What Internet users want to know about bitcoin

A few million Internet user queries from 13 countries containing the word "bitcoin"* have been analyzed during this study. As a result of this work, all the queries were divided into a few groups.

The first group is "fact-finding" requests, the purpose of which is to obtain general information about what bitcoin is. To expand their horizons with regard to bitcoin cryptocurrency, users type the following words and phrases in the search line: bitcoin, bitcoins, what is bitcoin, etc. This group accounts for about a quarter of all requests.

The first group are "get-to-know" queries - their purpose is to obtain general information about what bitcoin is. To expand the knowledges about bitcoin, users type in the search bar the following words and phrases: bitcoin, bitcoins, what is bitcoin, etc. This group accounts for about a quarter of all queries.

The second group is "currency and exchange". These types of queries are interesting for users who want to know:

 

• the price of bitcoin related to fiat money, other cryptocurrency, etc. The most common of these are the following words and phrases: bitcoin price, bitcoin value, bitcoin to usd, bitcoin to euro, etc.;

• How to buy or sell a cryptocurrency;

• How to create a wallet for bitcoins.

 

This group accounts for about a quarter of the requests as well.

The third group is "mining", which includes queries concerning the mining of cryptocurrency. In this group, the most popular are the following phrases: bitcoin mining, bitcoin mining calculator, computer for bitcoin mining, etc. These word combinations are in demand for users who want to know not only about the process of mining cryptocoins, but also about equipment, software, their price, the cost of the production process itself, etc.

The fourth group includes all the remaining queries which provide users with information about the millionaires who have made their capital in bitcoins. to study the new analyst about the bitcoin market analyse, to learn about the future of bitcoins, etc. It also concerns the latest market analytics and the future of bitcoin.

Among the countries analyzed, these are the leaders in terms of the queries containing the word "bitcoin": the USA is on top with more than 40% of the total number of queries analyzed. The lowest demand comes from the Netherlands (3%), Spain (3%) and Russia (2.4%).

Fig. 1 Structure of queries with the word bitcoin per countries

We'll take a more detailed look at the search queries with the word bitcoin in the US, Germany, UK, India and Brazil.

USA

In the US, 1.7 million queries are related to the topic of bitcoins and about a third of them are related to the cost of cryptocurrency. Thus, the phrase "bitcoin price" accounts for 14.5% of all requests, while the phrases such as "bitcoin exchange", "best bitcoin exchange", ect. have a share of 7.2%. And other 4.2% are the queries entered by users who want to know how and at what rate to exchange bitcoin for dollars and back.

22.4% of all queries are "fact-finding".

The share of queries related to the issues of mining is 6.8%. Americans want to learn "what is bitcoin mining", "bitcoin mining software", "bitcoin mining contract", "bitcoin miner" and so on.

The remaining requests are diverse: from the news and analytics to those like "is bitcoin dead".

Germany

In Germany there have been 276.2K queries with the word bitcoin, more than a third of which are "fact-finding". 26% of queries are the questions about the cost of bitcoin, the procc of its exchange for fiat money or other cryptocurrencies, and etc. In 10% of cases  users want to learn how to purchase bitcoin, 4% - how to create a wallet for bitcoins.

6.8% of queries are devoted to the issues of mining: users want to know what mining is, what software is needed to generate coins, etc.

German users are also interested in the news about bitcoins; chats and forums, where you can discuss bitcoin and its future, conferences with this subject, etc.

United Kingdom

About 322K hits to search engines in the UK are associated with bitcoin. 37% of inquiries are devoted to the cost of bitcoin, its conversion, purse, etc. 27% of inquiries are "fact-finding", 8% - are related to mining.

India

77.7K queries in India relate to bitcoins, and almost half of them are common: bitcoin, bitcoins, virtual currency bitcoin, bitcoin information, ect. More than a third of queries concern issues of buying and selling bitcoins, its cost, the process of creating a wallet, etc.

Slightly more than 7% of queries concern the issues of mining.

It is worth noting that in India there are queries of this kind "how to get bitcoins for free".

Brazil

In Brazil 49.5K queries were entered to find an information about bitcoins. More than 40% of them is a search for general information. More than a third relates to the cost of cryptocurrency, the process of its exchange, etc. The share of mining accounts for about 8% of queries.

* During the research, queries with the word bitcoin were analyzed in the following countries: USA, Germany, Great Britain, Brazil, Austria, Canada, France, India, Italy, Australia, Netherlands, Spain, Russia. The data is presented as of 06/07/2017. Queries were analyzed using the service https://ru.semrush.com. All the queries were entered in English, except for the ones in Germany (some words and phrases were found in German).