Whether you have a big or small business, you need to scale and become a household name in your industry. Competitor website research is a critical aspect that every business looking to grow should consider. But then, it all starts with understanding how you can check competitor websites.
This article will explore some of the best ways to research your competitors’ websites and extract important data. The data you gather will help you develop a strategy that guarantees you long-term success. These methods will deliver excellent results for direct and indirect competitors alike.
Let’s get started.
Evaluate Their Website Content
Although you may notice a few websites ranking highly, not all of them deserve those positions. Some rank with low-quality content on their pages, making it necessary to read between the lines. You should go deeper into individual pages and see whether they’re better than you in any aspect.
Once you have the idea, you can go ahead and create content beyond what they offer. The best way to beat them is to create better content that will intrigue your target audiences. Thus, it would be best if you never took competitor website evaluation as any other thing but a method with impressive returns.
Check Their Website Tools
Websites that rank high do not sometimes have to do everything. They mostly employ various tools, some automated to complete some tasks quickly and achieve better rankings. One of the important things you should be looking for on your competitors’ websites is the tools they use to rank higher.
For instance, your competitor could be using SEO proxies for keyword research or any other tasks. You can also check the web hosting they use or the email service they employ. All these are tools that not only enable better rankings but also help businesses increase revenue. You can try them on your website too.
Please Pay Attention to Their Brand
You should also check out how the business has branded itself on its website. It helps to look for how they’ve used logos, brand names, and colors, among many other features. You can also change your website for the better when you understand how competitors display their brand’s identity on their sites.
The best thing about website branding is that it gives your website a personalized touch. Besides, it makes your website look polished and brings about a sense of professionalism. Thus, it would help if you spent the time to ensure your site represents your brand correctly, and emulating competitors isn’t a crime.
Monitor Their Social Networks
Source: Pixabay
Monitoring competitors on social media gives you ideas of what they do with their websites. Many businesses use their social media pages for advertising their websites to potential customers. You can copy such a technique from your competitors if you notice that it gives them the success you desire for your website.
There is a lot of software that can help you monitor competitors on social media. However, most of this software can be expensive and could take a long time to deliver. You can simplify your research by following competitors and observing their activity. You can then analyze posts that attract more interactions and implement them.
Analyze Their SEO Strategy and Traffic
Getting a picture of a company’s SEO strategy and traffic can be a game-changer for you. Competitor websites contain various data from keywords, backlinks, etc. You can dig out for such information and build your website to be better than your competitors with high-quality backlinks, better keywords, etc.
Various tools will help you get the data you need about a certain competitor. If you consider tools like SEMRush, you’ll discover the keywords competitors are using to drive more organic traffic. This tool and many others are mainly helpful because a single website could have multiple pages making it difficult to research manually.
Don’t forget to look at the seller tools here to find free competitor research tools for business owners!
Consider Their Pricing
Source: Pixabay
Pricing is a vital factor that can draw traffic to your website, depending on how you use it. When looking at a website, you should consider its features and compare them against the product prices. You can also check for promotions or discounts that they’re offering their customers.
Some websites may not have pricing pages, so don’t panic if you can’t find such a page on your competitors’ websites. The fact that they do not have one should give you an edge over them in the market. You should quickly update a pricing page on your site as it also enhances transparency.
Check Their Reviews and Citations
Competitor website research is not only about checking their website. You can learn about what they do from their past clients by checking for online reviews. Most internet users will give an honest assessment of their experience with a certain website.
A positive response means that the website met their needs and is worth emulating. On the other hand, negative experiences show that the website needs to do better. You can check the site’s aspects that past clients mentioned in reviews, such as slow loading speeds, and improve them on your site.
Become a Customer
Sometimes you need to spend time on a competitor’s products to learn what they do. You can sign up for a service or buy a product as any customer to understand the process on the competitor’s site. The best thing about this method is that it gives you first-hand experience.
You will understand what works well on their site and what doesn’t. You will then concentrate on their shortcomings by providing better solutions than them. So, when you pose as a customer, the gaps and opportunities you’d exploit become more apparent. That makes it easy to know the changes your site needs.
Final Thoughts
Once you have got a picture of every variable, beating your competitors becomes easy. You can improve the quality of service or products and beat them in almost every business aspect. Most of the things you’ll learn from competitor websites are basics. It is all about who does these small things better than the other.