The Great SEO Experiment of 2025

This started with a simple mistake. I looked up the latest Google search trends while waiting for the kettle and found myself wondering whether I could weave them all into a single blog post.

It took me back to countless pitch meetings where agencies would send over Google’s “Year in Search” video to set the mood. My colleagues loved it. The music rose, the montage sparkled and, for a moment, it felt as if the entire year made perfect sense. If you want to look up the lists yourself, Google Trends publishes them publicly and it is very easy to lose an hour there.

So I decided to try a stripped back version. No sentimental montage. Just a written experiment using the most searched phrases people type into Google. A creative prompt disguised as a stunt.

This year’s list includes everything from OpenAI, Taylor Swift, Beyoncé, ChatGPT, iPhone 17 and Euro 2025 to UFO sightings, flights to London and the weather tomorrow. Mixed in with that are the familiar practicalities of modern life. Gold price today. Mortgage calculator. How to fix a dishwasher. Ryanair delays. Arsenal’s chances next season. Even the rise of the so called AI girlfriend. Plus Trump of course. It’s a cultural kaleidoscope, if a slightly chaotic one.

Where creativity ends and the algorithm begins

What becomes clear is that search data shows what people look for, not what they value. It’s noise, not insight. Useful in places, misleading in others, and oddly entertaining when treated as a snapshot of collective behaviour. The better ideas still come from paying attention to people, not keywords.

But an experiment is an experiment, so here it is. A piece of writing knowingly filled with trend bait, arranged as neatly as possible. If you landed here through one of those searches, welcome. You are part of the test.

I’ll check the analytics in a week to see whether anything interesting happened. Either way, the exercise proves that creativity can sit alongside the algorithm without being shaped by it.