When starting with search engine optimisation, performing a competitor analysis is important. This is because by knowing who the competitors are, how they are optimising their websites and what is their ranking, you can gain better insights on how to plan your own SEO strategy. The information which is gained after this analysis can be used in designing your own strategy to grow organic traffic, build authority and gain better SERPs rankings. This post highlights steps to do a competitor analysis for SEO.
Competitor analysis has been done in all niches to know about potential opportunities and challenges. It becomes even more important when doing search engine optimisation. When you check search engine optimisation techniques of your competitor, you gain insight into their winning strategies and their mistakes. It allows you to learn from their mistakes, while adopting and improving their successful strategies will help you to gain an edge.
Why is it important to perform a competitor analysis for SEO?
Competitor analysis is important because it gives insights about the search engine optimisation tactics which work in a particular industry and also help in improving rankings. It helps website owners to know which optimisation tasks must be prioritised and so, it has an impact on the way campaigns are built. Market research analysis for SEO allows you to find strategic advantages and link building opportunities. To know about the marketing strategy you can adopt during the pandemic for inexpensive campaigns, read our blog: MARKETING STRATEGY IN TIMES OF CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC FOR INEXPENSIVE CAMPAIGNS.
Steps to perform a competitive analysis for SEO
- Identify competitors: The first step that must be taken to check search engine optimisation activities of a competitor is to determine who are the top competitors that are to be analysed. You can find online competitors by using SEMrush. All you have to do is enter your domain name, go to the ‘organic competitors’ section and click on ‘view full report’. You can use various metrics like keywords and traffic to identify them.
- Analyse keywords: Check which keywords are being targeted by your competitors. This can easily be done by using SEMrush or ahrefs. For SEMrush, enter the competitor’s URL into the search bar and under the ‘organic search’ section, click on ‘positions’ to see which keywords they rank for. Next, determine which keywords they rank well for that your website does not. This way you will be able to know how you can rank for those keywords as well. Usually by improving metadata, site architecture, building links or making changes to the content can help you to rank for the same keywords as well.
- Analyse website optimisation: The next step which is to be done to check search engine optimisation activities of a competitor is to analyse competitors’ on site SEO. Check the keyword density as this will help you to know the optimal way to place keywords. Also check their meta information and how they have written it. See if they use call to actions or LSI keywords.
- Analyse content: Analyse competitors’ content, it will help you to create content which is better and this way you will be able to outrank them. Check the word count, content uniqueness, what kind of content types and medias they are using and also look at the number of outbound links in their content.
- Analyse links: Perform a backlink analysis, this will help you to find link opportunities which will boost your own ranking authority by getting backlinks from websites which link to the competitors.
Read about how to audit bad backlinks, in our blog: BACKLINK AUDITS: HOW TO ANALYZE BAD BACKLINKS.
When planning a digital marketing strategy, it is of utmost importance to perform a competitor analysis for SEO. It will enable you to build an SEO campaign which will perform better as it is based on what works in your niche. This analysis will give you an edge over your competitors and will help you rank better.
