If you run a small business, you will have competition – there is no denying this fact, and if you try to ignore it, you’ll run the risk of letting those competitors get ahead of you. This could be fatal to your business. As uncomfortable as it might be, knowing who your competitors are and as much about how they do business as possible is going to be extremely helpful.
One thing you’ll need to think about is their SEO – and yours. There are a number of ways you can use SEO to ensure you beat the competition, and since you need to employ good SEO tactics anyway, it makes sense to combine the two ideas. Here are some things to think about.
Conduct An SEO Competitor Analysis
Before you can really use your SEO to beat your competitors, you need to know what they are doing with their own SEO practices. This is why it’s wise to conduct an SEO competitor analysis, which entails researching what they are doing so you can use that information to develop your own strategy that will get you further ahead (or rather, higher in the search engine results pages).
Some of the things you’ll need to look out for include:
- The keywords they are using
- The kind of content they are creating
- How often their website is updated
- Who they are linking to
- Where they rank in the results
It might be that, by looking at these elements, you can ensure your own strategy is working well. You might find some search terms you hadn’t considered before, or some content that you can adapt for your own site, for example. If you need help doing this it’s best to contact a local SEO expert to ensure you get it right and see the most useful results.
Create The Content Your Audience Wants
Content is a massively important part of any SEO strategy; without content, you won’t be able to use keywords, links, images, or anything else that SEO requires. Content is the foundation for everything. However, it won’t do you much good if you don’t make that content useful and valuable to your audience. Make sure you are giving them information they want and they will stay on your site, return for more interesting content, and – eventually – buy from you.
If you can ensure that your content is better than your competitors, you will reap the rewards by gaining more visitors which will lead to more sales and profits. This is why it’s important to do your own keyword research and market research so you know who your market is and what they are looking for. When you know this, you can create content they will enjoy.
Don’t Forget Internal Links
Internal linking is a hugely important element of SEO, but it one that can be forgotten by those who don’t have an accurate strategy in place and who aren’t using experts to help them. When you link to other posts or pages on your own site in a piece of content, this creates a way for visitors to see more of what you do – it’s an extension of your SEO in other words.
However, because most business owners will be focusing on keywords and external links, this useful and highly beneficial part of the SEO strategy can easily be neglected. If you make sure you do it, you’ll be able to get ahead of a lot of your competition and be ranked much higher in the search engine results.
