What is TrendSpottr?
TrendSpottr is a Web service that identifies real-time trends from the social web (e.g., Twitter, Facebook and soon Google +) for any search term or topic of interest. TrendSpottr's algorithms are tuned to identify real-time trends at their acceleration point in order to provide early and predictive insights. TrendSpottr consistently identifies trends and trending information hours or even days before it becomes "popular" and reaches a level of general awareness. These early insights are invaluable to journalists, editors, traders, advertisers brand managers and trend hunters that need to be "ahead of the curve" to prepare for and predict market and social behaviors, consumer preferences, impending crises and major trending events.
How to use TrendSpottr?
TrendSpottr works very much like a search engine. Enter any keyword, phrase, hashtag or @name into TrendSpottr's search bar and click "Spot" to initiate a search for real-time trends about that query. You can also click on any of the Popular Topics (e.g., Technology, Economy, Sports, etc.) and Popular Searches on the left hand sidebar to view real-time trending information for these topics and search terms.
Use the "Advanced Search" option to the right of the search bar to filter trending results by source (e.g., Twitter and/or Facebook) and by geo-location from a drop-down list of cities.
How to use Twitter Lists?
TrendSpottr also supports searches on Twitter list URLs. To use this feature, simply enter a Twitter list URL (e.g., http://twitter.com/#!/BallHyped/top-100-sports-bloggers, http://twitter.com/#!/elbows/music-blogs) into the TrendSpottr search bar. TrendSpottr will then identify real-time trends from this highly relevant and curated list. There are several Twitter list directories that feature the top Twitter lists by topic or keyword, including: listorious.com, listatlas.com and www.twibes.com. Of course, you can create your own Twitter list and use that URL or visit any user's Twitter profile page and select from any of their Twitter lists.
How to view and share your TrendSpottr search results?
TrendSpottr trending results are presented on a single page and are organized into five categories (where applicable): Trending Headlines, Trending Images, Trending Videos, Trending Hashtags and Trending Phrases. Click on the "More" button at the far right of each category to reveal additional results when available. To view a trending headline, image or video, simply click on that result and TrendSpottr will open the article, photo or video in a new window. Click on "Recent Posts" to reveal the most recent tweets and posts related to trending piece of content.
There are two ways to share TrendSpottr content: 1) There are several sharing buttons at the top of each search results page. Using these sharing buttons, you can share a link to the search query you entered; eg., a link to top trending results for "Science" or "Lady Gaga"; 2) When viewing a specific trending headline, video or image in TrendSpottr's viewer, you can use the Twitter and Facebook buttons to share that specific piece of content. Clicking on the two other icons will take you to the original source of the content and close the TrendSpottr viewer.
Tips and Tricks
To discover trending information about a specific user, enter their @name into the TrendSpottr search bar (e.g., @barackobama, @scobleizer). To find real-time trends about stocks, enter the stock symbol preceded by the "$" sign (e.g., $aapl, $goog). To see what's trending now for a particular content source, enter that source's custom URL shortener (e.g., yhoo.it, reut.rs, tgam.ca) and TrendSpottr will show what articles and stories are trending right now.