Google is used by hundreds of millions of people daily. Some people look up different things while some look up the same. Luckily, if you want to see how much something got looked up, you can do so. Google trends allows you to look up how much a word or phrase has gotten looked up since 2004.
Your company should have an analytical team to produce actionable insights and suggestions. To ensure your analytic initiatives are successful, there are three things you must follow:
- Ensuring that the analytics team knows the company strategy.
- Ensuring the analytic initiatives answer questions that support your strategy.
- Engage with stakeholders to ensure they are ok with any recommendations that will help with the strategic goals.
During this week’s module, the focus was on Social Media Actions Analytics and Search Engine Analytics. In her lecture notes, Professor Thony says Social media actions of analytics typically involve the extraction, analysis, and interpretation of the insights contained in the actions that social media users perform. Examples of everyday social media actions are like and dislike buttons, share buttons, views, clicks, tags, and mentions, to name a few. Social media analytics are important because they allow their brands to learn what it is that their audience cares about, along with what influences their decision to engage with your company or not.
Search engine analytics are essential because they help build search demand. Perhaps the most crucial aspect of search engine analytics is search engine optimization. According to Professor Sharon Thony’s lecture notes, SEO are the techniques used to improve a website’s ranking on the search engine results page to bring more customers to our website. When digging further, you get into search engine data analytics. This type of analytics deals with historical search data to gain insight into trends analysis and keyword monitoring. Google trends is a great platform to use for search engine data analytics.
This brings me to the assignment for this week. The scenario is that I am the social media manager of a coffee manufacturing company in the US, and my company is considering getting into the end user market by opening ten drive-thru coffee shops somewhere in the country in the next 12 months and then another 25 by the following year. Because management wants to limit the location of the first ten shops to a specific area, I selected Nevada and the neighboring states of Arizona and California as the three areas I will focus on.
I researched using Google Trends to prepare a report for the top management. Before I can get into the data, I must first discuss why I chose Nevada. One reason is that it is a business-friendly state with a favorable tax environment. Another reason is because of the weather. It is generally hot in Nevada year-round, which makes it appealing to many. The city of Las Vegas is in Nevada, and Las Vegas is a major resort city known primarily for its gambling, fine dining, entertainment, nightlife, and shopping. Because of this, I believe that having a coffee shop in Las Vegas would do wonders for the company because of all the people in Las Vegas, whether they live there or are visiting.
When looking at a company like Starbucks, frequent customers know that the original Starbucks is in Seattle. If you want to start a chain, it is vital to have the original location be in a prominent area. Having the original in a prominent area ensures that people will always want to visit the original, especially if they can go on a vacation to Las Vegas. It would be a win-win situation. People would be able to visit Las Vegas and do what they please while also having some amazing coffee.
After doing some research using google trends, I found that since 2004, coffee shop searches in Nevada have consistently decreased, with a slight increase in recent years. One reason could be that some of these people have lived in Nevada since 2004 and already know where coffee shops are. Another reason could be because there are no good coffee shops anymore which is why it would be perfect to limit the locations of the first ten drive-thrus in Nevada and the surrounding states of Arizona and California.
However, when looking at coffee shop searches within the past twelve months, the number of searches fluctuates, decreasing slightly during the warmer months. While Nevada is generally warm year-round, they have the most visitors during the summer and winter months.
I then used Google trends to see how many searches there were for a coffee shop in Arizona over the past 12 months. Although there were not as many high points, the search results were much more consistent. There may be more searches in Arizona because Arizona has a higher population than Nevada, which means more people are searching.
Looking now at California, the numbers are even more consistent than those of Nevada and Arizona over the past 12 months. The weather fluctuates more in California than in Nevada and Arizona, but coffee can be had at any time of the year. California is one of the most populated states in the country, so it is not surprising that the numbers for California are so consistent.
My next search compared Starbucks and Dunkin Donuts in Nevada over the past 30 days. While Starbucks is clearly the go-to place for coffee, many people also utilize Dunkin Donuts. The numbers for Dunkin Donuts were relatively consistent while the searches for Starbucks fluctuated more. However, Starbucks is consistently above Dunkin Donuts in terms of searches. The high point for Dunkin Donuts does not even come close to the low point for Starbucks.
I followed this up by individually searching the states of Nevada, Arizona, and California and looking up Coffee. The numbers when searching up coffee by itself showed much more consistent data. I first searched Nevada, then Arizona, then California. The results all showed consistent searches. However, as I went from Nevada to Arizona and then to California, the results were not only higher in Arizona and California, but in California, the numbers were consistent year-round. At the same time, Arizona also saw consistent numbers but had more dips.
After looking at this data, it has become clear that Nevada would be a perfect place to start the drive-thrus. Not only are there many people in that area, but there are also many people that visit the area, which has the potential to bring in more revenue. Las Vegas is a party city, so people need coffee to wake them up in the morning after a night out. Because of this, there is unlimited opportunity. Considering the surrounding states of Arizona and California, which are also very Populus, should be even more appealing.
I did some research and found that there are 3.03 million people in Nevada, 4.174 million in Arizona, and 39.35 million in California, for a total opportunity of about 46.5 million people. Not all these people will buy coffee or become frequent customers. Even if you only get 1% of this number to become frequent customers at your locations, you will have 4.6 million people, which would still be a magnificent number. Taking 10% of the 4.6 million, you would have 460 thousand customers. These customers would go back for coffee on other days, and some would even go every day to get some coffee.
The goal is obviously to make money and having the drive-thrus in these locations will make a lot of money. As I stated previously, there is a low tax rate, so you can keep most of your profit. If you put the first group of shops in this location, you will have no regrets and will be more than satisfied with your decision. Not only is Nevada great, but the surrounding states of Arizona and California can help significantly. By selecting these states, you will achieve more success than you ever could have imagined.