🔍 Research

Trend Analysis Report

Analyze data over time to identify patterns, trends, and make predictions

★★★ Advanced 35 min January 13, 2025

Use Case

Understanding trends in your data helps with forecasting and strategic planning. Cowork can analyze time-series data, identify patterns, and generate comprehensive trend reports.

Example Prompt

I have sales data in ~/Data/sales_2020_2024.csv with columns:
date, product_category, units_sold, revenue, region

Please perform a trend analysis:
1. Identify overall revenue trends by year and quarter
2. Find seasonal patterns in each product category
3. Compare regional performance trends
4. Highlight anomalies or significant changes
5. Project Q1 2025 estimates based on patterns
6. Create a trend_analysis_report.md with visualizations

What Cowork Does

  1. Data Loading: Reads and validates the CSV data
  2. Time Aggregation: Groups data by periods (year, quarter, month)
  3. Trend Calculation: Computes moving averages and growth rates
  4. Seasonality Detection: Identifies recurring patterns
  5. Anomaly Detection: Flags unusual data points
  6. Forecasting: Projects future values based on patterns
  7. Report Generation: Creates markdown with charts and insights

Sample Output

# Sales Trend Analysis Report
Period: 2020-2024

## Executive Summary
- Overall revenue CAGR: 18.3%
- Peak season: Q4 (holiday effect)
- Fastest growing category: Electronics (+24% YoY)
- Anomaly detected: Q2 2023 supply disruption

## Revenue Trends

### Year-over-Year Growth
| Year | Revenue ($M) | Growth |
|------|-------------|--------|
| 2020 | 12.4        | -      |
| 2021 | 14.8        | +19.4% |
| 2022 | 17.2        | +16.2% |
| 2023 | 20.1        | +16.9% |
| 2024 | 24.8        | +23.4% |

### Quarterly Patterns
- Q1: 18% of annual (post-holiday slowdown)
- Q2: 22% of annual (steady)
- Q3: 25% of annual (back-to-school)
- Q4: 35% of annual (holiday peak)

## Category Analysis
[Detailed breakdown by product category]

## Regional Insights
[Performance by region with trends]

## Anomalies Detected
- Q2 2023: -15% from trend (supply chain issue)
- Oct 2024: +28% spike (viral product)

## 2025 Forecast
| Quarter | Projected Revenue | Confidence |
|---------|------------------|------------|
| Q1 2025 | $5.2M           | ±8%        |

Tips

  • Ensure date format is consistent
  • Include at least 2 years of data for patterns
  • Specify business context for anomalies
  • Request specific statistical methods if needed