How to Do an SEO Competitor Analysis + Free Template

What Is SEO Competitor Analysis?

An SEO competitor analysis (also called an SEO competitive analysis) is the process of researching your competitors to gather insights about their keyword, content, and backlink strategy and using those insights to improve your own SEO.

In this article we’ll cover:

• Why an SEO competitor analysis is important
• How to run an SEO competitive analysis
• How to create an actionable competitive analysis report (+ share a free template)

Why Is an SEO Competitor Analysis Important?

Understanding who your competitors are and analyzing their strategies and tactics is an integral part of any SEO strategy.

Why?

Because your business doesn’t live in a vacuum.

There are tens, if not hundreds, of websites with content similar to yours. And they’re fighting for the same spots in Google.

And an SEO competitor analysis is the best way to stay one step ahead.

It can help you identify who’s ranking highly for your target keywords so you can:

• Discover their winning strategies (and replicate them)
• Uncover their weaknesses (and capitalize on them)
• Benchmark your current SEO performance against them

And more.

Now, it’s time to discuss how to do it.

How to Run an SEO Competitive Analysis

Let’s walk through the process of performing an SEO competitor analysis.

Identify Your SEO Competitors

SEO competitors are websites that are ranking in organic (unpaid) search...