By understanding your competitors' advantages, disadvantages, and tactics, competitor analysis helps you improve the positioning of your website. You can get useful information even with free tools. Here's how:
1. Determine Your Rivals
Utilize Google Search: Enter your desired keywords to locate competitors that rank highly.
Use the free version of SimilarWeb to find related competitors and traffic insights.
2. Evaluation of Website Performance
Assess the technical health, user experience, and speed of rival websites with GTmetrix/Google PageSpeed Insights.
Use the Google Mobile-Friendly Test to examine mobile friendliness.
3. Information on Traffic and Audience
SimilarWeb (free basic version): Offers engagement data, top geographic locations, and traffic sources.
Ubersuggest (free tier): Displays top-ranking pages and the estimated volume of traffic.
4. Analysis of Keywords
Use Google Keyword Planner to find out which keywords your rivals may be focusing on.
Ubersuggest/SEMrush Free Tools: Examine SEO gaps and a small list of competitor keywords.
5. Analysis of Backlinks
Find out which competitors are receiving the most backlinks with the Ahrefs Backlink Checker (free).
View backlink sources and domain authority with Moz Link Explorer (free limited).
6. Review of Content Strategy
Use BuzzSumo (free searches) to monitor the blog activity of your competitors.
Examine the kinds of content that generate engagement, such as blogs, videos, and guides.
7. Performance on Social Media
Make use of native analytics tools, such as LinkedIn page insights and Facebook page transparency.
Track follower growth, engagement rates, and posting frequency by hand.
In conclusion, you can build a powerful competitor profile by combining free tools like Google, SimilarWeb, Ubersuggest, Ahrefs, and BuzzSumo. Consistency is essential; monitor changes frequently to improve your own website strategy.
