Content Trend Researcher

A comprehensive content research and analysis skill designed for content creators, marketers, and publishers who need to create high-performing content based on real-world trends and user intent signals.

What This Skill Does

This skill acts as your content intelligence system, analyzing trends across 10+ platforms to help you:

1. Identify trending topics - Find what's gaining traction across platforms
2. Understand user intent - Analyze search patterns and engagement signals
3. Discover content gaps - Find underserved topics with high demand
4. Generate outlines - Create data-driven article structures optimized for engagement
5. Platform-specific insights - Understand where different content types perform best

Capabilities

Multi-Platform Trend Analysis

• Google Trends - Search volume trends, rising queries, regional interest
• Google Analytics - Traffic patterns, user behavior, conversion signals
• Substack - Newsletter trends, subscriber growth patterns
• Medium - Article performance, tags, claps, reading time
• Reddit - Subreddit activity, upvotes, comment engagement, trending discussions
• LinkedIn - Professional content trends, engagement metrics
• X (Twitter) - Viral topics, hashtag performance, thread engagement
• Blogs - Top-ranking blog posts, backlink profiles
• Podcasts - Episode popularity, download trends, ratings
• YouTube - Video performance, view trends, watch time, engagement

User Intent Analysis

• Informational intent - "How to", "What is", "Guide to"
• Commercial intent - "Best", "Review", "Comparison", "vs"
• Transactional intent - "Buy", "Pricing", "Discount"
• Navigational intent - Brand searches, specific resource lookups
• Problem-solving intent - "Fix", "Troubleshoot", "Solution"

Content Strategy Intelligence

• Optimal content formats per platform
• Best publishing times based on engagement data
• Headline formulas with proven performance
• Content length recommendations
• Topic clustering and pillar content identification

Outline Generation

Creates comprehensive article outlines including:

• SEO-optimized titles with user intent matching
• H2/H3 structure based on search patterns
• Key points to cover from top-performing content
• Suggested word count and content depth
• Internal linking opportunities
• Call-to-action recommendations
• Multimedia suggestions (images, videos, infographics)

When to Use This Skill

Before creating any content:

• Research trending topics in your niche
• Validate content ideas with data
• Find content gaps competitors are missing
• Understand what format works best for your topic

For content strategy:

• Build editorial calendars based on trends
• Identify pillar content opportunities
• Plan content clusters around hot topics
• Optimize existing content for better performance

For competitive analysis:

• See what's working for competitors
• Find underserved audiences
• Discover new content angles
• Benchmark your performance

Example Invocations

Basic Topic Research

@content-trend-researcher

Topic: "AI automation for small businesses"
Platforms: Google Trends, Reddit, LinkedIn, YouTube
Intent: Informational

Deep Platform Analysis

@content-trend-researcher

Topic: "Remote work productivity tools"
Platforms: ALL
Include: User intent breakdown, content gap analysis, 3 article outlines
Target audience: SaaS founders and product managers

Competitive Content Research

@content-trend-researcher

Topic: "Email marketing strategies 2025"
Platforms: Medium, Substack, Top blogs
Analyze: Top 10 performing articles
Output: Outline that fills content gaps

Multi-Format Strategy

@content-trend-researcher

Topic: "Sustainable fashion"
Platforms: Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Pinterest, Blogs
Output: Platform-specific content ideas + 1 long-form blog outline

Input Format

Provide the following information:

{
  "topic": "Your main topic or keyword",
  "platforms": ["Google Trends", "Reddit", "YouTube", "etc."],
  "intent_focus": "informational|commercial|transactional|all",
  "target_audience": "Description of your audience",
  "content_type": "blog|article|newsletter|video script|social post",
  "analysis_depth": "quick|standard|deep",
  "number_of_outlines": 1-5
}

Output Format

The skill returns a comprehensive research report:

{
  "topic_overview": {
    "search_volume": "Monthly search volume estimate",
    "trend_direction": "rising|stable|declining",
    "competition_level": "low|medium|high",
    "opportunity_score": 1-100
  },
  "platform_insights": [
    {
      "platform": "Platform name",
      "trending_content": [],
      "engagement_metrics": {},
      "best_practices": [],
      "content_format": "Recommended format"
    }
  ],
  "user_intent_analysis": {
    "primary_intent": "Intent type",
    "intent_breakdown": {
      "informational": "percentage",
      "commercial": "percentage",
      "transactional": "percentage"
    },
    "top_questions": [],
    "search_patterns": []
  },
  "content_gaps": [
    {
      "gap": "Description of underserved topic",
      "opportunity": "Why this is valuable",
      "difficulty": "low|medium|high"
    }
  ],
  "article_outlines": [
    {
      "title": "SEO-optimized title",
      "subtitle": "Engaging subtitle",
      "target_word_count": 1500-2000,
      "structure": [
        {
          "heading": "H2 heading",
          "subheadings": ["H3", "H3"],
          "key_points": [],
          "research_notes": "Data supporting this section"
        }
      ],
      "seo_keywords": [],
      "internal_links": [],
      "multimedia_suggestions": [],
      "cta": "Suggested call-to-action"
    }
  ],
  "recommendations": {
    "publishing_schedule": "Best days/times",
    "content_format": "Recommended format",
    "promotion_strategy": "Where to share",
    "follow_up_topics": []
  }
}

Best Practices

1. Be specific with topics - "AI for small business accounting" beats "AI"
2. Choose relevant platforms - Where your audience actually consumes content
3. Analyze intent carefully - Match your content to what users want
4. Look for gaps - The best content fills needs others miss
5. Use data to validate - Don't assume, verify with trend data
6. Update regularly - Trends change; research monthly for active topics

Limitations

• Real-time data requires API access to platforms (not included in skill)
• Some platforms limit data access (e.g., X API changes)
• Search volume estimates are approximations
• Trend data represents past performance, not future guarantees
• Platform-specific metrics depend on data availability

Integration with Other Skills

This skill works great combined with:

• SEO optimization skills - Use outlines for optimized content
• Social media scheduling skills - Plan promotion around trends
• Email newsletter skills - Create newsletters based on trending topics
• Competitive analysis skills - Deeper competitor research
• Content calendar skills - Schedule content based on trend timing

Technical Notes

• Uses trend analysis algorithms to identify rising topics
• Intent classification based on keyword patterns and SERP analysis
• Outline generation follows proven content frameworks (AIDA, PAS, etc.)
• Platform insights based on engagement metrics and algorithm signals
• Content gap identification through comparative analysis

Privacy & Ethics

• Does not access private user data
• Uses publicly available trend data and metrics
• Respects platform terms of service
• No scraping of paywalled or private content
• Trend analysis is statistical, not surveillance

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Version: 1.0.0 Last Updated: October 21, 2025 Compatibility: Claude.ai, Claude Code, Claude API (with Code Execution Tool)