How to Analyze a Competitor's Website - page 2

by James Mahony, 2/17/2006

Scrutinize the Leaders.

The next step is to study the top 5 or 10 competitors very closely. There is a lot that can be learned by looking at competitors website and analyzing them. These are the things that you should look for.

Make sure you check to see what products or services they offer, and note anything that's different from your own offerings. Look for gaps that you could fill.
Think about the look, feel and functionality of their website.
See what advertising campaigns and offers they're running.
Look at their strengths and weaknesses, from the customer's point of view.
See if you can figure out their strategy.

When you're dealing with publicly traded companies, you can often get detailed information from their SEC filings. Write down the names of their key players and then look for any interviews and speeches they might have made about their website.

Look for Strengths, Vulnerabilities, and Gaps.

Now, summarize the information you've found into a few sentences for each competitor, highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of each one. Note strategies that are going to be necessary to counter their offering - these will depend on your own website's strengths. If you're small, then you'll need to be resourceful to exploit their weaknesses.

With this research, you can create a marketing plan. Be sure to include how you intend to deal with competition, and what steps you think you'll need to take for you site to come out on top. Once you've finished analyzing your competitors, you need to consider whether it would be better not to compete at all, and find a less-saturated market.

Don't get frightened away prematurely, though - make sure you know what you're getting into before you start, and don't let big companies intimidate you. Remember that you can move faster than they can! All you have to do is offer your customers things they can't find anywhere else.

Now you can understand why there's a growing interest in SEO. When people start looking for more information about SEO, you'll be in a position to meet their needs.

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About the author

James Mahony is the founder of Search Engine Optimization Tips - A site dedicated to Search Engine Optimization. SEO Tips, All About Domain Names, Articles for Website Content

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