Search engines can be daunting for anyone who isn’t familiar with terms like SERP, SEO competitive analysis, and keyword intelligence. One of the main reasons many aren’t sales-orientated shies away from learning how to sell themselves.
The good news is that Search Engine Specialists are all over the internet who can break these down into simple terms. These specialists support your property management business in reaching the top of Google Search.
But whether you’re going down the DIY route or recruiting a professional, it’s good to have a basic understanding of SEO competitive analysis. So here’s our guide to beating your competitors to the top.
Understanding Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs)
Search Engine Results Pages (SERPs) are sites you see after submitting a search. The most obvious example of this is the white Google page with the top results from your web search. SEO is a short-hand term for “search engine optimization.” In short, SEO competitive analysis helps your website in several ways.
Search engine optimization includes competitive intelligence and search engine marketing. Competitive intelligence is gathering and interpreting information on another company’s business. Doing this helps to check what the competition is doing.
This method is the process of improving a site’s visibility in search results. SEO helps your site rank for specific keyword phrases with millions of search engine results for each query. Unlike pay-per-click campaigns (PPC), you can’t buy your way to the top with SEO.
Research Strategy
SEO competitive analysis begins with basic keyword search levels and expansion. That way, you can find out what terms your target audience is using to search for your services or products. Branching out into researching similar keywords further expands the number of potential customers.
To tap into the search results’ first page, you need to be specific. Find a keyword phrase that gets regular search queries but isn’t too competitive. This approach shows more valuable results, which increase traffic.
For example, when selling a four-bed apartment, a basic search would be “four-bed apartment.” Customers could also be searching for similar detailed phrases like “four-bed apartment with garage.”
Know Your Audience
You must get to know your target market. If you know property management SEO results show customers searching for a “four-bed apartment with garage,” that’s a better keyword. The long-tail phrases are much more specific and targeted than the basic terms.
Understanding your existing customer base and their searches can be achieved through free tools such as Google Trends, Google Analytics, Google Search Console, and dedicated paid services that provide a wealth of other information. This information can be overwhelming for some, though, so it’s good to start with Google’s tools.
Once you know what’s driving your customers to your site, you can then look at who your competitors are. And usually, they aren’t who you think.
Competitive Intelligence
The majority of businesses fail when doing a competitive intelligence assignment as they fall at compiling competitive intelligence. When performing an SEO competitor analysis, you must not confuse your direct business competitors with your digital ones. The problem with this is that most companies do not know who their digital competitors are.
Digital Competition is what you use when talking about the list of online domains trying to rank for the same keywords as you already have in place. They don’t have to compete against you to carry out your business, for example, a company with a similar name. Sometimes, they can serve a different purpose altogether, but their higher position takes away traffic from yours.
Digital competitors are like an online market stall selling something different to you. You’re shouting to drive business, but the stall owner stood next to you has a megaphone, a clean booth that’s nice to look at, and gives a more convincing pitch that the customers want to hear.
SEO Strategy
Once you’ve identified focus keywords, compare each of your pages with your competitor’s. Do this to see where they are currently outranking you, and do so on a page-by-page basis. That way, you can also improve your business model as you’ll get a head start on-trend patterns in the industry.
Comparing their pages with your own will help identify issues in your pages. It will also show other reasons that your competitors rank higher than you. It will help you understand what you should be improving upon on those particular pages.
After completing this, you should have identified factors causing them to rank above. At this point, you will need to focus on what problems are most severe and how they affect your rankings. Make sure to fix these issues on your site to increase its ranking in the Google search engine.
Hire an SEO Competitive Analysis Specialist
If you’re having trouble improving your rankings, it’s a good idea to hire an SEO professional. Make sure that they have experience in the niche in which your business operates. In our case, that’s property management SEO.
We understand that time is money in the world of property management. So if you don’t have the resources to run your SEO marketing department, outsourcing is the way. And remember, not all SEO firms are equal, which is why it’s crucial to make sure that you’re choosing the right one.
If you’re wondering how we will be able to help you start a property business and get your business ranking at the top, get in touch with us for a quote today.
