How to Do an SEO Competitor Analysis [+ Template]

What Is SEO Competitor Analysis?

An SEO competitor analysis is the process of researching rival websites' search engine optimization strategies and results to gather insights you can use to improve your own results.

In SEO, competitor websites are those that often show higher than you for relevant search engine queries. And those higher positions in search results can divert traffic away from your website.

Why Is an SEO Competitor Analysis Important?

Doing an SEO competitor analysis is important because it provides insights that help you outrank (appear higher than) rival websites in search engines like Google.

Specifically, analyzing rival websites allows you to:

• Discover winning SEO strategies and replicate them
• Uncover rivals' SEO weaknesses and capitalize on them
• Benchmark your current SEO performance and measure how your performance changes

Ultimately, doing an SEO competitor analysis can help you boost brand awareness, generate more traffic, and increase your market share.

How to Do an SEO Competitor Analysis

We recommend that you do an SEO competitor analysis every three to six months, so you can quickly identify any changes in your market and adapt your strategy.

We also recommend that you analyze competitors' SEO efforts:

• Before launching new products or services, so you can learn about the market you're entering
• After a rankings decline, so you can get a better understanding of potential issues

Here's how to do an SEO competitor analysis-step by step:

1. Identify Your SEO Competitors

To identify your SEO competitors, search for your target keywords (search terms you want to show for) in Google to see which websites commonly appear.

Or, enter your domain into the Organic Research tool and go to the "Competitors" tab.

The tool will search our database to see which domains have the most keyword rankings in common with your domain.

It's important to note that SEO competitors aren't always business competitors.

For example, an industry publication might not sell the same products or services as you. But the publication could divert search traffic away from your website.

2. Find Keyword Gaps

Keyword gaps are keywords that competitors rank for but you don't, and filling these gaps can help you attract more traffic to your website.

You can find keyword gaps with Semrush's Keyword Gap tool.

Enter your domain and up to four competitors' domains. Then, scroll down to the table and apply the "Missing" filter.

You'll see keywords that all analyzed competitors rank for but you don't.

Use these filters to refine your results:

• Position: The ranking position of analyzed sites. You might want to filter for keywords that all competitors rank in the top 10 results for, as these keywords are more likely to be relevant to you.
• Volume: The average number of monthly searches for the keyword. Generally, higher-volume keywords can drive more brand awareness and traffic.
• KD: The keyword difficulty score, which measures how hard it'll be to secure a top-10 Google ranking. You may wish to focus on keywords in the "Very easy" to "Easy" range.
• Intent: The general purpose behind the search. Transactional keywords tend to be best at driving sales, while informational keywords tend to work best for blog posts.
• Advanced filters: Here, you can filter for keywords that include one or more specific words. This is helpful if you want to focus on a particular topic.

Look for relevant, high-potential keywords you want to target and save them to a keyword list.

Then, you can develop a plan to target these keywords.

3. Identify Competitors' Sitewide Strengths and Weaknesses

Identify competitors' sitewide strengths and weaknesses to pinpoint where your SEO efforts could have the greatest impact.

You can find these strengths and weaknesses by evaluating your rivals' content performance and technical SEO health:

Content Performance

Analyze your competitors' content performance to see what content works for them, and then try to replicate their results.

You might be able to see which pieces of content attract the most comments on their website. Or attract the most engagement on social media.

But you can get better insights with an SEO competitor analysis tool.

For example, the Organic Research tool can show your competitor's top-performing pages based on the estimated amount of unpaid search traffic they bring in.

Make sure to examine your competitors' top-performing pages to look for patterns.

For instance:

• Is the content mostly long-form or short?
• Do they use lots of videos or images?
• Are they mostly product pages, blog posts, or something different?

Let your answers to these questions guide your content production. To take the guesswork out. And recreate what's already working-in a better way.

Technical SEO

Analyzing your website's technical SEO health and comparing it against your rivals' is a key step in doing a competitor analysis, because technical health can make all the difference in rankings.

You can learn about your site's technical health for free through Google Search Console.

The tool provides various reports, including:

• Page indexing: Discover which pages have and haven't been added to Google's index (database of possible search results)
• Core Web Vitals: See how your site scores on three page experience metrics, collectively known as Core Web Vitals
• HTTPS: Check that all the pages on your site use the secure HTTPS protocol, as recommended by Google

Alternatively, use Semrush's Site Audit tool to review your technical SEO.

You can run regular audits to check your progress.

And get advice on how and why to fix each issue.

If you used Google Search Console to review your technical health, do the following to evaluate your competitors:

• Review competitors' Core Web Vitals with the PageSpeed Insights tool (just know that this only shows metrics for the specified page)
• Manually check if competitors' webpages use the HTTPS protocol
• See how competitors' websites perform on a mobile device
• Inspect competitors' XML sitemaps to see which pages they've flagged for indexing

If you used Site Audit to crawl your website, use the same tool for your competitor analysis.

Then, compare your results.

Try to match competitors in areas where they're strong. And beat competitors in areas where they're lacking.

4. Analyze Competing Sites on a Page-by-Page Basis

There are many on-page SEO factors that influence a page's performance in search results, so it's helpful to review specific pages as part of your SEO competitive analysis.

Here are the specific elements you should analyze on each page:

A title tag is an HTML element that indicates the title of a webpage and is commonly displayed in search engine results, social media posts, and browser tabs.

Like this:

Title tags help signal to Google what your pages are about. And optimizing them is one of the easiest ways to improve your rankings.

Which is why you should look at your competitors' title tags. Especially the ones on pages that outrank you.

When you do, ask yourself:

• Do competitors integrate keywords better than you?
• Do the target keywords appear near the beginning of the title tags? At the end?
• Do competitors include special, click-enticing modifiers like "easy," "best," and "free"?

The answers to these questions should give you an idea of how to craft your title tags-so you can boost your rankings.

A meta description is a short snippet of text that summarizes a webpage's content and can appear in search engine results pages.

Like this:

Meta descriptions aren't a direct ranking factor. But they can affect (and improve) click-through rates.

Meta descriptions are often overlooked, particularly on large sites. So, don't make that mistake.

Instead, see how your competitors use meta descriptions. Notice what's working and what isn't. And adjust yours accordingly.

URL Structure

URL structure is the order, compartmentalization, and grouping of webpage URLs within a website.

Like this:

Your URL structure affects how easily users can navigate a site, find specific pages, and find specific content types.

Ideally, a URL structure is intuitive, clear, and organized.

Study your competitors' URL structures on their pages that outrank your pages. And ask yourself:

• Do competitors integrate keywords in their URLs? If so, how?
• Do competitors use shorter URL slugs?
• Do competitors' URLs describe the page content?

If you notice something you can improve, act on it so your URLs are as good as-or better than-your competitors'.

Content and Keywords

This step in your SEO competitor research involves taking a deeper look at the pages that outrank your pages and analyzing their content.

As you do, ask yourself questions like:

• How are competitors using keywords throughout the page?
• Are there relevant secondary keywords you could add to your content?
• Is the writing of high quality?
• Do competitors cover topics in a similar level of detail as you?
• How does the content demonstrate Experience, Expertise, Authoritativeness, and Trustworthiness (E-E-A-T)?
• What makes the content unique?
• How do competitors use images, videos, data, etc.?

Answering these questions helps you identify ways to improve your own content.

5. Find Backlink Gaps

If a reputable site links to a competitor but doesn't link to you, you have a backlink gap that's worth addressing.

Closing backlink gaps can be important in SEO because Google uses backlinks to gauge the authoritativeness of websites and webpages.

You can check your own backlinks in Google Search Console. And find competitor backlinks by searching competitors' names in Google and checking the results that show up.

But it's quicker and more reliable to use Semrush's Backlink Gap tool.

Enter your domain and your rivals' domains, and the tool will show your "Best" prospects by default.

These are websites that link to all your rivals but not to you.

You can learn more about competitors' backlinks by clicking the arrows in the corresponding rows and columns.

Like this:

To identify the best backlink prospects, consider factors like:

• The authoritativeness of the website and webpage: Backlinks from more authoritative websites and webpages tend to be better for SEO. Semrush's Authority Score (AS) measures authoritativeness out of 100.
• The relevancy of the website: Backlinks from topically relevant sites tend to be better for SEO. So, look for websites that are authoritative in your niche.
• The context of the backlink: Prominent backlinks on relevant, high-quality pages tend to be best for SEO. You also want your brand to be mentioned in a positive context.
• The nofollow status of the backlink: If you see that the backlink has a nofollow attribute, this means Google may ignore the link for SEO purposes

There are many link building tactics you can use to acquire links from your chosen prospects. But it's smart to mimic the tactic that worked for your competitor.

For example, the competitor might have got their product featured in a relevant round-up. Or allowed the website to interview their CEO.

6. Monitor Competitors' SERP Features

When competitors appear in SERP features (non-traditional search results) for target keywords, they may attract more attention on the search results page.

If you optimize for the same SERP features, you may be able to replace your competitors and capture the attention for your own site.

You can search Google manually to see if your competitors appear in any SERP features.

Like this, which is an example of a featured snippet :

Alternatively, analyze a competitor in Semrush's Organic Research tool. And go to the "Positions" report.

The icons in the "Position" column represent SERP feature rankings for the corresponding keywords.

You can focus on specific types of SERP feature rankings by using the filter at the top.

There are distinct ways to optimize for different SERP features. And you can find advice about many of them (e.g., sitelinks, AI Overviews, and the local pack) on the Semrush blog.

Here are some quick tips for success:

Try Our SEO Competitor Analysis Report Template

Semrush's My Reports tool provides a competitor analysis report template that makes it quick and easy to compile key information about rival websites.

Enter your competitors' domains and the tool will present detailed information about their:

• Website traffic
• Market share
• Keywords
• Backlinks
• Paid search ads
• Brand mentions
• Social media performance

(Assuming you have the necessary tool subscriptions.)

The competitor analysis report is fully customizable and easy to share with your team.

Plus, you can schedule the report to run every month.

Start your free trial to use the template and create your first SEO competitor analysis report.

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