Pokémon go Search trends

Everyone has heard about the new craze- Pokémon Go and it’s safe to bet you are in one of two groups. 1, you love it and currently trying to catch em’ all or 2, you’re frankly sick of hearing about it. Either way, it’s hard to ignore just how phenomenal this craze has become in just a few weeks. To give you more of a perspective, here are some side by side facts.

Pokémon Go vs Candy Crush

In terms of mobile app games Candy Crush is pretty huge, it’s a rare occasion that you take a train or a tube without seeing someone engrossed in crushing multi-coloured sweets. However, as you can see from the above graph Pokémon Go (Blue) has well and truly surpassed Candy Crush (Red) in terms of online searches.

What’s the weather like today?

Does it look hot out? Great! Time for Pokémon hunting! People are searching for Pokémon more than they are a common global interest, the weather. In fact, the weather searches have even dropped slightly since the release of Pokémon Go.

And finally, if you’re still not convinced of Pokémon Go’s popularity, take a look at the below infographic from Forbes:

So how do you cash in on this?

Pokestop: Allows game users to collect Pokeballs and eggs

Pokeballs: Allows game users to catch Pokemon

Eggs: Hatch into Pokemon

Gyms: A place Pokemon trainers can fight Pokemon

Well, unfortunately, there’s no way currently to create your shop/business into a Pokestop or to encourage Pokémon fans to gather around and fight Pokémon in your café! This is because all Pokestops and Gyms are in the same place as Niantic's previous game, Ingress, in fact, the stops are using the same coordinates, names and even pictures. However, apparently, Niantic says it will let marketers pay to become locations that will attract players sometime soon. It will charge marketers by the visit, the way search ads charge per click. Rumours have it that McDonalds are already in their coding.

Currently, the businesses that are benefitting most are the shops/restaurants that happen to have a Pokestop near them already, who are using the popularity of the game as an advantage and advertising the location. Some businesses are taking this a step further and using Incense, a feature in the game used to lure Pokemon to a certain location for 30 minutes at a time.

Yelp has added a feature so that people can search for local cafés and restaurants with Pokestops, so hopefully the rumours will ring true and Niantic will start selling locations soon!

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