higher pre-COVID volume. The open rate hovers at around 15% and that is 10% – 20% higher than April 2021.
  • Sales outcomes. U.S. Businesses adapted extremely well to the numerous protocols required by the shutdown, most dramatically demonstrated by the quick and often well- executed pivot to working from home. America means business! However, unreliable cash-flow prevented many customers from buying and that resulted in sluggish sales revenue in many organizations. In April 2020, sales outcomes bottomed out at 36% lower than 1Q20 benchmarks. Positive sales outcomes rose gradually throughout 2020 and May 2021 finished with a 10% increase in deals done (national or international companies). Deal creation (proposals) climbed 35% above benchmark.

So how do these statistics apply to you? They definitively show that the shutdown has ended, that money is being made agin and that you can make money again, too. Reboot your operation by using what have become standard marketing and sales strategies and actions.

Develop a powerful digital presence for your company. Employ Inbound and Outbound marketing and sales tactics. Optimize your website to help prospects easily find information about your products and services. Post and distribute relevant marketing content to confirm your expertise. Send emails to promote engagement with customers and prospects. Work hard, work smart.

Thanks for reading,

Kim

Image: A young lady gets serious about researching benchmark data.

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Industry Growth Trends 2015 – 2017

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Growth  is always on the minds of entrepreneurs,  business owners and Freelance consultants.  Growth is essential for the survival of a business and it can take many forms,  from an increase in current and potential customers,  to a greater number of employees,  higher profits,  or the number of products or services available for sale.  Here are projected industry trends and B2B small business growth projections through 2017 that are based on expected demand,  meaning that there will likely be more current and potential customers ready to spend money in these industries.   The list was compiled by Jackie Nagel,  author of the blog “Oh, The Places Where Your Small Business Can Grow”.

Industries expected to outpace the overall growth of the US economy are:

Technology    42% growth projected

Health care    28% growth projected

Finance          14% growth projected

Retail              14% growth projected

HR Services

Human Resources is an exceptionally broad field and all aspects are expected to show growth over the next 12 – 36 months.  Executive search,  benefits management,  payroll management,  training/ professional development/ executive coaching and compensation specialists can all expect many opportunities to expand their client lists and generate more billable hours.

Internet Security

Freelancers and small business owners do not always pay attention to the many occurrences of internet data security breaches that hackers have visited upon several large corporations.  Be advised that recently,  I was one of many who received a phishing attack email that a hacker sent illegally from the address of a colleague.  The email address lists of all recipients were at risk.  No one wants the embarrassment of a hacked email bearing our business name sent to our client list.  Internet security risks are a real concern and the need for protection is growing.  It’s time to call in a professional and set up a firewall.

Marketing Services

Small business owners often have ambitious marketing plans,  but execution can be a sticking point.  Freelancers who specialize in helping small businesses to launch their marketing strategies will be needed to bridge the time,  talent and strategy development gaps faced by many small organizations,  for-profit and not-for-profit.  The demand for social media strategies,  videography and podcast development,  website development and content marketing expertise will likewise remain strong.

Technology Services

Small business owners and Freelancers continue to explore the benefits of cloud computing for data storage,  real-time document and secure data sharing and videoconferencing.  Entrepreneurs are in search of technologies that will help them to quickly scale-up a business.  Which apps will help entrepreneurs to efficiently grow and manage their enterprise and can it all be mobile?  Demand for technological advances such as 3 D printing and online eyeglasses and contact lenses that let customers virtually try on lens ware are big new entries to the scene and the trend will be upward.  Video game and app development continues to lure talented techies into entrepreneurship as does television and home theater installation.

Green and sustainable building construction

Architects,  structural engineers,  general contractors,  electricians and manufacturers of solar panels are expected to have lots of business through 2017.  Saving money on heating and electricity with energy-efficient buildings are big priorities that real estate developers,  current homeowners and prospective buyers are willing to pay for.  Even landscapers get into the act when they design attractive alternatives to water-sucking lawns.

Boutique mind/ body fitness studios

Overweight and over-stressed Americans are ever optimistic about a new regimen to cure what ails us.  Boutique cycling,  personal training, Pilates,  yoga and meditation studios will continue to proliferate in metro areas.  These studios are less expensive to operate than traditional fitness centers primarily because participants do not perform aerobic routines in big,  mirrored studios,  nor are lines of treadmills and ellipticals needed.  Rather,  participants are confined to a mat,  stationary bike or compact training studio that is stocked with  a well-curated choice of exercise equipment.  Boutique fitness studios even use proportionately less water than traditional fitness centers because participants typically shower at home.

Thanks for reading,

Kim