Top 10 Tools to Monitor Your Competitors SEO Strategy

Having a strong SEO strategy is crucial for businesses to get noticed by their target audience. The primary goal of an SEO strategy is to optimize various aspects of a website, its content, and its online presence to make it more appealing to search engines like Google, Bing, or Yahoo. By doing so, your website can attract more organic traffic from users who search for relevant keywords or topics.

But it's not just about understanding your own SEO performance; knowing what your competitors are doing can give you a significant advantage. Imagine being able to identify the keywords your competitors are ranking for, discover their backlinks, and analyze what makes their campaigns successful. By learning these things, you can make sure your content is more visible than theirs. An effective SEO strategy takes time and consistent effort, as competition for online visibility is ongoing.

Let’s look into 10 easy-to-use tools to better understand your competitor’s SEO strategy and start refining your own approach.

#1: SE Ranking

SE Ranking is a comprehensive SEO platform that allows you to perform a variety of SEO tasks like keyword rank tracking, backlink checking, competitive research, and much more. A free account gives you access to 17 different SEO tools to create and optimize your website and content. Using tools like IP Lookup, Website Speed Checker, Subdomain Finder, and much more, you can track different website metrics to improve your SEO strategy.

In order to really dive into your competitor’s SEO strategy, you will need a paid subscription. Starting at $44 per month, a paid account offers a comprehensive range of SEO tools. In addition to keyword rank tracking and backlink checking, you can evaluate the performance of your competitor’s web page, analyze their website traffic, and identify their successful keywords. This wealth of data allows you to adapt your content creation to stay ahead of your competitors.

#2: Semrush

Semrush is an all-in-one marketing platform that helps you optimize your visibility across key channels and tackle all aspects of your marketing campaigns, including SEO, PPC, SMM, and content marketing. Signing up for a free account grants you 10 requests for certain tools targeting various aspects of your marketing campaign. To monitor your competitor’s SEO strategy, input their domain or specific keywords within the specific tool you want to utilize. Semrush will promptly provide you with valuable analytics about your competitor’s key moves. With a paid account, you can unlock a greater number of requests and access to more SEO tools, allowing you to gain deeper insights into your competitor's SEO tactics and tailor your strategy accordingly.

#3: Serpstat

With an extensive database of backlinks and keywords, Serpstat allows you to conduct competitor research, keyword rank tracking, backlink analysis, website audits, and much more. For the first few searches, most tools under Domain Analysis, Keyword Research, URL Analysis, and Backlink Analysis are free. Simply enter the keyword or URL of your competitor, and Serpstat will collect valuable metrics. While partial results can be viewed with a free account, upgrading to a paid plan is necessary to access the entire list.

A paid subscription also provides access to Rank Tracker and Keyword Clustering. These tools further simplify the monitoring process because you can track changes in keyword rankings and notice when your competitor adopts new SEO strategies.

#4: BuzzSumo

BuzzSumo is a cloud-based platform that allows you to discover the most popular keywords and content based on criteria like topic or website. You can even use BuzzSumo to reverse engineer your competitors outreach strategies and identify valuable influencers that your competitors are working with.

BuzzSumo is especially known for their Monitoring tool, as it helps you identify high-performing PR strategies, track your competitor’s brand and content, and stay up-to-date on recent SEO trends. For a comprehensive competitor analysis, you can input your competitor’s domain into the Content Analyzer or Backlink tool. BuzzSumo will compile data on their content publishing, engagement, and much more to provide ideas on how to improve your SEO strategy. BuzzSumo is currently offering a 30-day free trial with unlimited access to all of their tools, so you can explore all these tools before committing to a paid subscription.

#5: Frase

Frase is an AI-powered SEO tool that simplifies the process of researching  your competitors to help you optimize your content and outperform them. To create a new content piece, simply input a few target keywords and allow Frase to populate a few suggestions. Once you select a few relevant topics that catches your attention, Frase will build out a content outline for you. To start writing, you can utilize the SERP analysis function in order to generate headings and content based on ideas that have been successful for your competitors. With Frase, you can even optimize existing pieces of content after you analyze keywords that your competitors are ranking for.

You can access free AI tools to craft specific parts of your content, but Frase won’t incorporate your competitor’s strategics and analytics without a paid subscription.

#6: SEO SpyGlass

As a product of the Link-Assistant SEO PowerSuite, SEO SpyGlass provides you the most up-to-date backlink data from the most important search engines like Google, Bing, and Yahoo. With this tool, you can manage your backlink portfolio, research popular keywords, and track your competitor’s backlinks. By inputting your domain and your competitor’s URL, you can identify the differences and brainstorm ways to improve your SEO strategy.

You can download SEO SpyGlass for free to check the history of your backlinks, discover up to 1,100 of them, and search for an unlimited number of websites. You also have access to basic features like competitive analysis and backlink quality checks. For paid subscriptions, you find an unlimited number of backlinks and export reports.

#7: Morningscore

Morningscore is a gamified SEO tool that makes competitive research fun and engaging. You can track daily changes in your link profile, analyze your competitor’s keyword rankings, and complete unique missions to improve your SEO. You can easily start using Morningscore by either adding keywords to the rank tracker or uploading a website URL to check backlinks.

While Morningscore doesn’t provide a free version, you can explore all of the features through a 14-day free trial. With a basic paid subscription, you can track up to 200 keywords and 5 websites.

#8: SpyFu

SpyFu is a valuable SEO and PPC tool that can help you improve your online search performance. SpyFu excels in competitive analysis, so it can help you analyze keywords and reverse engineer your competitor’s search strategy in both organic and paid campaigns.

SpyFu offers a free version for users to explore the tool and understand what type of metrics they can see. To start using SpyFu, simply enter a keyword or competitor into the main search bar. While there’s no limit to the number of searches you can input, the free version only provides a certain number of results. With a paid subscription, you can view all the data, track keywords, and customize the search database, along with other premium features.

#9: Ahrefs

With a variety of tools for backlink analysis, keyword research, traffic analysis, ranking tracking, and much more, Ahrefs can help you optimize your SEO strategy and direct more traffic to your website. By crawling search engines and websites for reliable data, Ahrefs can provide you with high-performing keywords and identify link-building opportunities.

You can access several Webmaster Tools for free by verifying ownership of your website. With a free account, you can use these tools on an unlimited number of verified websites, and you receive 5,000 crawl credits per project per month. With a paid subscription, you will have higher data allowances, access to all of the premium tools, and the ability to analyze your competitor’s websites.

#10: Moz

Moz is another all-in-one SEO software suite that helps you improve your search engine visibility. With over 55 SEO tools, you can build effective links, conduct keyword research, and examine your competitor’s SEO performance. Notable tools that Moz offers are Link Explorer, Keyword Explorer, and Rank Tracker.

With a free Moz account, you get 10 free keyword searches a month and limited access to Link Explorer. After signing up, you can enter a keyword or domain to start taking advantage of all the insights that Moz can offer. If the metrics are valuable, you can subscribe to a paid version for a greater number of searches and crawls, as well as full access to the variety of tools.

Final Thoughts

The array of tools highlighted in this article provides you with invaluable resources to monitor and analyze your competitor’s SEO strategy. Whether you're operating within a limited budget or have the means to invest in more comprehensive insights, there's a tool suited to your needs. The insights gained from this practice can significantly improve your own SEO efforts and enhance your digital presence. Remember, however, that acquiring these tools is just the initial step. Effectively utilizing the data they offer and making informed decisions based on these insights will be the key to gaining a competitive edge.