SEO competitor analysis is the process of finding the sites that rank for the searches you want, working out why they rank, and turning the gaps into a prioritised list of pages to write and links to earn. Done well, it answers three questions: who do we actually compete with in search, what do they have that we lack, and which of those gaps can we close first.
The sites you meet in search are often different from the companies your sales team names. A plumbing firm's search competitors include directories and home improvement publishers. A software company competes with review sites and blogs. And since AI assistants started answering buying questions directly, there is a third set: the brands ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude name when someone asks for a recommendation.
This guide walks through the full process in seven steps, with the tools to use, a gap template, and a monthly routine to keep it current.
Step 1: separate business competitors from search competitors
Start with two lists.
| Business competitors | Search competitors | |
|---|---|---|
| Who | Companies your customers compare you with | Any site ranking for your target keywords |
| Where to find them | Sales calls, lost deal notes, review sites | The search results, and "competing domains" reports in SEO tools |
| Examples for a dental clinic | Other clinics in the same city | Other clinics, plus Healthline, the ADA site, Yelp, Zocdoc |
| What you learn | Positioning, pricing, offers | Content formats, topics, links, SERP features |
To build the search list, take 20 to 50 keywords you most want to rank for and record every domain in the top 10 for each. Count how often each domain appears. The domains that show up across many of your keywords are your real search competitors. Ahrefs (Organic competitors) and Semrush (Competitors in Organic Research) automate this by measuring keyword overlap.
Keep both lists. Business competitors tell you which brands buyers weigh you against. Search competitors tell you who holds the traffic.
For local businesses, run the same exercise on the map results. The local pack has its own competitors, and they vary by street. A geo-grid rank check shows who wins at each point around your location.
Step 2: find the keyword gap
A keyword gap is the set of searches your competitors rank for and you do not. Every major tool has a report for it: Ahrefs Content Gap and Semrush Keyword Gap both take your domain plus several competitors and return the keywords where they rank and you are absent or far behind.
How to read the output:
- Filter to keywords where two or more competitors rank. One competitor ranking can be a fluke. Several ranking means Google sees the topic as relevant to sites like yours.
- Remove irrelevant terms. Competitors rank for their brand names, careers pages and topics you do not serve.
- Tag each keyword with intent. Informational (learn), commercial (compare), transactional (buy) or local.
- Group into topics. One good page usually ranks for a cluster of related queries.
- Score each topic on business value and difficulty. Our keyword difficulty guide explains how to judge difficulty from the results page.
Also check the reverse: keywords where you rank 4 to 20 and a competitor ranks 1 to 3. Those "weak" keywords are often the fastest wins, because you already have a page Google considers relevant.
Step 3: find the content gap
The keyword gap tells you what topics to cover. The content gap tells you why the competitor's page wins on a topic you both cover. For each priority keyword, open the top 3 ranking pages and your own page side by side and compare:
| Check | What to look for |
|---|---|
| Format | Guide, list, tool, calculator, comparison, video, category page |
| Coverage | Subtopics and questions they answer that you skip |
| Evidence | Original data, examples, screenshots, named experts, first-hand testing |
| Freshness | Last updated date, current prices, current product names |
| Structure | Answer in the first screen, scannable headings, tables |
| Intent fit | Does the page do the job the searcher came for? |
Google's guidance on creating helpful, reliable, people-first content gives a useful self-assessment list for this comparison. Questions such as whether the content provides original information, reporting or analysis apply equally to your page and theirs.
Write down the specific improvement for each page: "add a cost table", "add a section on insurance coverage", "replace 2022 data". Vague notes like "make it better" do not get done.
Step 4: find the link gap
Links remain one of the clearest differences between pages that rank and pages that do not. In Ahrefs' study of about 14 billion pages, 96.55% got no traffic from Google, and lack of backlinks was one of the three main reasons it identified (Ahrefs, Search traffic study, 2023).
Run two comparisons:
- Domain level. Use a link intersect report (Ahrefs Link Intersect, Semrush Backlink Gap) to list sites that link to two or more competitors and not to you. Industry associations, local news sites, supplier pages, "best of" roundups and resource pages show up here. These are your outreach list.
- Page level. For each priority keyword, compare referring domains to the top 3 pages with referring domains to yours. If your page has 3 and theirs have 40, better content alone will rarely close the gap.
Sort the link opportunities by how they were earned:
| How the competitor got the link | How you get one |
|---|---|
| Listed in a directory or association | Apply or join |
| Quoted in a news story | Offer your expert to journalists covering the topic |
| Cited for a statistic or study | Publish your own data, or a better-sourced summary |
| Included in a roundup or comparison | Contact the author with a reason to add you |
| Sponsored a local event | Sponsor or partner locally |
| Paid placement or link scheme | Skip it. Google's spam policies treat links bought to pass ranking credit as link spam |
Industry-wide link data is collected on our backlink statistics page.
Step 5: map the SERP features
Rankings are worth less when the results page is crowded. For each priority keyword, record which features appear and who owns them. Google documents the result types it can show in its visual elements gallery.
| Feature | What to record | What it means for you |
|---|---|---|
| AI Overview | Which sites are cited | You need to be a cited source, as well as a ranking page |
| Featured snippet | Which page holds it and its format (paragraph, list, table) | Match the format with a direct answer near the top |
| People also ask | The questions | Answer them on your page under clear headings |
| Local pack | The 3 businesses shown | Compete on your Google Business Profile and reviews |
| Video carousel | Channels shown | Consider a video for this topic |
| Ads | How many | Organic clicks will be lower |
AI Overviews deserve special attention. Pew Research tracked the browsing of 900 US adults in March 2025 and found users clicked a traditional search result in 8% of visits when an AI summary appeared, against 15% when one did not (Pew Research Center, 2025). Google says pages appear in AI features if they are indexed and eligible to show with a snippet, with no special optimisation required (Google Search Central, AI features). So the competitors cited there are usually the ones already ranking well.
Step 6: find your AI answer competitors
People now ask ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and Perplexity questions like "best payroll software for a 10 person company" or "who is the best family dentist in Denver". The brands those answers name are competitors even if they rank nowhere near you on Google.
How to find them manually:
- Write 10 to 20 questions a buyer would ask before choosing a business like yours. Use plain, natural phrasing: "best", "top", "recommended", "alternatives to".
- Ask each question in at least two assistants. Use a fresh chat with no history.
- Record every business named, its position in the answer, and any sources cited.
- Repeat monthly. AI answers change from run to run, so a single check is only a sample.
- Open the cited pages. They are often review sites, directories, Reddit threads and comparison articles. Being listed or mentioned on those pages is a big part of getting named.
Manual checks get tedious quickly. Rank.ai's free AI grade runs 12 customer questions through ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini and shows how often you are named, which competitors are named instead, and which pages the assistants read. For ongoing tracking, AI visibility tracking asks your questions every day and records who is named and which pages are cited, so you can see a competitor gain ground the week it happens.
The concept of share of voice applies here: the percentage of answers for your category that name you versus each competitor. Our guide on how to get recommended by ChatGPT covers what to do with the findings.
Step 7: turn findings into an action plan
Combine everything into one table. Each row is one action with an owner and a deadline.
| Action | Gap type | Target keyword or question | Competitor to beat | Effort | Impact | Owner |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Write "cost of dental implants in Denver" page | Keyword | dental implants cost denver | Clinic A, Healthline | Medium | High | Content |
| Add pricing table and FAQ to implants page | Content | dental implants denver | Clinic B | Low | Medium | Content |
| Apply to state dental association directory | Link | n/a | Clinics A, B, C listed | Low | Medium | Marketing |
| Get listed on the 2 review sites ChatGPT cites | AI answer | best implant dentist denver | Clinic A | Medium | High | Marketing |
Prioritise by impact divided by effort. Do the low-effort, high-impact rows first. Then recheck in 60 to 90 days: rankings, links gained, and whether the AI answers changed.
A monthly competitor monitoring routine
Competitor analysis is most useful as a habit.
| Frequency | Task | Time |
|---|---|---|
| Weekly | Review rank changes for your top 20 keywords and note who moved above you | 15 min |
| Monthly | Check new pages competitors published (sitemaps, blog feeds, tool "new keywords" reports) | 30 min |
| Monthly | Check new referring domains to competitors | 30 min |
| Monthly | Re-ask your top AI questions and record who is named | 30 min |
| Quarterly | Rerun the keyword gap and SERP feature map | 2 to 3 hours |
| Yearly | Rebuild the search competitor list from scratch | Half a day |
FAQ
What is competitor analysis in SEO?
It is the study of the websites that rank for the searches you want, to find the keywords, content, links and search features they win and you do not. The output is a prioritised list of pages to create or improve and links to earn.
How do I find my SEO competitors?
List 20 to 50 target keywords, record the domains in the top 10 for each, and count how often each domain appears. The most frequent ones are your search competitors. SEO tools such as Ahrefs and Semrush automate this with organic competitor reports.
What is a content gap analysis?
It compares your content with competitors' to find topics they cover and you do not, and weaknesses in pages you both have. Tools list the missing keywords. Reading the top pages side by side shows what to add.
How often should I do SEO competitor analysis?
Run a full analysis once a quarter, and a lighter check monthly: new competitor pages, new links, rank changes and AI answers. Fast-moving markets justify weekly rank checks on priority keywords.
Can I do competitor analysis for free?
Partly. Google search itself, Google Search Console for your own data, and free tiers of SEO tools cover the basics. Paid tools save time on keyword and link gaps. Asking AI assistants your customers' questions is free, though slow to do at scale.
Should I copy what my competitors do?
Use competitors to learn what Google and searchers expect, then build something more useful. Copying a page rarely outranks it, and copied content can fall under Google's spam policies on scraped content.
