| Why NH Owns the Seacoast |
EDITOR AT LARGE
Dictionary.com tells us that the word "seacoast" (say 'sE-"kOst) means "the shore of a sea or ocean". If that’s true, then why does the word inevitably refer to New Hampshire. There are tens of thousands of miles of seacoast in the world – right? But "America’s Smallest Seacoast" (sm) wins the search hands down as the new Google Trends software proves
SEACOAST 'R US
Google has another new software called "Trends" that confirms what we had long suspected. When people use the word "seacoast" they are usually talking about New Hampshire. That is weird, of course. The New Hampshire seacoast is only 18 miles long. The state of Maine advertises a seacoast of 3,500 miles, if you count all the ins and outs of the undulating shore. They should be the seacoast, or California should or Florida. If you count Great Bay, the NH coastline doubles, but that’s not much to shout about length-wise compared to 15,000 miles of American shores. But finally the littlest guy wins. More than a decade ago when this web site was just a gleam in the editor’s eye, we struggled to come up with a domain name. Okay, it only took about three minutes. We coined the phrase "America’s Smallest Seacoast" (sm) and set to writing about stuff going on here past and present. A decade later, new local stuff goes up every day, and there is no end in sight.
Now comes further evidence that this region has, through constant repetition, actually "branded" the word seacoast. The new Google Trends lets us see how often users search for a particular word and suggests WHERE they are searching from. Statistics will evolve, but as of today, most of the people searching for the word "seacoast" on Google are already living on the NH coast – in Portsmouth, Exeter, Dover, Durham and Rochester. The rest of the searchers are nearby – Concord and Manchester (NH), Lawrence and Newburyport (MA) and Portland (ME). We are, it seems, searching for ourselves. Click the "Region" button on Google Trends and we can see that almost everyone in the world searching for the word "seacoast" is doing so from the USA. There are a few searchers from Canada, a dribble from Britain, and that’s it. That is not true if you look at search trends for the word "coast". Those searchers are largely from Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, then the United States and Canada. Results are similar for the word "shore", but with New Zealand in the lead. The U.S. takes back the lead, however, in searching for the word "shoreline", which seems to be the dominant word in the state of Washington. Remember that Google can only spit back what Google knows. This only shows us what people using the Internet are looking for. The more we call ourselves the Seacoast, the more the world perceives us as "THE" official seacoast. In fact, Google has come to define the word in our favor. The Google "web" definition has spread to Wikipedia that tells us – and I quote: "The Seacoast Region is the southeast area of the U.S. state of New Hampshire. The region stretches 13 miles along the Atlantic Ocean from New Hampshire's border with Salisbury, Massachusetts to the Piscataqua River and New Hampshire's border with Kittery, Maine. The shoreline is generally very rocky and rough in nature, although a few sandy beaches have been created using jetties/groins." Therefore, "seacoast" equals "Seacoast Region" that equals New Hampshire. The digital circle is complete. Of course, as with much on Wikipedia, the facts are less than facts, but it just goes to show that the Internet is literally redefining the language. Just as the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, those who make it to the top of the search engines, make it to the top of the search engines. CONTINUE with NH OWNS "SEACOAST" If you study the four major search engines for the word "seacoast" you will find this web site rated as #1, #2, #3 or #4 out of over 6,600,000 listings. Most people never search beyond the TOP TEN listings and that’s where New Hampshire dominates. More than half of the TOP TEN listings for "seacoast" on all four engines are for web sites generated here. And that’s for the English-speaking world. Here are the stats: Percent of Top Ten Listings from NH Everything changes, by the way, when you search for individual towns. A Google search for the word "Portsmouth" showed only 30% of the sites emanating from Portsmouth, NH. Just 20% of sites under "Exeter" came from Exeter, NH and 10% of "Dover" searches were from Dover, NH. Most turned up web sites from the United Kingdom. Not a single Hampton, NH web site came up in the top ten with a search for "Hampton".
GOOGLE TRTENDS PROVES WORD IS REGIONAL (continued)
50% on Google.com
60% on Live.com (Microsoft)
60% on Yahoo.com
80% on Ask.com
Other New Hampshire regions, by the way, have no such luck. Although the White Mountains do appear in a Top Ten search for “mountains”, they are quickly overwhelmed by other mountains of the world. The NH Lakes Region also gets a single appearance under “lakes” and then is swallowed up. Only the NH seacoast reigns supreme. What does it all mean? Not much, probably, except that marketers of this itsy-bitsy region have been handed a gigantic opportunity. Probably, we will blow it. There are seven chambers of commerce in the Seacoast NH region alone, seven more in South Coastal Maine next door, and they will continue to promote their individual territorial brands come hell or high water. The "united we stand" concept has never been big around here, which is why we started this web site (after a few seacoast videos and books) in the first place. Call us crazy, but we love this whole region, not just any town. Either way, language is as fluid as water and it will find its level. At some point in the not-too-distant past, the words "sea" and "coast" cmbined to form a single term. Now Google has given that word to us on a silver platter, to use or abuse as we see fit. We can collectively promote our 18cherished miles or reinvent the wheel one town at a time. Let’s hope we handle this marketing opportunity better than we handled the Old Man of the Mountains. VISIT: Google Trends ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Top 21 Listings for the Word SEACOAST Seacoast Newspapers, Portsmouth, NH
on GOOGLE and Where they Come from:
(See what it is today)
Seacoast Church, South Carolina
SeacoastNH.com, Seacoast, NH
Seacoast Repertory, Seacoast, NH
Seacoast Alliances, Key West, FL
Seacoast Science Center, Rye, NH
Seacoast Expeditions, Victoria, BC
Sea Coast Realty, Wilmington, NC
Seacoast Hospice, Seacoast, NH
Seacoast Fun Park, Windham, ME
Seacoast Building, Belgium
Seacoast Aids Response, Portsmouth, NH
Seacoast Outright, Portsmouth, NH
Foundation for Seacoast Health, Portsmouth, NH
Seacoast Harley-Davidson, Portsmouth, NH
SeacoastEats, Portsmouth, NH
Greater Seacoast United Way, Portsmouth, NH
Seacoast Echo, Bay Saint Louis, MS
SeaCoast Web Design, Seattle, WA
Seacoast.com, Newburyport, MA
GOseacoast.com, Seacoast, NH