Beyond the Buzz: What If Trend Research Started with Real People, Not Headlines?

Overview

Trend research often arrives too late to act, so Soulmates.ai positions Brand Soulmates as an always-on layer for testing emerging topics directly with high-fidelity audience personas in real time.

Key Takeaways

• Headline-driven trend tracking can miss the window, while human-first querying surfaces what audiences are already doing now.
• Asking Brand Soulmates about participation, attention, and purchase intent reveals the “why” behind a trend, not just the topic.
• The output is actionable language and behavioral cues that help teams time content and shape it with purpose.

In content strategy, timing is everything. The unfortunate truth, however, is that research lags way behind. By the time a trend surfaces in headlines, the window to meaningfully participate has closed.

That’s why publishers and content leads like Matthew Downes at Ayzenberg are rethinking how they approach content and trend research. In this workflow video, Matthew and AI Product & Strategy Manager Ilana Wahlin illustrate how Soulmates replaces reactive tools with a real-time, always-on research layer, built around the people you’re actually trying to reach.

Instead of scanning social feeds or guessing based on gut feel, Matthew works directly with Brand Soulmates’ high-fidelity personas to explore questions like:

What trends are our audience already participating in?

What content feels most worth their time?

What would make them pause, consider, or even purchase?

Each answer reveals more than just topics; it uncovers behavioral cues, emotional drivers, and segment-specific language that helps his team shape content with purpose.

Soulmates doesn’t just show what’s trending. It helps you understand why a trend resonates so you can act on insight, not assumptions.