Google has announced the results of its 2018 year in search, offering an insight into the year’s major moments and top trends based on searches conducted in Nigeria.
Taiwo Kola-Ogunlade, Google’s Communications and Public Affairs Manager, Anglophone West Africa, made the announcement in a dispatch to the News Agency of Nigeria in Lagos.
NAN reports that Google Search, also referred to as Google Web Search or simply Google, is a web search engine developed by Google LLC.
It is the most used search engine on the World Wide Web across all platforms, with 92.74% market share as of October 2018, handling more than three billion searches each day.
Google Trends which was launched in May 2006, allows one to see how popular, search terms and its demography have been over time on the search engine.
According to him, the Osun elections, Alexis Sanchez, Black Panther searches top the 2018 trending list.
Kola-Ogunlade said that the trend had to do with what people, places, and things were trending around the globe this year, the top trending news moment of the last 12 months and which new music and movies trended to the top and grabbed people’s attention.
He said: “This year’s most searched news event was the Osun elections, which gripped national attention in September due to alleged incidents of voter intimidation and interference.
“Manchester United footballer, Alexis Sanchez, was both the most searched person and the most searched sportsperson of 2018.
“Black Panther took number one in the trending movies list, while Fever by Wizkid was the top trending song.”
Koka-Ogunlade said that the top trending news searches for the year were: Osun elections, Ekiti elections, PDP Presidential Primaries, ASUU Strike, NLC Strike/Minimum Wage, Offa Robbery, Kaduna Crisis, Lagos APC primaries, Royal Wedding and Atiku Running Mate.
For the top trending people, the Google spokesman listed them as Alexis Sanchez, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Meghan Markle, Stan Lee, Philippe Coutinho, Atiku Abubakar, Tosyn Bucknor, Avicii, Aisha Abimbola and Sylvester Stallone.
He said that for the top trending questions are: How to check Jamb result, How to write a Business Plan, Who is leading in Osun Election, How to check BVN, Who is Prince Harry?, Who is the richest musician in Nigeria?, How to write a CV.
Others he listed are: How to dance Shaku Shaku, Who is Atiku’s running mate? and Who is the president of Croatia?
The top trending songs are Fever – Wizkid, Assurance – Davido, Science Student – Olamide, Motigbana – Olamide, Nwa Baby – Davido, One Ticket – Kiss Daniel ft Davido, Gbona – Burna Boy, Manya – Wizkid, Soco – Wizkid and Fia – Davido.
He listed the top trending movies as Black Panther, Avengers Infinity War, Acrimony, Venom, Deadpool 2, King of Boys, Wedding Party 2 and Rampage.
The top trending sports people he said are Alexis Sanchez, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, Philippe Coutinho, Emmanuel Eboue, Fred, Anthony Joshua, Jorginho, Unai Emery, Willian and Didier Drogba.
