7 Guidelines for Competitive Business Intelligence & SEO Market Research
Paid Search Marketing, Search Marketing Tools, SEO – Facebook – Google+ 1 – LinkedIn – Twitter – Pinterest
When it comes to success with search engine marketing, half the battle is in knowing what your competitors are up to and being able to exploit that information to your advantage. Having the right competitive business intelligence tools and being able to decipher what they show with regard to SEO market research is essential to staying one step ahead of your competition. The following seven guidelines will help you understand that there is a right way to approach gathering competitive business intelligence and how to use that SEO market research effectively to increase your chances for success.
1. Gather Marketing Research Data Methodically
2. Acquire the Right Business Analytics Tools
3. Always Gather Updated Competitive Intelligence
4. Be Precise, but Think Big Picture
5. Keep Your Business Analytics Market Research Current
6. Establish and Remain Consistent with Business Intelligence Indicators
7. Separate Yourself from Your Competition by Always Knowing What They Are Doing
Nearly all companies in the digital space conducts marketing research to some degree, but most do not approach it very methodically. All companies can benefit from gathering and computing online data in a systematic way. The trouble is, most do not have a good way of gathering data, do not know what data to collect, or do not know how to interpret the data to make smarter decisions once they have the data. Converting big data into actionable insights is the end result here, and that’s why you need a good competitive business analytics tool.2. Acquire the Right Business Analytics Tools
Any good online marketing consultant will say that businesses should focus on their most important source of traffic (where they attract the largest volume of customers). This may be organic search, paid search, local SEO, ecommerce sites such as Ebay or Amazon, Email marketing and so on. Each business is unique, and therefore different business should consider using the right business analytics tool or combination of market research tools to extract the most optimal data set that will lead to better decisions. Unfortunately, there is no complete competitive intelligence tool on the market today. However, by using just a few together may help you dominate every channel. I personally like a combination of Traffic Travis, SEMRush and WebMeUp.3. Always Gather Updated Competitive Intelligence
To stay competitive, a business must not only be aware of its own performance, but also keep looking at what’s going on in their market, who is getting stronger and who is losing market share. Keeping abreast of your digital surroundings is of the utmost importance. Always gather updated competitive intelligence on a regular basis.
If you don’t have an idea of what is happening in your vertical, you may fail to recognize key opportunities before your competitors become aware and try to exploit that knowledge to take away YOUR business. Gaining an understanding of each of your competitor’s strategies will enable your business to foresee threats and allow you to plan a stronger online approach. Without knowing your competitor’s search strategy, you may be just guessing instead of laser targeting your own strategies, allowing you to gain valuable online market share.4. Be Precise, but Think Big Picture
Search engine marketing intelligence should be the result of a comprehensive competitive analysis so you get a complete picture of where you stand. The competitive factors of your market are important sources of marketing intelligence. The vast majority of intelligent business practices involve establishing a clear understanding of these aspects along with your market position in the competitive landscape. This includes exhaustive views of aggregated competitive web analytics, combining both paid and organic results into one all-encompassing view.
For example, with some analytics tools, such as SEMRush, you are able to understand the competitive strategies of the top players in the search market. You can compare how your website performs against named competitors for both organic and paid search traffic volume. You can even see what kinds of messages your competitors serve one those same terms to see if you can beat them.5. Keep Your Business Analytics Market Research Current
Business analytics market research is only as valuable as how current the information is that you are using to gain insights and make directional decisions for your online search marketing campaigns. Basing your decisions and strategy on outdated data could damage your business, and may take months to recover lost revenue. Current and sufficient data is critical, as the digital landscape move so fast. By the time you finish reading a traditional competitive analysis report, the data is too old to actually give you the relevant insights you need. Having search engine marketing business analytics tools at your beck and call are invaluable for their complexity of insight and timeliness of information.6. Establish and Remain Consistent with Business Intelligence Indicators
Let’s face it, CEO and CMO’s are busy. They often do not have the time or the capacity to sift through reports full of big data. They just want to know the key insights needed to make decisions better and faster. That is why it is very important to establish key business intelligence indicators, sometimes known as KPI’s and remain consistent with them. Competitive intelligence must be completed in a way to transform complicated big data into meaningful numbers, so all marketing people can easily understand and use our intelligence as a common KPI.7. Separate Yourself from Your Competition by Always Knowing What They Are Doing
In every single industry, there will always be a certain amount of companies all competing for valuable market share and incremental revenue. New companies will enter and old companies will leave. You cannot expect to base your strategies online to match what your competitors are doing, or you run the risk of always falling behind. Learn what your competitors, both new and old are up to and then do it better than them. Convince your audience that you are the best solution to meet their needs. Expand your reach into marketing channels where your competitors are not. Never stop!
If you follow these seven guidelines for competitive business intelligence and SEO market research, adjust them to meet your own personal business goals and needs, you will quickly find yourself at the top of the market with new found success
