Useful verbs to describe trends in Business and the Economy
A trend signifies a situation that is developing or changing. There are three specific changes I wish to highlight in this blog:
- Financial (Sales, profits, costs, budgets)
Sales fell slightly last quarter.
Profits have risen 3% year-on-year.
- Marketing (Market share)
We saw some growth in market share last year
Sales in the Asian market dropped by 10% last year
- Economy (Inflation, interest rates, unemployment, house prices)
There has been a steady rise in inflation.
Unemployment has increased this year
House prices went up last year
The most common verbs to describe movement up are:
| Rise | Grow | Increase | Go Up |
The irregular verb forms are:
| Infinitive | Past Simple | Present Perfect |
| Rise | Rose | Risen |
| Grow | Grew | Grown |
| Go Up | Went up | Gone up |
The noun forms are:
| Rise | Increase | Growth |
The most common verbs to describe movement down are:
| Go down | Fall | Drop | Decrease |
The irregular verb forms are:
| Infinitive | Past Simple | Present Perfect |
| Go down | Went down | Have gone down |
| Fall | Fell | Have fallen |
The noun forms are:
| Fall | Drop | Decrease |
Verb Forms
It is important to remember the difference between the past simple and the present perfect. The past simple is used to describe a time period that is finished. For example:
Costs rose last year in January
The present perfect is used to describe a time period in the past that continues up to the present. For example:
Costs have risen this year in January
Using Adjectives and Adverbs
We often want to give more details about the size or speed of a trend. We can use basic words like small, large, slowly, quickly including the words in the table below.
| Adjective | Adverb | Meaning |
| Slight | Slightly | Very small |
| Gradual | Gradually | Slow and over a long period |
| Steady | Steadily | Slow but continuing |
| Significant | Significantly | Noticeable and important |
| Sharp | Sharply | Large and sudden |
Look at the examples in the following table:
| Adjective + Noun | Verb + Adverb |
| There was a slight rise in profits | Profits rose slightly |
| There was a small increase in profits last year | Profits increased a little last year |
| We have seen a steady growth in market share | Market share has grown steadily |
Describing changes in your business or the economy using this more complex vocabulary can help you advance in the English language more rapidly.