How to find opportunities hiding in plain sight

Most teams spend thousands on market research reports and focus groups to understand customer demand. They commission studies, run surveys, and hire consultants to tell them what customers want. But customers are already showing you exactly what they're looking for through their search behaviour.

Search demand testing shows you which problems people are actively trying to solve, the language they use to describe their pain points, and the relative size of different opportunities through data that already exists.

What's a Search Demand test?

It's using search data to find out what people are looking for, when they're searching, and how they describe their problems. You analyse search volume, related queries, and trends to understand genuine market demand rather than stated preferences.

No surveys about hypotheticals. No asking people what they might want someday. Just objective data about what they're already searching for right now.

The insights often surface opportunities that traditional market research completely misses

How a major CPG company discovered a £50M product category

A leading consumer packaged goods team we work with was exploring new growth opportunities in the health and wellness space. Their market research pointed toward established categories: protein supplements, meal replacement shakes, and vitamin products.

Before investing in product development, they decided to run a Search Demand experiment with us to understand what health-conscious consumers were actually looking for online.

The process: We analysed search trends across health, wellness, and nutrition-related terms over 24 months, focusing on UK and EU markets. Instead of searching for existing product categories, we looked for problems and frustrations.

What we expected: High search volume for established supplement categories and weight loss products.

What we found out:

• Gut health searches were exploding: "Improve gut bacteria" had 340% higher search volume than "protein powder" and was growing 45% year-over-year. Related searches revealed specific problems: "bloating after meals," "digestive issues," and "gut health foods."

• Language revealed the opportunity: People weren't searching for "probiotics" or "digestive supplements". Instead, they were searching for "foods that help digestion" and "natural gut health remedies." They wanted food solutions, not pills.

• Geographic patterns were telling: Search volume was highest in urban areas with health-conscious demographics, exactly matching their existing distribution channels.

• Timing showed urgency: Search spikes correlated with January (New Year resolutions), post-holiday periods, and summer months. People were actively seeking solutions at predictable times.

The insight: Consumers wanted convenient, food-based gut health solutions rather than traditional supplements. They were searching for products that didn't exist yet in mainstream retail.

Based on this insight, the team shifted their research focus to gut health foods and ran additional validation experiments before launching.

The eventual product line delivered:

• £52M in revenue within 18 months

• 23% market share in the emerging gut-health food category

• Distribution in 1,400+ retail locations

The total cost of the Search Demand testing: £300 for Google Ads keyword tools and two days of analysis. The value: identifying a £50M market opportunity that traditional research had completely overlooked.

How to run Search Demand testing

The power of search demand testing lies in looking at real customer behaviour rather than asking about intentions. People's searches reveal problems they're actively trying to solve.

1. Start with problems, not products

Don't search for your product category. Search for the problems your product solves: "back pain from sitting," not "ergonomic chairs." "Meal prep for busy parents," not "prepared foods."

2. Analyse related queries

Google shows what else people search for alongside your terms. These related queries often surface the real problem or adjacent opportunities you hadn't thought of.

3. Look for growing trends, not just volume

A search term with 1,000 monthly searches growing 200% year-over-year is way more valuable than one with 10,000 searches declining 20%.

4. Pay attention to seasonal patterns

Search volume timing shows when people feel the pain most acutely. This tells you when to launch and how to time marketing campaigns.

5. Focus on geographic hotspots Search volume concentration shows you where demand is strongest and where to test or launch first.

Try this next week

Pick a customer problem your team is trying to solve for. Look at how people describe that problem online (not your solution). Look at search volume, growth trends, and related queries. Focus on language customers actually use versus how you describe the problem internally.

You'll likely discover that real demand exists in adjacent areas you hadn't considered, and customers describe their problems very differently than you assume.