Whether you have been advertising online for many years, or have just created your very first website and are raring to go, knowing who your competitors are is crucial to online success. Your competitors may not be who you think they are and your online competitors may be completely different to your offline competitors.
Similarly to having a shop on the same street as another business selling similar products, your online competitors are websites which are competing to be shown in the search results for the same words and phrases you want to be. Unless you are in an incredibly small niche, you are likely to have a wide variety of websites competing with you, but this doesn’t make them a direct competitor.
In this article we will show you how to identify your online competitors, keep reading to find out how!
Keyword Competition
The most effective and simple method of identifying other businesses trying to sell to your potential customers is searching for the keywords you are targeting into a search engine. Take note of the domains ranking on page 1 of the search results for your keywords, including those who appear in paid listings. If you are a local business, you should change your search term to include the area your business serves or enter ‘near me’ at the end of the phrase.
Find Related: Competitors on Google
Google has a helpful search operator which you can type into the search engine to discover high quality sites related to your website, Google will likely associate related websites as competitors. For example, we looked into John Lewis’ competitors:
Directories
Niche directories that focus on specific areas or niche industries are a great way for you to identify competitors. Start by search for directories of businesses in your immediate area and see what businesses appear (and if they have a website).
Competitor Analysis
If you don’t have the time to do the research, that’s what we’re here for! We provide a full competitor analysis service to identify who is competing against you, how you perform organically in comparison to them and much more to help you form a bulletproof SEO strategy.