iEntry 10th Anniversary RSS Newsletter Advertising
Join the WebProWorld Forum!

Fitness More Interesting Than Diets To Searchers


Finally changing our couch-potato ways?

Are people waking up to the idea that exercise is the best way to lose weight? Maybe. Traditionally, Internet searches for burning off those holiday pounds spike the first week of the year. But this year, according to Hitwise, there’s been an increase in gym interest and a decline in search queries involving the keyword “diet.”

At least that’s the way it is in the United Kingdom. Across the Pond traffic to gym and health club websites spiked increased 14 percent compared this time last year. Searches for “diet” and “diets” have fallen by 20 percent and 50 percent respectively.

Hitwise research director Robin Goad lumps in “detox” with diets, and finds a small increase, likely influenced by rapper Dr. Dre’s long-awaited album, which is in reference to a different kind of detox.

Hitwise general manager Bill Tancer finds a similar increase in traffic to gym websites and notes how men in particular become suddenly concerned with getting in shape after the holidays. The rest of the year gym traffic is dominated by women.

A quick look on Google Trends reveals the term “fitness” exceeds searches for “diet,” “diet pills,” and “gastric bypass.” It may be a matter of semantics, though. Another comparison shows the term “exercise” is only half as popular as “diet” with a definite spike for both at the end of December.

Fitness More Interesting Than Diets To Searchers

But that fitness beat out dieting is a positive development, as is the fact that dieting beat out diet pills and invasive surgery. A review of search trends for the last days of December and first days of January reflect what we already know: people are still mostly couch potatoes, driven to search online about what they see, or want to see, on television.

But fad diets are still out there. Shortly after the “flat belly diet” and so-called “Sassy water” appeared on NBC’s Today show, searches spiked predictably. Others have shown interest in Chantel Hobbs’ “Brain Change” diet, the “Eat-Clean Diet,” and Dr. Siegal’s “Cookie Diet.”

Dr. Siegal recommends his weight-loss cookies, not the Girl Scout Cookies people are actively searching for at the moment also. Dang Girl Scouts. How can one expect to stick to a diet when they come peddling in the middle of diet season? 

One has to wonder if the economy isn’t also a culprit in the rise of fitness interest. Diets are expensive sometimes, so is healthy food in America. But, like in Rocky IV, exercise can be accomplished anywhere for free.    
 

About the author:
Jason Lee Miller is a WebProNews editor and writer covering business and technology.

3 Comments

Fitness and Diet

You need both fitness and proper diet to be in a good shape. All the exercises in the world won't help you if you eat more than you should or if you eat junk.

I think this is the case as

I think this is the case as people who are not overweight but are looking to become more fit - example you can run a 5k but want to be able to run a marathon - will be searching for fitness related terms. So you have to factor that into the numbers there.

interesting analysis

Interesting analysis. One reason fitness and gym interest may be increasing relative to diet searches is that jobless claims continue to increase, so on average people have more time to devote to fitness, while less money to spend on diets etc.

Comment viewing options

Select your preferred way to display the comments and click "Save settings" to activate your changes.

Post new comment

The content of this field is kept private and will not be shown publicly.
  • Web page addresses and e-mail addresses turn into links automatically.
  • Allowed HTML tags: <a> <em> <strong> <cite> <code> <ul> <ol> <li> <dl> <dt> <dd>
  • Lines and paragraphs break automatically.
CAPTCHA
This question is for testing whether you are a human visitor and to prevent automated spam submissions.
2 + 7 =
Solve this simple math problem and enter the result. E.g. for 1+3, enter 4.
Featured Headline
Hashtags Now Linking in Twitter
Greater Emphasis Put on Twitter Search
Comment | 8 hours ago
 
Subscribe to WebProNews


Send me relevant info