How to do an SEO competitor analysis to stay ahead of the curve

Analyzing competitors helps you understand your market position and identify improvement opportunities. By examining what’s working for other companies, you can uncover successful SEO practices you’ve not yet tapped into.

Effective competitor analysis starts with assessing your own SEO strategies, such as your backlinks, target keywords, and technical optimization. Then, you analyze competitor websites with analysis tools that illuminate why they outrank you in search engine results pages (SERPs).

Learn how to conduct a competitor analysis so you can adapt your SEO strategy to outrank them.

The importance of conducting an SEO competitor analysis

Analyzing competitors can provide you with the following valuable information:

• New insights into your industry landscape and trends, such as new content types, target keywords, and search intents.
• SEO gaps your competitors fill that you don’t, such as popular subtopics or emerging audiences.
• Untapped strengths you have over your competitors, like features and design choices you can highlight to differentiate your brand.

3 competitive analysis tools

To conduct SEO competitive research, start with an SEO tool that can provide insight into your competitors’ websites. Here are three of the best SEO analysis tools on the market.

1. Semrush

Semrush is a robust competitive analysis tool that offers crucial insights about your site’s organic traffic, direct and indirect competitors, and keyword data. It checks multiple data points to discover gaps in your content and compares your traffic against those of your competitors. Then, it generates actionable tips for improving your SEO strategy, like optimizing meta tags, focusing on different keywords, or fixing broken links.

2. Ahrefs

Ahrefs, an alternative to Semrush, offers many similar features. They have their own content and keyword database, which they use to provide insights on search intent, domain authority, and keyword rankings. Combined with their web crawler, Ahrefs has quickly become one of the best sources for web traffic data.

3. SpyFu

SpyFu focuses primarily on identifying opportunities for search engine marketing (SEM) ads, but the tool also offers SEO features like keyword research, backlink analysis, and competitor analysis. The company also recently introduced an AI tool called RivalFlowAI that can suggest changes to your content to improve SEO performance. 

These tools each offer valuable insights into your competitors’ strategies, but the real value lies in how you interpret and apply the data. Outline and compare how your competitors perform across different factors — including keywords, content, and backlinks — to uncover opportunities to improve your own SEO performance.

Effective SEO competitive analysis: 5 elements

An effective competitive analysis involves digging into your competitors’ SEO strategy to uncover opportunities to perform better. 

First, identify your competitors by checking the SERPs or SEO tools to find websites ranking higher than you in relevant query results. Then, use your SEO tool and review those competitors’ sites to analyze the following five factors.

1. Traffic sources

Traffic sources are the various channels through which competitors get their web traffic. Pay attention to how much of a competitor’s search engine traffic comes from organic traffic versus paid search ads. Higher organic traffic indicates their SEO is doing most of the heavy lifting, meaning they may have invested significant effort into their SEO strategy. Higher paid search traffic likely means they’re supplementing weaker SEO tactics with paid SEM methods.

2. Content gaps

Use your SEO tool to analyze your competitors’ top-performing pages and compare them to your own content. Look at topics and keywords that your competitors rank highly for that you don’t. Also, examine the types of content that perform well — for example, blog posts, videos, or landing pages. By addressing these content gaps, you can capture untapped search traffic and improve your overall website SEO.

3. Backlink opportunities

Backlinks direct users to your content from other sites. Search engines consider backlinks when determining a site’s authority, assuming that a site with more backlinks must have authoritative content since so many people refer to it. 

There are many ways to get backlinks, such as partnering with sites in adjacent industries or adding your site to a directory. But ultimately, the best way to attract these links is to write authoritative content that other sites will refer to as a credible source.

Semrush offers a helpful Backlink Gap tool that checks competitor content for backlinks and shows where they’re coming from. If you notice many competitors are getting theirs from the same places, contact those websites and ask them to consider linking to your site, too.

4. Paid search keywords

You can learn a lot from reviewing the keywords that sites select to advertise for, especially regarding the topics and intents they’re prioritizing. For example, online retailers will often go after intent keywords like “buy” or “purchase” — but if you notice your competitors start bidding on terms like “subscribe,” you know they’re trying a strategy that leverages an email campaign, a newsletter, or a subscription service. That may inspire you to try similar strategies.

5. Technical SEO

Technical SEO is another vital component that affects how your site ranks in SERPs. As you review competitors’ websites, observe technical elements like:

• Site speed. Use a tool like YSlow to compare competitors’ website load speeds to yours.
• Structured data. Tools like Schema.org’s markup validator can show how competitors use schema markup to label and categorize their website elements — which helps search engines understand content better.
• Responsive design. Check how well competitor content displays and functions on multiple device types.
• Redirects, 404s, and site errors. You have an advantage if your competitors have any of these problems. Ensure your site contains fewer of them, and — all other things being equal — you’ll perform better in search results.

Future-proof your SEO strategy with Webflow

As your industry grows and evolves, it’s up to you to learn from your competitors and adapt your site to remain competitive. Far from a one-off project, SEO competitor analysis is a regular part of website maintenance. And with the right website platform, it’s not as time-consuming as it sounds.

‍Webflow has the tools you need to quickly make the SEO changes highlighted by your competitor analysis. Breeze through site adjustments with sitemap controls, automated metadata, and scalable schema markup. These SEO features (and more) can help you pivot your content strategy to pull ahead of competitors.