International Beauty Day: Google reveals Nigeria’s top beauty, fitness searches

Google on Thursday revealed that `how to grow natural hair’, `reduce belly fat’ were top beauty and fitness searches as the world celebrateed International Beauty Day.

The National Daily reports that the International Beauty Day is an annual event observed to celebrate the outer and inner beauty of individuals across the world.

Mr Taiwo Kola-Ogunlade, Communication Officer, Google West Africa, said that to commemorate the day, Google revealed the top beauty related searches that captured the interest of Nigerians over the past 20 months.

Kola-Ogunlade said that due to the COVID-19 pandemic, questions such as “how to grow natural hair’’ and “how to decrease belly fat,’’ were among the most often googled beauty terms by Nigerians.

She added phrases such as “hairstyles for women’’ and “bone straight hair,’’ among the most googled beauty terms.

He said that it indicated that Nigerians were more conscious about how to feel beautiful and stay fit as they navigated through the pandemic.

“Butterfly braids” is a breakout search query that emerged in Nigeria over the past year, while searches for “bone straight wig” increased over 4,000 per cent.

“Jungle braids, however, was a break out search in the past month in Nigeria.

“Bayelsa state was also identified as the top state in Nigeria in terms of beauty-related searches during 2020,’’ he said.

According to her, individuals worldwide, including Nigerians, have been coping with the pandemic’s effect on their mental health and overall well-being since 2020.

He said that experts had recommended self-care techniques to cope with those stressful conditions.

Kola-Ogunlade said that as a result, self-care had become more important, globally.

He said that for example, a study conducted by the skin-care company on the mental health implications of adult acne discovered that a skincare regimen might significantly decrease stress levels.

Kola-Ogunlade said that, similarly, beauty regimens and fitness programmes might have become go-to coping mechanisms for Nigerians looking to maintain mental well-being as they navigate the pandemic.

Search trends information is gleaned from data collated by google, based on what Nigerians have been searching for and asked google, which processes more than 40,000 search queries every second.