In online searches for drugstore products, brand names are used in over 70 percent of queries. In the furniture segment, however, only every tenth search query contains a specific brand. This is the result of an analysis of Google search queries by Germans over a period of 17 months - from January 2022 to May 2023. In the segments "pets", "drugstore", "car", "tech", "furniture", "jewelry", "food", "garden", "sport" and "fashion", over 1,000 of the most frequently used search terms were each examined and analyzed for their brand reference.
Foundation instead of fashion: the hottest brands in the drugstore segment
The greatest brand reference in Google searches by Germans can be found in the drugstore sector. Over 70 percent of all searched terms contained specific brand names. Flaconi stands out in particular with an average of over 500,000 searches per month. Rituals follows with just over 300,000 searches. Kelvin Klein and Lacoste follow with around 100,000 queries each in the same period.
Among the 20 terms with the highest average search volumes, there were only five generic keywords with no direct brand reference. With comparatively higher search volumes, examples of generic terms in the drugstore segment include "Valentine's Day" and "Advent calendar". These rank particularly well due to the strong growth during the respective season.
Apple products dominate the tech segment, with a strong downward trend
Around two thirds of all keywords searched for in the technology segment contained specific brand names. One major player is undeniable here: Apple. Among the 20 most searched terms, 11 were directly related to Apple, with iPhones being searched for particularly frequently. However, if the new iPhone 14 is excluded, search queries for all Apple products fell by around 45% over the study period from the beginning of 2022 to mid-2023.
The entire Search volume of Apple products in the top 20 search queries amounted to around 3.96 million queries over a period of 17 months. In comparison, the total volume of search queries for game consoles - including Playstation 5, Nintendo Switch and Xbox Series X - amounted to only around 1.2 million in the same period.
Search queries for tech products climb disproportionately high, especially at the launch of new products. The same applies to the last quarter of the year in the tech segment, as Black Friday sales and the Christmas period increase interest in giftable products or heavily discounted goods.
New furniture - brand doesn't matter
The furniture segment shows the opposite trend. Here, only two of the 40 most searched terms have a specific brand reference. In total, only around one in ten searches here contains Keyword a brand name. Mainly generic descriptions of the furniture and objects searched for are used, such as "closet", "desk" or "sofa". This could be an indicator that general brand awareness in the furniture segment is much lower among Germans than in the tech or drugstore segment.
Niels Stuck, founder and managing director of Wolf of SEO commented:
"The search behavior of Germans on the Internet often shows how interests and priorities are shifting in relation to certain brands. Brands play a particularly important role in the lifestyle sector. This makes it all the more remarkable that there is hardly any brand awareness among Germans when it comes to furniture, for example. The right advertising for the right keywords is essential for brands in order to reach the right target group and address interested parties precisely.
About the investigation
Over 1,000 of the most searched keywords in each of the segments "pets", "drugstore", "car", "tech", "furniture", "jewelry", "food", "garden", "sport" and "fashion" were found. Germany analyzed over a period of 17 months (January 2022 to May 2023). As a result, each Keyword between "brand reference" and "generic".
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