Step Wice SEO

Here, we’ll ask you to use your memory and a couple of new tools and techniques-to dive all the way in:

Identify Your Top Five Competitors
Snooping Tools and Techniques
Assess On-Page Factors
Assess Off-Page Factors
Paid Competition

Identify Your Top Five Competitors
Here you need to choose which competitors to review in depth. To keep this week’s tasks manageable, we recommend that you limit the number of top competitors you examine to five.

If one of your biggest competitors doesn’t have a website, then give them an honorary mention on your list. But we want you here to choose five competitors with at least some Web presence.

Your review will be the most meaningful if you select your “Big Five” from the following categories:

Business Competition Even if you know who the major players in your field are, you should check with your sales and executive team members to get the back story that you may not be aware of.

For example, there may be different competitors for different products or target audiences.

There may be a “new kid on the block” who’s poised to enter a space that you’re currently dominating.

Or your company may have just lost a big job to someone in particular. Ask your colleagues to prioritize their competitors based on current issues, goals, and grudges.

Search Competition You should have an excellent grasp of who’s who in the top spots. Who did you see in the top ranks frequently enough to make you take notice?

Whose listings were not only visible, but also well written? Whether these companies hold a candle to your organization in real life isn’t relevant here.

Even if they’re just a blip on your business radar, if they’re attracting the eyeballs that you want, you need to find out how they’re doing it.

Pay-per-Click Competition Even though PPC and organic listings are different animals, they are displayed in direct competition to each other in the search engine results.

So if there is a company out there who is showing up in the sponsored links for your targeted keywords, you may want to add it to your Big Five.

As you’re going through your search and PPC competition, be on the lookout for “left field” competition. These are listings that are displayed for the same keywords that you’re targeting but have no connection to your organization’s focus.

For example, the directors of the Green Acres Day Camp in Toronto are going head-to-head with trivia sites about the old Green Acres TV show.

Whether you choose to review one of these sites is up to you. But if you’re finding a lot more “left field” competitors than you expect, you may need to rethink your keyword choices.

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