Why Businesses Should Bother About SEO Competitor Analysis

As the business landscape expands, almost every organization has to face daunting competition regardless of the domain it belongs to. Keeping an eye on the competitors is important if you want to survive, sustain and grow in the long run. SEO competitor analysis is vital in this context because you cannot ignore the online landscape. Essentially, it is about knowing what your online rivals are up to. By doing so, you can uncover their strengths and weaknesses and use them to realign your strategy.

Needless to say, competitor analysis is a critical segment of search engine optimization but many companies still ignore it. They prioritize aspects such as keyword mapping, content optimization, and link building, without paying adequate attention to this aspect.  However, ignoring the competition can have an adverse impact on your campaigns and even cause them to fail. Here are some reasons that justify the value of SEO competitor analysis for any business.

Identify your competition

The worst mistake that any business can make is ignoring the competition it faces. Investing in a competitor analysis is a smart move as it enables you to identify your rivals in the market.  Once you know them, you can also gauge their standing and practices to understand what they are doing better (or worse) than you.

There is an additional benefit of knowing your rivals. Obviously, your customers will have good reasons for choosing a brand over yours if your offerings are quite similar. Identifying these reasons is important so that you may implement an action plan to get the customers to your side. This is exactly where a comprehensive analysis of the competitors’ strategy can help.

Know the websites they are linking to

When it comes to the analysis of your online competition, you get the benefit of knowing more about the websites that are linking to. This is an obvious advantage is you can use the information to find more backlink building opportunities.

The idea is to reach out to these websites (which will probably be niche-relevant and authoritative) and pursue them for some quality backlinks through guest posting. By doing so, you can strengthen your link profile and avail myriad benefits such as better search rankings, higher traffic and an improved reputation for your business.

Decide the right keywords

While you analyze your competitors, you can perform a keyword gap analysis to pinpoint the kind of keywords that are taking them ahead of you. There could be specific keywords that may be ranking high for the rivals but you may not be using them at all. Including such keywords on your site can definitely give you an advantage.

Besides knowing the right keywords, you also need to tighten your anchor text strategy.  Adam White at SEOJet explains that a great competitor analysis report will let you see the specific kinds of anchors you should use to crush your competition. Knowing these parameters well enough is the only way you can get ahead and ramp up your plan for better results.

Learn about the content that is working for them

Without any doubt, content is the backbone of SEO and you cannot expect to rank high without great content resources. When it comes to the SEO analysis of your competing sites, it includes having an in-depth look at their content pages as well. Check everything you can and list the facts you find interesting. Remember that every detail matters.

How often do they publish blog posts? What are the content types they publish- infographics, guest posts, press releases, case studies, FAQ pages or video content? What is the average word count of their posts? Learn more about their content marketing approach and consider what you can emulate to improve your strategy.

Enhance your digital marketing campaigns

SEO competitor analysis goes much beyond just polishing your SEO strategy; rather it can enhance your overall digital marketing campaigns as well. These campaigns require a great deal of hard work for successful planning and implementation. At the same time, marketers need to understand the market trends as a whole. This is possible only if you know the competition well enough and understand what they are up to.

A competitive analysis covers your needs to a significant extent and also offers you almost all the information you require. It acts as a credible source of information and data, which can serve as valuable assets for designing your marketing campaigns effectively.

Discover what the customers want

The most incredible reason why you should perform a thorough SEO competitive analysis is that it lets you discover what the customers want. When it comes to establishing an online presence, understanding the customer expectations is perhaps the most challenging aspect. By analyzing your rivals, you can uncover what works for them.

At the same time, you know what really drives results for you. With such useful information, it is easy to put two and two together and understand what the customers really expect from a business. You can dig deeper into aspects such as product features, website architecture, and marketing approach. These are powerful pieces of information that you can use smartly to align your offerings and campaigns with customer expectations.

Unlock new marketing channels

Exploring the tactics followed by your competitors can help you unlock new marketing channels that can take your business to the next level. For example, you may find that a rival us relying greatly on social media marketing and getting immense benefits from the approach. You can easily integrate it into your strategy and start deriving great results.

 Similarly, it is a great idea to utilize user-generated content such as reviews and product stories shared by real customers. If a competitor is using this tactic and getting effective results, you can “steal” the idea too. So there are opportunities to widen the scope of your campaigns by checking what others are doing.

Knowing your competitors well is a smart idea for any business as it takes you one step ahead. It makes you well-prepared for the future and ensures that you never make the mistake of underestimating your rivals. Therefore, you should make all the efforts to get a full grasp on their viability, success and potential shortcomings.