I was wondering if the guys at Google could use their Insider status to use search patterns for business opportunities.
On some certain day there may be MILLIONS of sites containing the phrase “push-rod V8” but relatively fewer searches for that phrase.
Let’s suppose an Insider at Google notices that on a certain day million of people are searching the net for the phrase “electro-compounded Gas Turbine”, yet only about 300 sites exist on the net discussing electro-compounded gas turbines.
“HEY!”, sez he, “Demand outstrips Supply. Lets start investing in Electro-Compounded Gas Turbines!”
Can Google and other Search Engines be tapped for market trends this way?
My guess would be is that, yes, search engines will sell data like that. In fact, if you sign up for Google Ad Words, you can see which keywords are “hotter” by their price-per-click. You can figure out how many sites are out there by just searching for the keyword.
However, by the time there’s a substantial increase in searches for something it is usually too late to be the first few to capitalize on the hype.
It a pretty good idea. I am sure it could be used in some way. It also seems like that type of data would show up much faster than other sources so that could be useful for fast business decisions.
If Google, had some kind of pay-for-use web interface that lets someone build their own statistics, I think that could be used in a lot of ways.