Whenever a website is optimized for search engines, various elements are kept into consideration. One of the important elements of SEO is the market research and the competitive analysis. Understanding of competition in the market, their services, techniques, tactics, initiatives etc. helps a website obtain crucial advantage. In accordance to SEO, the competitors are basically the ones who have been occupying high rankings on the SERP (search engine results page) for the targeted keywords.
A checklist for competition analysis is as follows:
- Identifying competitors: competitors can be of two types- broad competitors and niche competitors. Both the types should be analyzed to gain high rankings in local as well as global search engines.
- On Page competition analysis: after identifying the competitors, their website, content, coding, design issues as well as technical aspects should be thoroughly studied. The quality of their content, keyword usage, keyword repetition, etc. should be observed and used.
- Off Page competition analysis: the backlinks, indirect promotion strategies, link building strategies, etc. should be thoroughly assessed so that similar and better techniques can be utilized.
- Constant surveillance of competition: a constant check should be kept on the various SEO services implemented by competition. If a change is noticed, and if it is beneficial to the site, a similar strategy should be applied.
A competitor analysis from SEO viewpoint is similar to traditional marketing. The results obtained by competition analysis are then implemented for compilation of effective SEO services.
