How to Analyze a Competitor's Website
How to Analyze a Competitor's Website
Competitors' websites, if analyzed properly, can give
you all sorts of information that you can use to increase the traffic
and the popularity of your site. Here is an article on how to analyze
a competitor's website.
Identifying the Leaders
Start off by identifying the major players. A good place to do
this is Yahoo’s directory. It is good to view the major players
in similar fields to your own so that you have a better view of
your web site as perceived by others.
You may want to print out the directory to take a closer look.
Check some of the bigger companies and find out some of the innovative
approaches and new products offered.
Sites like Media Metrix 500 can tell you which companies get the
most traffic, and you can learn about the relative traffic by using
Alexa. It is a free add-on to your browser that ranks the traffic
for each site you visit and informing you whether it is in the top
100 or top 1000 ranking. This gives you a rough idea of where your
competitors are in the ranking order.
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' web
sites and analyzing them. These are the things that you should look
for:
1. Make sure you check to see what products or services competitors
offer, and note anything that’s different from your own offerings.
2. Look for gaps that you could fill.
3. Think about the look, feel and functionality of the competitors'
web sites.
4. Check the advertising campaigns and offers they are running.
5. Look at their strengths and weaknesses, from the customer’s
point of view.
6. See if you can figure out their strategy.
If you are dealing with a public company then you can get detailed
information from proper sources and write down the names of their
key players. Then it is possible to look for any interviews, articles
or speeches they might have made about relating to their web site.
Look for Strengths, Vulnerabilities, and Gaps
Now summarize the information you have found into few sentences
for each competitor, highlighting the strengths and weaknesses of
each one. Note down the strategies to be followed to counter your
competitor’s offering.
With this research, you can create or modify your marketing plan.
Be sure to include how you intend to deal with competition, and
what steps you think you would require getting top rankings in the
search engines.
On the basis of your research on your competitors' websites, you
need to make a decision of either to compete with your competitor
or walk out of the competition and focus on other areas.
Don’t get frightened away prematurely, though – make
sure you know what you are getting into before you start, and don’t
let big companies intimidate you. Remember that you can move faster
than your competitors if you have confidence in your abilities.
All you need to do is offer your customers things that they cannot
find anywhere else.
About the Author Halstatt Pires is with
the Internet marketing firm - MarketingTitan.com
- an Internet marketing company in San Diego, which offers online
database solutions through BusinessCreatorPro.com for ecommerce.
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