With so much extra on their hands, people around the country are turning to Google to learn new skills. Data provider SEMrush takes into the minds of the general public, showing us what people searching the internet really want to know.
SEMrush has found the public are searching for skills on Google ranging from the light-hearted “learn how to backflip” up 182% in March from December 2019, to the more cerebral “how to learn sign language” 12,290 searches in March. The data is showing us Brits are a nation of gardeners, linguists, bakers, gymnasts as well as the terms most searched for related to COVID19 and lockdown.
Sign language gets the thumbs up from Brits
Since the beginning of isolation, there has been a significant rise in people searching how to learn a new language. Interestingly, while “how to learn French” (6,800 searches) and “how to learn Spanish” (7,910 searches) prove popular, the most searched for was “how to learn sign language” with over 12,290 in March 2020, a 175% increase from December 2019 (4,340 searches).
There has also been a rise in the number of people asking, “how to learn Welsh”, which almost tripled in searches from 210 in December 2019 to 590 in March 2020.
Public go bananas for baking
The nation has gone baking mad while placed in isolation. SEMrush has looked at the types of recipes searched for online and found that lockdown in March caused an increase of 74% in the total volume of searches for recipes, rising from 4,450,000 in December 2019 to 7,743,900 in March 2020.
It seems the public are turning to comfort food more so than healthy food, with searches for “salad recipes” featuring way down in 83rd place. Baking, however, has proved to be the most popular type of cooking, with the top five searched for recipe terms being; “pancake recipe”, “banana bread recipe”, “bread recipe”, “scone recipe”, “flapjack recipe”.
With that in mind, it seems likely there will be a big spike in people searching for their local dentist once lockdown is over.
Millions search for furlough
The most dramatic changes in search volumes come from an analysis of COVID-19 related terms. From February 2020 to March 2020 there has been a 62,122% increase in people searches related to “Furlough”, going from 3,600 in February to 2,240,000 in March 2020.
A list of the other top five most searched for terms can be found below:
A surge in self-sufficient Brits seeking spuds
Data looking British gardening habits shows a dramatic increase in the numbers of people looking to grow their own fruit and veg in the face of the COVID-19 shutdown.
The new data shows that in March alone, there were 1,417,000 garden-related searches by shutdown Brits, many of them looking for tips on how to grow your own fruit and vegetables – an increase of 113% on the numbers of people searching for the same information pre-lockdown.
With online searches for ‘how to grow potatoes’ increasing by 834%, onions at 407% and carrots and tomatoes, both up 406% month on month, it’s obvious to see which larder staples Brits don’t want to face dinner without.
Ambitiously – there has also been a dramatic spike in people searching for how to grow their own avocados, up 83%.
There is also a tropical twist to what people want growing in their gardens, with Watermelon and Pineapple also proving popular searches alongside more traditional British staples – up 46% and 83% respectively.
Searches for ‘vegetable garden’ alone have spiked by 175% over the last month.
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