By Rieva Lesonsky
Google Wants to Keep You Fashion Forward
Google is getting into the fashion business—and that’s good news for fashion entrepreneurs. If you sell clothing or accessories, wouldn’t it be helpful to know what fashion items consumers were searching for?
Well, who knows that better than Google? The search giant just launched its first report, Fashion Trends for 2015 as Told by Google Data.
This is how it works: Google is looking at what fashions people are searching and then, “by categorizing past apparel-related queries” they’re identifying “trends to watch and trends to forget.” There’s a little more to it, but suffice it to say, it makes sense.
If you want to stock the fashions consumers are searching for this spring, you’ll make sure you have plenty of:
- Tulle skirts. From January 2014 to this January, searches for tulle skirts (the kind ballerinas wear) are up 34 percent. Of course, as The New York Times point out, a search does not necessarily equal a sale, but the data is interesting nonetheless. Google Data reports the trend for tulle started on the West Coast and consumers are searching for it “in all colors of the rainbow (and even in rainbow), but the most popular colors are…black and white.”
- Jogger pants. Searches are for women, men and kids. Apparently the most searched style is jogger pants with emojis. (Not sure that’s a keeper.)
- Midi skirts. This trend is “making its way back to the U.S.” from the U.K. where its popularity was reborn in 2013. Though it’s not quite as popular as tulle skirts or jogger pants, Google Data says the “midi skirt has seen 9x growth in searches” in the last three years.
The key, of course is to get the scoop from Google and find a place (Alibaba, perhaps) to get the goods in a hurry so you can take advantage of each trend.
Rieva Lesonsky is CEO of GrowBiz Media, a media and custom content company focusing on small business and entrepreneurship. Email Rieva at rieva@smallbizdaily.com, follow her on Google+ and Twitter.com/Rieva.
Photo Courtesy: Anthropologie
