Despite having a solid SEO strategy, producing excellent content, and conducting technical SEO audits, your material may still not receive the attention it merits because two-thirds of all clicks on Google go to the top five organic search results. Actually, Google search traffic to 90% of websites is completely absent! If not you, then who is getting that traffic? Rivals for SEO. The truth is that if your rivals are executing all of these strategies more successfully than you are, you will find it difficult to stand out in the search results. An SEO competitor analysis is useful in this situation.
Performing SEO competitive analysis as a digital marketing agency can provide valuable insights into your industry, allowing you to identify competitors, understand their strategies, and discover keyword and content opportunities. Finding the benefits and drawbacks of your SEO and that of your rivals involves performing a competitive analysis using SEO. Your competition might be viewed in one of two ways: as a hassle or as a valuable resource of knowledge.
By understanding more about your competition’s strategy you can enhance your own SEO performance. Let’s understand in detail how we can perform an efficient SEO Competitive Analysis:
Step 1: Identify Your Competitors
The first step is always to identify your competitors. You can use tools like Google to search for your target keywords and see who else is ranking for those terms. You can also use tools like SEMrush, Ahrefs, and Moz to identify your competitors and analyze their performance.
Step 2: Analyze Competitor On-Page Optimization
The second step is to analyze your competitor's on-page optimization. Look at their website structure, URL structure, meta titles and descriptions, and header tags. You can also analyze their content, keywords, and internal linking structure. This will help you understand what your competitors are doing well and what you can improve on.
Step 3: Analyze Competitor Backlinks
The third step is to analyze your competitor's backlinks. Look at their backlink profile, including the number of backlinks, the quality of those backlinks, and the anchor text they are using. You can use tools like Ahrefs, Moz, and Majestic to analyze your competitor's backlink profile. This will help you identify opportunities to build quality backlinks to your website.
Step 4: Analyze Competitor Content
The fourth step is to analyze your competitor's content. Look at the type of content they are producing, the topics they are covering, and the engagement they are receiving from their audience. You can use tools like Buzzsumo to analyze your competitor's content and see which topics are performing well. This will help you identify content gaps and opportunities to create better content than your competitors.
Step 5: Analyze Competitor Keywords
The fifth step is to analyze your competitor's keywords. Look at the keywords they are targeting, the search volume for those keywords, and their ranking for those keywords. This will help you identify keywords that you should be targeting and opportunities to improve your rankings for those keywords.
Step 6: Analyze Competitor Social Media
To finish it all the final step is to analyze your competitor's social media presence. Look at the social media platforms they are using, the engagement they are receiving, and the type of content they are sharing. This will help you understand what is working well for your competitors and what you can do to improve your own social media strategy.
From six months to a year, you should conduct another competitor study, based on the scale of your website and the number of active rivals. By analyzing your competitors, you can benchmark your own performance, identify gaps in your content strategy, and stay ahead of emerging trends and technologies. With this knowledge, you can adapt your SEO strategy and gain a competitive advantage in the market. Overall, SEO competitive analysis is a crucial step in developing a successful SEO strategy, providing valuable insights and helping you stay ahead of the competition.