How to Conduct an SEO Competitor Analysis

SEO, or search engine optimization, is becoming more and more crucial for any online business. Why? Where you rank is important because SEO is one of the primary ways that consumers find your business online, using SEO writing among other strategies.

After all, according to Backlinko, the top slot on Google receives a 27 percent click-through rate, whereas the second page only receives a 0.63 percent CTR.

When you add an SEO competitive analysis to a full digital marketing competitive analysis, you can see how you stack up against your competitors and what they’re doing with SEO.

In order to develop a plan that keeps you ahead of them in the rankings (both Google and otherwise), it will point out your advantages and disadvantages. When conducting a competitive analysis, you follow these five essential steps:

• Determine your rivals.
• Examine their SEO approach.
• Examine their keywords.
• Examine their optimization on-page.
• Examine their backlink profile.

Let us now examine how to perform competition analysis in SEO.  

Step 1: Identify Your Competitors

Whether you’re a start-up or an established company you should know who your competitors are. This is true for both your SEO competition and where you rank on search engines, in addition to the products or services you offer!

Making a list is the first step in identifying your competitors. Examine your desired search terms and website searches to determine which businesses or websites appear first.

For instance, if you search for “SEO trends 2025,” you’ll see that Wordstream has the featured snippet, while Search Engine Journal has the second and third places.  Finding out who your rivals are is the first step in any competition analysis. These could be indirect competitors that rank for the same keywords but work in other categories, or direct competitors—companies that provide comparable goods or services. By examining industry-relevant keywords and determining which domains frequently show up in search results, you can use tools like Semrush and Ahrefs to find both kinds of competitors.

Step 2: Analyze their SEO Strategy

Examine the websites of your closest competitors to gain insight into their SEO approach. This covers the content categories produced, the targeted keywords (both short-tail and long-tail), and the structure of the website.

You should also look at how responsive and fast your competitors’ websites are on mobile devices. You can accomplish this by using Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test and PageSpeed Insights.

Want to know how to optimize website loading speed? Read our guide to get tips and tricks. Understanding these factors will enable you to assess how your website stacks up against those of your rivals in terms of technical SEO. 

Understanding which keywords drive traffic to your competitors’ sites provides insight into their SEO strategies. By identifying these keywords, you can discover opportunities to target similar terms or find gaps where your content can fill unmet needs. Tools like Ahrefs’ Site Explorer allow you to see the keywords your competitors rank for, their search volumes, and the traffic they generate. 

Step 3: Analyze their Keywords

Your major keywords may be performing well, but what about the ones that rank well but put you at the bottom of the first page of the search engine results page?

Keep an eye on those keywords because if you put in the work to incorporate them into the content, you might be able to surpass your competition and secure a place before them.

Additionally, you should search for keyword opportunities and gaps. Using tools like SEMRush or AHREFS, this will assist you in determining which terms or phrases you could and should rank for. Content is a cornerstone of SEO, and analyzing your competitors’ content can reveal what resonates with your shared audience. Consider the following aspects:​

1. Content Types: Are they producing blogs, videos, infographics, or podcasts?​
2. Publishing Frequency: How often do they release new content?​
3. Engagement Metrics: Which pieces receive the most shares, comments, or backlinks?​

By assessing these elements, you can identify successful content formats and topics to incorporate into your strategy. Tools like BuzzSumo can help you discover the most shared content in your industry, providing inspiration for your own content creation.

Step 4: Analyze their On-Page Optimization

It’s possible that your competitors invest more time and energy into optimizing their pages than you do, which is why they rank higher in search results.

Therefore, you must examine the pages that are ranking higher than you. This will assist you in figuring out why your competitors are performing better in terms of their search engine positioning.

You should take into account the following factors in your analysis:

Titles: Google considers your page’s title to be significant since it indicates how pertinent a keyword is to a search and affects ranking. Because title tags instruct browsers on how to display the title of your website in search results, social media, and browser tabs, make sure they are accurate and linked to the appropriate keyword.

Meta-data: This relates to the meta description tags and meta keywords. Both will assist Google in determining the purpose of your page. Examine how your rivals are improving their search engine optimization.

Headlines or Headings: When tags are associated with particular keywords, Google favors them and gives them weight. To get your material to the top of the page, you may also pluck these out for featured snippets. Note that Google uses H1 tags about 51 percent of the time when it disregards the title tag, according to Ahrefs.  

Internal linking structure: Internal links can boost your sites’ SEO and help guide users to relevant material. Instead of stuffing an article with links, make sure they are relevant and of high quality to keep readers on your page.

Want to know a complete SEO checklist needed for website. Continue reading our guide. 

Quality content: No matter how much material you publish, visitors won’t stay on your site long enough to read it, and search engines won’t rank it if it isn’t relevant and of high quality. When it comes to creating content, quality is preferable to quantity.

Videos and images: Do your rivals optimize their movies and images for mobile and the web? Are they appropriately labeled with names that are pertinent and descriptive? To compete, you ought to follow suit.

Schema markup and structured data: Structured data can increase a page’s exposure in search results and aid search engines in understanding its content.

URLs: Examine the URLs of your rivals to determine whether they are taking any unique actions. Make sure your URLs contain appropriate keywords and are clear and informative.

Customer experience: Your competitors’ page layout, navigation, and load speed should all be considered because usability affects rankings. What is the typical customer experience like, and how does it differ from yours?  

Step 5: Investigating Backlink Profiles

Backlinks remain a significant ranking factor in SEO. Analyzing your competitors’ backlink profiles can uncover opportunities for your own link-building efforts. Focus on:​

• Referring Domains: Which authoritative sites link to your competitors?​
• Anchor Text: What keywords are used in the backlinks?​
• Link Acquisition Strategies: Are they earning links through guest posts, partnerships, or content marketing?​

Utilizing tools like Ahrefs or Semrush’s Backlink Analytics can help you gather this information and identify potential link-building opportunities.

SEO Competitor Analysis: Key Factors & Tools

Conclusion

Learn how to do an in-depth SEO competitive analysis.

Since trends show that SEO is constantly evolving, it’s critical to regularly perform a competitive analysis in order to stay ahead of the competition. Our experts at Zrafted will thoroughly examine all the foundations of SEO, including how to enhance your website, optimize content, and use on-page, off-page, and local SEO in addition to strategy. Sign up today!