October 21, 2018 - Google has been collecting data about its users for more than a decade. What are the trends and interest in Croatia since the launch of Google Trends in 2004?
It is just over three months since Croatia almost broke the Internet. More than 60 BILLION views on Croatia-related articles in the wake of the national football team's heroics in Russia was more online love than the tiny country which dared to dream had received in the previous 28 years as an independent country, according to media monitoring agency Mediatoolkit. Eleven dudes kicking around a field in Russia did more to attract interest in their native country than everyone else in 28 years - awesome!
For a visual appreciation, Google Trends is a website by Google that analyzes the popularity of top search queries in Google Search across various regions and languages. The website uses graphs to compare the search volume of different queries over time.
And it wasn't just Croatia that was popular - captain Luka Modric was in demand as well, a lot more so than at any time of his career.
And, with footballing success, a huge spike in interest in Croatian girls, even though they weren't playing in the World Cup.
A lot more than for Croatian boys for some reason - and they were the ones playing in Russia!
It was an unprecedented opportunity to present the nation to the world, as millions asked the same question - Where is Croatia?
Away from the World Cup, Google Trends shows that interest in Croatia has been growing in recent years. Note the peaks and troughs - perhaps Croatia will one day become a 12-month destination.
Interestingly, interest in searching for 'Croatian tourism' has declined a lot over the years, apart from that brief moment when those boys in Russia kicked that ball.
Google Trends was a very fun tool to play with, looking at trends within Croatian tourism and life over the last few years. Interest in travelling between Split and Dubrovnik is on the rise, for example.
And it was interesting to see what, if any, effect Total Croatia News and its various websites might have had on the world. It all started, of course, with Total Hvar in the idyllic town of Jelsa back in October 2011. It took Google a while to hear about us, but when it did...
Total Split started in November 2012, just one of many factors in the transformation of the Dalmatian capital into the popular tourist destination of today.
One of my favourite graphs of all - the rise of Sinj and Inland Dalmatia.
Interestingly, not all tourist destinations have seen a bounce in the Google love - Zagreb, which has become incredibly popular, has less search interest than a year ago.
Moving away from tourism, perhaps the more interesting graphs.
A decline in interest in investing in Croatia.
And the birth - and rise - of a 'business' to replace it - welcome to Uhljebistan.
