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  • 7 Games and Activities Designed to Boost Call Center Agent Engagement

    Managing a call center team isn’t easy. Call center agents are customer service providers 24/7, which means they need to deal with customers with varying moods all day.
    Due to the nature of their work, it’s common to see call centers struggle with low agent engagement. And if managers aren’t paying attention, this dynamic can severely impact work performance, customer satisfaction, and other aspects of their operation.
    While there are plenty of ways to engage call center agents, there is one low-cost, fun way to boost motivation and general satisfaction with your employees – games!
    How to Foster Agent Engagement in a Hybrid Contact Center
    Why do games help call center agent engagement?
    Games might seem juvenile at first glance, but gamification is a popular and highly effective way to engage your staff, no matter their age. By mixing a bit of fun with performance incentives at your call center, you might see more sales, more smiles, and more engagement!
    Motivational games can also boost agents’ productivity at work, and there are many different kinds of games to play. Here are a few additional reasons to add games to your call center agent engagement strategy:
    They’re inexpensive.
    Contact centers don’t always have the budget for an employee trip or paid course. Games and activities are usually low cost, and their impact comes from creativity and planning.
    They assist with training and performance.
    The best games are not only fun, but also opportunities for learning. Some games, when executed properly, can help agents absorb and internalize information more effectively while boosting their performance.
    They bring your team together
    Games create a great structure for team bonding. This is especially true for call centers that operate remotely, or for call centers that have become remote due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
    8 great games to boost call center agent engagement.
    So what are you waiting for? Check out our list of games and activities to try with your team of call center agents:
    Contact Center Knockout.
    Contact Center Knockout is a great game to play if you don’t have a lot of time or resources. A dry marker board is all you need!
    Instructions:

    Draw a grid on the dry marker game, with a box for each member of your crew.
    Anytime an agent makes a sale, they can put their initials inside the box. Once all the boxes are filled, agents can “knockout” other agents from their boxes with more sales.
    If an agent makes a significantly large sale, or if they receive excellent feedback from a customer, they can “lock” the box so nobody else can take it.
    The call center manager chooses the winning boxes before the game begins, and whoever has initials in those boxes get a prize. Some centers use cash, gift cards, early sign offs or sleep-ins, and food for prizes.

    This game is a great way to add a bit of fun competition to your agents’ day-to-day, and encourage more sales.
    Zip Code Bingo.
    Call center agents deal with diverse customers from different areas all the time. Zip code Bingo uses that diversity to help drive engagement.
    Instructions:

    Managers give agents bingo cards with zip codes instead of numbers. For example, 101 for Manhattan NY, or 103 for Staten Island, NY.
    Agents cross out those zip codes after speaking to a customer who lives in that area.
    The first agent who gets a line, cross, or “full house” gets a prize.

    This game helps agents become efficient in their calls, as they want to move onto the next customer to cross out another postal code. While this is usually a good thing, it’s important to make sure agents aren’t rushing calls to the detriment of the customer’s experience.
    Call Center Monopoly.
    For call center monopoly, all you need is a pen and paper, and a die.
    Instructions:

    Create a new monopoly board, but with property names relevant to the call center. Keep the “Go to Jail,” “Chance,” and “Community Chest” squares, however.
    Set aside 10-15 minutes each week or each day to play.
    Each participant gets monopoly money before the game begins, and can roll the die once they meet a certain KPI target. For example, reaching a number of sales in one day. Each time they pass go, they collect a certain amount of money.
    Instead of spending Monopoly money on property or hotels, the goal is to keep as much of the money as you can over time.
    After an extended period of time, perhaps a couple of months, players can use their monopoly money on prizes like more breaks, early sign off, lunch with the CEO, or any other treats you feel could work.

    This game is great for coworker communication and interaction, and long-term productivity boosts.
    Snakes & Ladders.
    For this game, you’ll need a large snakes & ladders board to post on a wall, or somewhere else that the team can easily access.

    Agents can roll the dice if they receive positive feedback on the IVR survey
    The survey asks about the customer’s experience – specifically, how much effort the call took, on a scale from 1 to 9.
    If the agent receives a 9, they can roll the dice and move up or down the board.

    This game is a great way to encourage call center agents to ensure customers are satisfied with their calls. It’s also a great way to make use of Fonolo’s Visual Interactive Voice Response (IVR) system, which is accessible, multi-lingual, and gives your agents real-time updates on the status of your call-backs.
    What’s a Visual IVR and How Does it Improve CX?
    Mystery Prize.
    Mystery Prize is another cost-effective game that boosts agent engagement.
    Instructions:

    Hide a prize somewhere in your call center. Make sure it’s a prize that won’t easily be found or guessed by your team.
    The agent who performs the best on a decided metric each day gets a clue. Each clue should help the agent get closer and closer to the prize.
    The first person that finds the prize wins.

    This game really helps agents boost their performance using metrics that are timely and relevant to your call center’s needs.
    Quality Scores Baseball.
    Instructions:

    Every month or every year, hold a competition for agents to win “home runs” based on their performance
    The agent with the most home runs at the end of the month or year wins tickets to a baseball game.
    You can alter the theme of this game to suit different sports preferences, like basketball, tennis, or football, depending on what your team enjoys.

    This game helps agents prioritize performance over the long term. While quick wins are always nice, incentivizing a longer-term, strong performance can help keep sales steady
    Agent Target Practice.
    This game is a great way for agents to relax and enjoy themselves without thinking about sales for a moment. It’s important to decompress sometimes too, so this could be a great way to give employees that little break that they need to jump back into making those sales!
    Instructions:

    Separate your agents into teams
    Each team rolls the die to determine how many bean bags or tennis balls they can throw.
    Managers decide the value of points for each target.
    The first team to reach an agreed-upon number of points wins!
    The winning team gets a small prize.

    Get your call center into a festive mood.
    Holidays are great opportunities to get your call center in a festive mood. Managers and employees might share culturally festive foods and treats to share on the days nearing Christmas, Easter, Diwali, Kwanzaa, and more.
    There are also many opportunities throughout the year to play holiday games. You could have a leprechaun relay or St. Paddy’s Day trivia for St. Patrick’s Day. Or, you could try a Halloween Jinx or candy corn game for Halloween.
    Don’t force your call center agents to participate.
    While the benefits of engaging employees through games are clear, it’s important to remember that if anything is forced, it’s not fun. Some agents might not be comfortable with the public competition or exposure brought on by workplace games. Additionally, if a manager forces their agents to play a specific game, it can be seen as patronizing.
    Instead of deciding on one game for everyone to play, allow your agents to choose which game they’d like to play. And, if they don’t want to play any games, ask them about any other ideas they have. Taking your agents’ voices and opinions into account increases their engagement because it helps them feel valued.
    5 Important Strategies for Agent Engagement in 2021
    The bottom line.
    Call center agents learn a lot from their day-to-day work, and the many call centers offer opportunities for learning and growth. However, when it comes to your job, culture is important too. Having quality time with your coworkers and management, enjoying each others’ company, celebrating holidays, and having a little fun once in a while goes a long way with employee engagement.The post Blog first appeared on Fonolo.

  • Over the circumstances

    How do you act when you’re in charge? Or when someone else is in control?

    How do you act when you win? Or when you lose?

    Is there a difference between the times you’ve been given the benefit of the doubt and the times you wish you had?

    The circumstances change, but perhaps the way we’d like to contribute, to be seen and to connect shouldn’t.

    The circumstances are here, no matter what we do. It’s up to us to decide to be under them or over them.

  • 5 Emails for Summer Campaign Inspiration

    Summer is here!  It’s the time of year for taking time off from work and setting up much-needed vacations. Taking advantage of the warmer weather (or traveling to climates with warmer weather) is what summer is all about. And while it all may seem like fun and games, summertime is also synonymous with declining sales.…
    The post 5 Emails for Summer Campaign Inspiration appeared first on Benchmark Email.

  • Getting Back to The Office: An Evening with Dunder Mifflin’s Finest

    According to Michael Scott, “Real business is done on paper.” Considering we help companies send more than 180 billion personalized emails every year, however, we have other opinions.
    Regardless of how you do business, though, the last year has been full of changes. After all, who thought you’d be balancing Wi-Fi priorities between your work and school Zoom calls? Or that you’d forget what wearing pants all day feels like?
    We’ve been away from work for so long that many of us have forgotten our favorite parts about office culture. So, how will things like Casual Friday, coworker gossip, and coffee breaks change as a result of this ‘new normal?’
    The Future of Work?
    The truth is, nobody has all the answers. So, we asked two of our favorite accountants to lead Back to The Office: An Evening with Dunder Mifflin’s Finest. And while Chili’s wasn’t at 100% capacity yet, this virtual experience still brought Kevin, Oscar, and hundreds of marketers together to discuss the future of office life.
    If you weren’t there, you missed out on an intimate, hour-long Q&A session with Brian Baumgartner and Oscar Nunez that covered topics like:

    The art of prop comedy
    What they’ve both been learning and doing at home during the pandemic

    Untold, behind-the-scenes stories from the set of The Office

    Their predictions about the future of office culture

    Fortunately, for the next month you can access our full recording of this experience. Simply click here, enter ‘dundies’ into the password prompt, sit back, and enjoy!
    The post Getting Back to The Office: An Evening with Dunder Mifflin’s Finest appeared first on Campaign Monitor.

  • Salesforce User Experience (UX) Designer Certification Available Now!

    The brand new Salesforce User Experience (UX) Designer Certification is available now! If you navigate to Trailhead credentials, you’ll see there is a new role called “Salesforce Designer” and the new credential “User Experience (UX) Designer”.  “Are you passionate about creating human-centered user experiences? Salesforce… Read More

  • 3 Actions to Take on the Road to Leadership Bravery

    “The best way to learn if you can trust somebody is to trust them.”
    – Ernest Hemingway
    Companies that practice what I call “leadership bravery” are choosing to reverse the trend on business practices that have defined their industries. Through leadership guidance and company actions,  they are establishing more balanced relationships, where both sides win.  Both customer and company are better off because they are in each other’s lives.
    What Does Leadership Bravery Look Like?
    Ask how we will and will not grow.
    Three common behaviors are common among these admired companies as they move in this direction. First, leaders are clear about how they will and will not grow.  Leaders diligently take actions to point out exactly what the high road is; creating a path for the company to follow.  For example, by refusing to open their stores on Black Friday, REI’s CEO took a stand to inspire employees and the marketplace by deciding how they would and would not grow.  For REI, Black Friday is a family day, not a commerce day.  Airbnb takes the high road by showing employees how to embrace the coda “belong anywhere:” building its culture of “belonging.”
    Lean into transparency.
    Next, they choose to be transparent in explaining the “why” behind their actions, such as pricing or how and why they build products the way that they do.  By sharing information about their products and pricing, and by openly transferring knowledge to customers they prove they want to do what’s best for them.
    When writing my book, Would You Do That To Your Mother?, I learned a term that describes this approach to fearlessly sharing, that builds bonds with customers: “radical transparency.” In that book, you’ll read about OVO Energy in the UK, who practices this level of transparency with customers by opening up their pricing plans to the public, outlining exactly what the energy costs are to them, so customers feel equity in what they are paying.  As a result, they are earning customer raves and growth.
    Transparency, increasingly, is becoming more important to customers, and more differentiating for brands.  A recent Harvard Business Review article cites a study by researchers at the MIT Sloan School of Management, which found that consumers may be willing to pay 2% to 10% more for products from companies that provide greater supply chain transparency.
    Level the playing field.
    Finally, these admired companies choose to level the playing field, reducing or eliminating practices where in the past, customers might have felt that the company was holding all the cards. They are deliberately resisting or changing industry practices so that customers feel a balanced and equitable partnership, and one based on trust. For example, Luscious Garage brings the technician and customer together as partners making decisions.  As a result, they have eliminated that phone call of waiting for the ‘final’ estimate of the car repair, turning the experience instead into one of collaboration, trust, and even joy.
    Why Take the High Road?
    Some of the high-road actions these admired companies take to grow may sound irrational.  But repeatedly, examples of their bravery in committing to customer relationships have proven otherwise.  They build bonds by the humanity that their acts display.
    The high road is a choice.  And while it’s not always the easiest choice, it’s the one you’ll be happiest about in the rearview mirror. It’s the stuff that clearly makes that mom of yours proud.
    The high road is also the route to success for companies who take this path. Empirical data and anecdotes from customers and employees prove that behaving in this manner grows a business.  Fred Reichheld was one of the first to connect the dots between “golden rule behavior” and business growth.  Further, Danny Meyer’s Hospitality Quotient proves how companies with business practices and employees that deliver values based and human experiences significantly beat the S&P 500. But the key to growing in this manner is leadership.  Leaders must build a company that believes that doing the right thing is the right way to grow.

    Some of the high-road actions companies take to grow may sound irrational. But repeatedly, examples of their bravery in committing to customer relationships have proven otherwise. It can be a route to success.Click To Tweet

    Leadership Bravery Pays Dividends
    As customers, we desire to give our trust to companies who trust us back.  We seek out companies whose employees are given permission to do the right thing, and where we are honored as assets. We breathe a sigh of relief and gratitude when “Gotcha!” moments are flipped to “We’ve got your back” moments. We applaud accountability  because we know that everyone makes mistakes.  And we thank goodness for the companies who level the playing field, and give us information to prosper.
    It takes all of us years of experience to figure out exactly how we, as leaders, will take the high road.  But as we go through the ups and downs of living…it becomes clearer.  Situations provide the choice.  The hard work is having the life lessons to test it out.  Those moments where my dad would say to me, “Jeanne, you can learn from this if you let yourself.”

    This blog post is excerpted and adapted from Would You Do That To Your Mother? 
    Learn more about the book and find out where to order »
    The post 3 Actions to Take on the Road to Leadership Bravery appeared first on Customer Bliss.

  • Getting Back to The Office: An Evening with Dunder Mifflin’s Finest

    According to Michael Scott, “Real business is done on paper.” Considering we help companies send more than 180 billion personalized emails every year, however, we have other opinions.
    Regardless of how you do business, though, the last year has been full of changes. After all, who thought you’d be balancing Wi-Fi priorities between your work and school Zoom calls? Or that you’d forget what wearing pants all day feels like?
    We’ve been away from work for so long that many of us have forgotten our favorite parts about office culture. So, how will things like Casual Friday, coworker gossip, and coffee breaks change as a result of this ‘new normal?’
    The Future of Work?
    The truth is, nobody has all the answers. So, we asked two of our favorite accountants to lead Back to The Office: An Evening with Dunder Mifflin’s Finest. And while Chili’s wasn’t at 100% capacity yet, this virtual experience still brought Kevin, Oscar, and hundreds of marketers together to discuss the future of office life.
    If you weren’t there, you missed out on an intimate, hour-long Q&A session with Brian Baumgartner and Oscar Nunez that covered topics like:

    The art of prop comedy
    What they’ve both been learning and doing at home during the pandemic

    Untold, behind-the-scenes stories from the set of The Office

    Their predictions about the future of office culture

    Fortunately, for the next month you can access our full recording of this experience. Simply click here, enter ‘dundies’ into the password prompt, sit back, and enjoy!
    The post Getting Back to The Office: An Evening with Dunder Mifflin’s Finest appeared first on Campaign Monitor.

  • Customer Onboarding & Project Management for Salesforce [In-Depth Review]

    TaskRay is a Salesforce native, customer onboarding and project management application, designed to make projects organized, repeatable, and scalable. TaskRay enables you to deliver flawless customer service, automate and template repeatable tasks and projects, as well as easily identify and report potential issues. This in-depth… Read More

  • How to Embed Video in Email [Quick Tip]

    Nowadays, video is an undeniably popular channel for marketing purposes.
    In fact, in 2021, 86% of businesses use video as a marketing tactic.
    If you’re an email marketer, I’m willing to bet you’ve considered how you might spruce up your subscription and click-through rates with video. It’s a good idea in theory, with roughly two-thirds of consumers preferring video over text when learning about new products or services.
    In reality, however, it can be tricky. Major email clients including Gmail, Yahoo, and Outlook don’t support embedded videos, so your subscribers either won’t be able to watch your video within the email, or worse — they won’t see your email at all, because it’ll end up in their spam folders.
    Fortunately, there’s a creative workaround to help you embed part of your video within your email, and incentivize subscribers to click-through to watch the rest. Here, let’s explore how to do just that.

    Embed YouTube (or Any Other) Video in Email
    There are two options you might consider when embedding a video within your email — you can either embed a GIF of your video with a “click here to watch full video” CTA, or you can embed a still photo of your video, and when subscribers click the “Play” button, they’ll be re-routed to your video’s URL.
    Let’s explore the GIF option, first.

    You can use the following instructions on any video from a video hosting platform of your choosing, including YouTube, Vimeo, Facebook, DailyMotion, etc. In the following examples we used a Facebook URL, but a YouTube URL would work just as well. 
    1. Find the URL of the video you want to include, or download and save your video to your computer.
    To create a GIF of a video I wanted to include in my email, I first went to HubSpot’s Facebook page and copied the URL of a recent video the team uploaded to the site — “How a Senior SEO Strategist Sees the World”.

    2. Go to Imgflip.com, a tool that enables you to create GIFs of videos.

    You can upload a URL directly to Imgflip, or you can upload a video you have saved on your computer. For our purposes, I copied and pasted the URL from HubSpot’s Facebook page. Alternatively, you can copy and paste a YouTube URL or website URL. 

    3. Choose a starting point and end point for your GIF.

    Once your video is finished downloading, you’ll see this pop-up. There are two triangles that can help you choose where you’d like to start and stop your GIF — if you move the green one you’re choosing a starting point for your GIF, and if you move the red one you’re choosing an end point.

     

    (It’s important to note, for non-Pro accounts, you can’t create a GIF that lasts longer than 20 seconds on Imgflip.)

    Once you’ve chosen a clip you’d like to use for your GIF, click “Generate GIF”.

    4. Download your GIF. 
    Once your GIF has been generated, you’ll have the option to copy-and-paste the image link or image URL. Instead, click “Download .gif”.
    5. Drag-and-drop your GIF into your email, and add a video CTA linking to the full video. 
    Now comes the fun part! Simply create your email to send to your subscribers, and drag-and-drop your GIF from your desktop into the email itself.
    Below the GIF, create a video CTA, like “Click to view full video here” with a URL to your video (the URL will likely lead to your own website, YouTube, Facebook, or another social platform).

    You can spruce up your email subject line with “Video included” to further incentivize click-through rates.
    Of course, you’ll want to use email marketing best practices when embedding a GIF, and ensure the video you want to include is truly a compelling, interesting piece of content for your email subscribers.
    This is a unique opportunity to further engage with your prospects and customers, so make sure to use it wisely — don’t just send a video advertisement for your products or services.
    Next, let’s explore how you might include a still image of your video with a “Play” button.
    How to Create a Still Image of Your Video With a Play Button
    1. For this example, I’ll use the same video as before. Instead of copying the URL, however, I simply screenshotted a paused section of the video.

    2. When I paused the Facebook video, it automatically included a “Play” button. However, if you screenshot a video while it’s playing, you might not have a “Play” button. To add one to a still image, go to the website Add Play Button to Image, upload your image, choose a play button design, and click “Create Play Button Image”.
    Then, click “Download Image”.

    3. Next, simply click “Insert Photo” in your email to include the image with the Play button. Then, highlight the image and select “Insert Link”. Copy-and-paste the link to the full video (in this case I pasted the Facebook URL, but you can also paste a URL to a website with your video, or YouTube).

    4. And that’s it! Now, when a subscriber clicks on your image, they’ll be redirected to the full video. Ensure the video auto-plays so the subscriber doesn’t have to click “Play” again.

    How to Embed a Video in a HubSpot Email
    1. If you’re a HubSpot email tool user, you’ll see a Video module on the left-side of your screen when you’re creating an email. 
    Simply drag-and-drop the module into the section of the email you’d like to include a video.

    2. Next, you have the option to Embed a video using a URL, or uploading a video to your COS. For our purposes, let’s copy-and-paste a YouTube URL into the text box.
    3. Finally, edit the video to suit your needs. You can modify the video’s width and height, and even create a custom thumbnail.
    4. When you’re ready, click the orange “Review and send” button at the top-right of your screen.
    How to Use HTML5 Code to Embed Video in Email
    Finally, some email clients do support embedded video. If you feel it’s the right strategy for your subscribers, you can embed a video within email using HTML5.
    Here’s an example of an HTML5 code you might use in your email:
    <video width=”300″ height=”200″ controls>
    <source src=”movie.mp4″ type=”video/mp4″>
    <source src=”movie.ogg” type=”video/ogg”>

    </video>
    If the video isn’t supported, your subscriber can see a static image linking to another page, instead.
    If you don’t have experience coding, you might consider asking a developer to help you, or take a look at W3 School’s HTML5 Video article.
    However, it’s important to note — we don’t recommend this strategy, since you risk either ending up in your subscribers’ spam folders, or using code that many of your subscribers’ email clients won’t support. Ultimately, it could be more trouble for many of your subscribers’ than it’s worth.
    To ensure your video can be seen by all your subscribers, I’d recommend one of the strategies listed above, instead.
    If you’re looking for other opportunities to boost email click-through rates and conversions, take a look at HubSpot’s free email marketing tool.

     

  • 25 Google Search Statistics to Bookmark ASAP

    In many ways, marketing is a game of trend watching. The marketer who’s best at spotting and using trends earns their business market share, brand recognition, and ultimately, revenue.
    But how do you search for trends? And where do you start?
    Well, since it owns more than 92% of the global search engine market, the answer to both of these questions is, Google.

    Google’s nearest competitor, Bing, only holds 2.5% of market share, while Yahoo accounts for 1.5%. The distribution has remained relatively stable over the past few years with Google consistently claiming competitive victory thanks to detailed search results, in-depth analytics, and evolving service offerings.
    Consider the rapid uptake of “Google” as a verb meaning, “to search” — “I’ll just Google it,” “can’t you Google that?” “isn’t it on Google?” It’s not an exaggeration to say that when it comes to searching for information online, Google is — by far — the digital frontrunner.
    Google also makes efforts to personalize search results, in turn, increasing the chances that users will opt for Google the next time they have a question. For users that aren’t logged into a Gmail or another Google account, the company uses anonymously stored browser cookies to get a sense of search histories and preferences.
    For users signed into their Google account, Chrome’s browser history provides the data necessary for Google to construct a profile based on age, language preference, gender and search preferences, which informs the type of search results returned. Location offers an easy example of this approach — if users have location services turned on, Google search results will be filtered by geographic location to increase overall relevance.
    Now, let’s look at a few of this year’s top Google Search statistics and take a deeper dive into the trending searches that guide your marketing strategy.
    Top Google Search Statistics in 2021
    Now that we know how to search for trending topics, let’s look at how Google influences search with these latest statistics.

    The top five Google searches in 2020 were “Election results,” “Coronavirus,” “Kobe Bryant,” “Coronavirus update,” and — unsurprisingly — “Coronavirus symptoms.” (Google)
    More than 50% of Google searches end without a click. (Search Engine Land)
    92% of all search queries are long-tailed keywords. (Backlinko)
    As of October 2020, there were more than 267 million unique U.S. visitors to Google. (Statista)
    89% of URLs and 37% of URLs in positions 1-20 rank differently on mobile and desktop. (SEMRush)
    There are now more than 1.8 billion Gmail users worldwide. (TechJury)
    Compressing images and text could help 25% of web pages save more than 250KB and 10% save more than 1 MB. These changes reduce bounce rates and increase page rank on Google SERPs. (Google)
    Chrome accounted for 69% of web browser market share in 2020. (Net Marketshare)
    In 2021, 56% of web traffic took place on mobile phones. (Broadband Search)
    14% of Google searches are a question. (Backlinko)
    In 2020, 500 keywords accounted for 8.4% of all search volume. (Backlinko)
    The average click-through rate for first place on desktop is higher than that of mobile, at 31.5% and 24% respectively. (Advanced Web Ranking)
    Four times as many people are likely to click on a paid search ad on Google (63%) than on any other search engine — Amazon (15%), YouTube (9%), and Bing (6%). (Clutch)
    55% of teens use voice search on Google every day. (Marketing Dive)
    55% of people clicking on Google search ads prefer those to be text ads. (Clutch)
    For every $1 businesses spend on Google Ads, they make an average of $2 in revenue. (Google)
    The average click-through rate in Google Ads across industries is 3.17% in the search network and 0.46% on the display network. (WordStream)
    The average cost-per-click for a keyword is about $0.61. (Backlinko)
    The average cost-per-click in AdWords across all industries is $48.96 for search and $75.51 for display. (WordStream)
    More than 90% of web pages receive zero organic traffic from Google. Just about 5% receive 10 visits or less each month. (Ahrefs)
    A third of all Google searches are for an image and 13% of SERPs feature an “Image Pack.” (Moz)
    The average keyword is roughly two words long. (Backlinko)
    The average conversion rate in AdWords across all industries is 3.75% for search and 1.77% for display. (WordStream)
    There are over 190 different versions of Google Search. (GiT Magazine)
    25. When Google opened its proverbial doors in September 1998, it only averaged about 10,000 daily search queries. (“The Search

    With search volumes constantly fluctuating in response to world events and evolving news coverage, it’s worth knowing what searches are trending, how quickly they’re ramping up, and how they tie into similar keyword queries.
    While one option is a scattershot approach — simply type a potential trend term into Google and see how many total results are reported — more targeted options often provide an easier path to improved search performance.
    Let’s review some of the most useful tools available in the section below.
    1. Google Trends

    Review the “Year in Search,” take Google Trends lessons, and see what’s trending now. You can also view the peaks and valleys of topic interest over time, which uncovers seasonality and allows you to plan your marketing calendar accordingly. Plus, find related topics and queries, and identify sub-regions your topic has been trending to better target your campaigns.

    2. Think with Google

    Discover articles, benchmark reports, and consumer insights that keep you up to speed on search. From ad bidding strategies to brand jingles, you’ll find interesting content that helps you think bigger while staying educated on how to leverage Google search for your business.

    3. Twitter

    Sign on to Twitter for more than vaguely hostile political debates. Use the “trends” feature to uncover what’s trending in your state, country, or around the globe. When you click into a trend, you’ll see top tweets about the topic, relevant news stories, and live responses as well.
    Image Source
    4. BuzzSumo

    Identify the most shared content in the previous 12 months or the last 24 hours with BuzzSumo. BuzzSumo allows you to drill down and analyze the topics that matter to your industry, your competitors, and the influencers you learn from.

    5. Feedly

    This RSS feed aggregator allows you to follow your favorite brands and see their most recent content in one place. Add your favorites and discover new publishers by searching your industry, skills, or — you guessed it — trending topics. Feedly also allows you to set up keyword alerts, so you’re always tracking the latest trends on topics you’re interested in.

    6. Reddit

    Freshness and user-based voting determine how content is prioritized on Reddit. A quick visit to the homepage shows you trending or popular posts. And, you can filter by country or recency for a more relevant feed.

    7. Ahrefs

    Conduct competitive research, home in on a keyword, or search for trending topics. Ahrefs helps you identify trending content and shows you what to do to outrank your competitors.

    8. Pocket

    Pocket allows you to save content from anywhere on the web. Review your content whenever you wish and head to the Explore page to find trending topics that are relevant to you.

    9. Quora

    Sign up for Quora and select topic areas that interest you (e.g., “startups,” “marketing,” and “economics”). Quora will stock your feed with questions related to your content interests. This gives you insight into what your customers are asking, real-time debates about competitors, and even allows you to answer questions about topics you have experience in.

    Expanding Your Google Impact
    Bottom line? Google owns the largest piece of both search and web browser market shares and provides a host of interconnected services that empower the company to deliver personalized, real-time search results.
    For marketers, this makes Google an irreplaceable tool for boosting consumer loyalty, courting new clients, and improving customer conversions. Armed with actionable trend data and relevant source statistics, marketing teams can expand their Google impact and ensure the right content gets seen by the right customers to jumpstart the sales process.