What do you look for when doing competitor analysis?

I have read a lot on finding out if it is possible to rank on the top page but did not get a clear picture.

• I would look at the top 3 to see if they are optimized for the keyword ( in title, url, or description)
  • ​​What if they aren't = good sign, go for it.
    • ​Oh my god, I see Amazon and Walmart but they aren't optimized. Is this an issue?
      • ​I believe this would be fine because they are only ranking on domain authority and Google needs something to show?
  • If a normal website besides these major authority sites are optimized then I would check their backlink profile.
    • ​Check for keyword anchors to see if they are strongly going after a certain keyword.
    • Look at how many different referring domains they have.
    • then what?

I only wrote all this down to show I have tried my best to understand it. I just can't find the confidence in my ability to find a good keyword to rank. If I knew that top 3 was actually possible then I would build a PBN for it.

Can anyone give any advice or have a type of article they may have read that explains it very good?

I am sorry if I rambled on or wasn't clear on anything.

I'd just add - Check their social metrics and where they advertise(semrush has this?) then you can start creating your own strategy.

I would stay away from any keywords that have Amazon and Wal-mart in the top few spots. Not only because it will be hard to outrank them, but think of someone searching for your keyword. Do you think they are gonna trust a no name site they've never heard of or they gonna go for Amazon?

google.com/webhp?sourceid=chrome-instant&rlz=1C1ASRM_enUS578US578&ion=1&espv=2&ie=UTF-8#q=best%20electric%20shaver

There is a website here that outranked Amazon pretty good.

How do people even do SEO for an Amazon Associate site if they can't even pass Amazon?

Hybrid12346 said:

I would stay away from any keywords that have Amazon and Wal-mart in the top few spots. Not only because it will be hard to outrank them, but think of someone searching for your keyword. Do you think they are gonna trust a no name site they've never heard of or they gonna go for Amazon?

Click to expand...

I've outranked Amazon in the past with a niche site targetting an 8000 searches per month keyword, but it wasn't easy. Therefore, it's better to avoid keywords where Amazon and other ecommerce sites rank in the top 10 like you said.

TragikGod said:

I have read a lot on finding out if it is possible to rank on the top page but did not get a clear picture.

• I would look at the top 3 to see if they are optimized for the keyword ( in title, url, or description)
  • ​​What if they aren't = good sign, go for it.
    • ​Oh my god, I see Amazon and Walmart but they aren't optimized. Is this an issue?
      • ​I believe this would be fine because they are only ranking on domain authority and Google needs something to show?
  • If a normal website besides these major authority sites are optimized then I would check their backlink profile.
    • ​Check for keyword anchors to see if they are strongly going after a certain keyword.
    • Look at how many different referring domains they have.
    • then what?

I only wrote all this down to show I have tried my best to understand it. I just can't find the confidence in my ability to find a good keyword to rank. If I knew that top 3 was actually possible then I would build a PBN for it.

Can anyone give any advice or have a type of article they may have read that explains it very good?

I am sorry if I rambled on or wasn't clear on anything.

Click to expand...

Look for keywords where there's at least one affiliate niche site ranking in the top 10. That way you'll be sure your site will perform well because if Google is willing to rank an affiliate site in the top 10, there's no reason why they won't rank yours as well.

As for competition research, don't just look at the top 3. Analyse the top 5 competitors and factor in their domain age while trying to figure out if you can beat them or not.

I think it has all been pretty much said here!

The biggest thing I do is analyze the links of the top 3 with SEO SpyGlass. I want to see the PR of the incoming links, how many outbound links those pages have, the age of those pages, and the anchor text used.

Sadly KW research is something that you get better and better at with each failed site. You really gotta study the top 10 and top 20 if you're putting serious money/effort into a domain. Luckily most of your work can be automated. First scan the top 10 to see how keyword dense they are (how often keyword appears in title/URL/meta). Then copy/paste all the URLs in the top 10 and plug them into MozCheck to check PA/DA. This will tell you if the pages are ranking based on Authority (high DA, lower PA), links alone (high PA, low to mid DA) or both (high in both categories). If you see lots of pages with both that's a bad sign. If not you should have some luck. Then use Majestic (I use Market Samurai) to run their backlink profiles and CF/TF. Then take the ones that are most likely ranking based on links and use something like aHrefs to dig deeper into their links. The main question is: can you match or outmatch their backlink profile? If yes do it, if not stay away.

Also remember some if it is just having balls and going for it. You get better the more you do it. Good luck!!