Google Shows How People Search

11 January 2010

Every year, Google gives us a look at the most popular search for terms for the year. The 2009 results show the ten fastest rising and falling search terms on both a global scale, and within the United States. "Michael Jackson" was the fastest rising search term globally, with "Beijing 2008" as the fastest falling term. Within the United States, "Twitter" was the fastest rising search term, and "John McCain" was the fastest falling.

Interestingly, has also revealed some other interesting facts with regards to search behavior over the course of 2009:

• Country with the greatest increase in Google web search traffic in 2009 from 2008: Indonesia
• Average amount of time it takes Google to answer a query: Less than 1/4 second
• Proportion of Google users in the U.S. making over one query per day: 7 out of 10
• Proportion of Google users in the U.S. making over 10 queries per day: 1 out of 7
• Fraction of Google queries, duplicates excluded, never seen before: More than 1/3
• Approximate percentage of Internet users in Indonesia: 11.1%
• Average amount of time it takes a user to finish entering a query: 9 seconds
• Median distance from a user's location to ice skating rinks found on Google Maps: 30km
• Median distance from a user's location to ski resorts found on Google Maps: 300km
• Fraction of Google queries, duplicates included, never seen before: More than 1/5
• Number of search quality improvements made by Google in 2009: 540, ~1.5 each day
• Proportion of Google result pages that show a map in search results: 1 in 13
• Average increase in driving distance on weekends vs. weekdays on Google Maps: 11km

This kind of statistical insight can provide an interesting glimpse of search on a broad scale. Those of us who are directly connected to the search and marketing industries can often find it difficult to step out of the box and look at search from the average person's perspective. Information gleaned from industry giants like this can often help to put things in the the perspective.