How to do SEO Competitor Analysis?

SEO Competitor Analysis

SEO Competitor Analysis
SEO Competitor Analysis

SEO competitor analysis is the study of the SEO methods used by your competitors to rank higher in the SERPs. Deciphering their links, content, on-page SEO strategies, and other tactics would be part of this. This aids in the discovery of unique SEO optimization chances that you may not have considered earlier.

How often should you perform Competitor Analysis?

Due to the time and effort required, SEO competitor study can be overwhelming. It is not a one-day effort, and it will take some time to analyse and devise an appropriate plan.

We propose conducting SEO competitive analysis on a quarterly basis to save time and effort. You can stick to a schedule that works best for you.

Why is Competitor Analysis Important?

In SEO, competitor analysis aids you in taking a closer look at your market as a whole and identifying industry holes that you can address. You can figure out where your competitors stand, compare it to where you are, and use the data to help you grow your company.

Your company might possibly be among the top five search results for the most relevant keywords in your domain. However, a website will constantly strive to outrank you and take control of your rating by exploiting your website’s flaws.

When considering how to conduct competition analysis, it’s critical to know what you want to get out of it. In SEO, competition analysis can be used for a variety of things, such as creating a roadmap to see what your competitors are doing better than you. Perhaps they are featured snippets or have a more active community.

These factors can only be established by doing a thorough investigation of your competition.

Ways to find your SEO Competitors

To begin an SEO competitor study, we must first identify who our actual competitors are. In traditional marketing, you almost certainly already know who your competitors are. When it comes to SEO, though, your competitors are unlikely to be the same.

Here’s how you can find your true SEO competitors

Google SERP

The best place to look for SEO competitors is the Google SERP. Determine the keywords you want to rank for first. Now go to Google and look up these terms. Your competitors are the websites that appear on the first page of a search engine. For the majority of your queries, you may find some rivals ranking repeatedly.

These are the ones you need to pay attention to. Make a list of 5-10 potential competitors based on your preferences.

By using Tools

You can use specialised SEO tools to locate your competitors in addition to Google SERP, which is a manual approach. Both Ahrefs and SEMRush are well-known tools that you can employ.

Who are your actual competitors?

Smaller firms may be your largest competition, so keep that in mind while planning your strategy. In this case, the opposite could also be true. The essential idea here is that when conducting SEO competitor analysis, you should not overlook any company that is making an effect in your industry.

One of the most important tools here is keyword research, which can assist you in finding your true competition. Big corporations frequently invest money on expensive keywords and are viewed as direct competitors. Smaller businesses, on the other hand, may be able to dominate categories by strategically exploiting long-tail keywords.

ALSO READ: Top Off-Page SEO Submission Sites Lists 2021 for Best Ranking

It’s also true that you’ll have to decide which websites you won’t be competing with. It would not be a smart idea to devote money and time to outrank websites like Pinterest and Wikipedia if your website is ranking third on the SERPs for your desired keyword/s.

Instead, focus on the phrases that your determined competitors are outranking you on, which could be costing you website visitors.

Types of SEO Competitor Analysis

Types of SEO Competitor Analysis
Types of SEO Competitor Analysis

We’ve compiled a list of essential competitor analysis tactics to assist you in improving your search engine optimization results:

Keyword Gap Analysis

This method entails researching the keywords that your competitors rank for. The essential point is to keep an eye out for keywords that your competitors are ranking for but that you aren’t. Make a list of these keywords and tailor your SEO approach to include them. You can use a tool like SEMRush to complete this task.

Once you have the list of such keywords that your competitors rank for, there are few things you need to do going forward.

  • Why your pages are not ranking for these keywords?
  • Are you targeting these keywords in your SEO strategy?
  • What is your Domain Authority (DA) and Page Authority (PA) as compared to your competitors?
  • Do they have a backlink strategy targeting these keywords?
  • What type of content are they writing for these keywords?

For your assistance, we will later discuss these in detail in this blog.

Content Gap Analysis

Content Gap Analysis
Content Gap Analysis

This is a process that entails researching various sorts of material produced by your competitors. This will provide you with information on how to plan your content strategy.

Here are some things to keep an eye out for:

Word Count

To find the word count of your competitors’ sites, utilize a programme

like Screaming Frog. Content is king in SEO, and long-form material generally outperforms short-form content. Keep an eye on the word count of the content your competitors are putting out. Your goal should be to write content with a word count that is equivalent to or larger than that of your competitors.

Uniqueness

Scraping your competitors’ material and pasting it into your page isn’t going to benefit you. You may face Google penalties as a result of this heinous attempt. You can get ideas for content themes from your competition, but you must create original, high-quality material.

Other forms of content

Examine your competitors’ content creation methods, such as infographics, photographs, and videos. When site owners go out of their way to create a positive customer experience, Google appreciates it. If your competitors are using these various types of material to get high rankings, it’s time for you to step up your game.

MUST READ: Keyword Difficulty – All You Need to Know in 2021

Answer based content

Some of your competitors might show up in featured snippets. Examine their material carefully to see if they use question-based queries (answering questions about the content). This answer-based material gives you a leg up on the competition by allowing you to appear in featured snippets. It’s also beneficial to your voice search SEO.

If you’re having trouble creating high-quality SEO material, consider hiring a company that specialises in SEO content marketing. This will assist you in creating SEO-optimized content and improving the ranks of your website.

Backlink Gap Analysis

Backlink Gap Analysis
Backlink Gap Analysis

This method entails analysing rivals’ backlinks in order to assess how powerful their backlink profile is. A basic competition analysis technique is backlink analysis, often known as link gap analysis. It may be challenging to rank above your competition if they have a high-quality backlink profile.

Common Backlinks

To locate all of your competitors’ backlinks, utilise a service like Ahrefs. Enter the URL of your competitor’s website into Ahrefs. To see all of their hyperlinks, go to the ‘Backlinks’ section:

To locate all of your competitors’ backlinks, utilise a service like Ahrefs. Enter the URL of your competitor’s website into Ahrefs. To see all of their hyperlinks, go to the ‘Backlinks’ section:

Referring Domains

Examine the domains where your competitors are receiving links. You can find these using Ahrefs once more.

Do your competitors have backlinks from the.edu or.gov domains? Backlinks from unique domains are thought to be of high quality and can help you raise your domain authority (DA). Look for opportunities to obtain backlinks from high-domain-authority unique domains.

This will also help you improve your website’s rankings. This competition backlink analysis can aid you in improving your backlink profile and establishing Internet authority.

Website Architecture Analysis

The structure of your website affects both the rankings and the user experience of your site. The design layout, as well as the CTAs, all contribute to conversions. Your competitors’ website is more likely to perform better in all elements of the digital marketing funnel if it has a better UI and design. To get the most out of your design language, you might wish to invest some money.

Internal Linking Structure

Examine the internal linking strategies of your competition. You can increase the authority of your top sites and ensure that the Google crawler scans all of your pages by using a good internal link structure. This will also help your website rank higher in the search engine results page (SERP).

Examine how your competitors use internal links and the anchor texts that follow.

Internal links can be found in the content or in the footer of a page. To include these internal links, most e-commerce websites use the ‘Popular Searches’ or ‘People also search’ section/s. Examine the keywords used as hyperlinks by your competitors.

URL and Breadcrumb Structure

Keep a close eye on the URL and breadcrumb structure of your competition. This will assist you in the beginning stages of developing the layout of your website. Your page’s URLs should be user-friendly and contain your major keyword. And the breadcrumbs should be designed to give the user the best navigation experience possible.

Top Navigation

top navigation
top navigation

The most significant aspect of your website is the top navigation section. This is the area where users will have the most interaction.
Take a look at how your competitors have organized their top navigation. This will assist you figure out how to divide your top navigation into categories. You can also use the terms used in the navigation to your advantage by studying them.

Technical SEO Analysis

Technical SEO Analysis
Technical SEO Analysis

Technical analysis entails investigating your competitors’ backend technology and subsequent frameworks. It also entails considering their site’s page speed and performance data.

Page Speed

Page speed is, without a doubt, one of the most significant technical SEO metrics. It is also a ranking element according to Google. Keep an eye on your competitors’ page loading times.

These measurements can be found using the Google Page Speed Insights tool. Your website will rank higher if it has a faster page speed than your competitors.

Mobile-Friendly

With the amount of people using mobile devices growing every day, it’s more crucial than ever for our website to be mobile-friendly. The mobile version of your website should be well-optimized. It should have a mobile-friendly design that can be viewed on any smartphone.

You can use the Mobile-Friendly test tool to see if your website is mobile-friendly.

You may be able to outperform your competition in desktop rankings, but not in mobile rankings. You need to work on improving your mobile-friendliness.

Technologies used

Websites are built using a variety of technologies, including Java, PHP, Ruby, Angular JS, Node JS, and others. Examine the technology used by your competitors’ websites. Also, look at the page speed and mobile friendliness numbers mentioned above. If the websites of any of your competitors are performing extraordinarily well. This is a platform around which your website should be built.

If you’re still competing with your competition, we recommend contacting an SEO firm that specializes in advanced technical SEO.

Conclusion

We all want to outrank our rivals in the rankings. However, you must first have a good understanding of what you are up against. As a result, competitor analysis is an essential component of any SEO strategy. Once you know who your rivals are, you can focus your SEO operations and efforts on outperforming them.

Competitor analysis can assist you discover SEO methods you weren’t aware of previously. It also shows you the aspects of SEO you need to work on. We hope that this comprehensive guide aids you in conducting a healthy SEO competitive analysis.

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