Researching Your Competition and Beating Them

One of the most important steps when you’re looking at entering into a niche is to have a good understanding of who your competition is. This step allows you to see whether a niche is worth your time or if you should skip out and try something different. A question that I receive from affiliates quite often is, “If I use the Google tool and the search volume for keywords is about half a bar yet the advertiser competition is a full bar, should I look for a different niche?” My answer to that question is, absolutely not! At least not without checking out the competition first. Just because a niche has a lot of people bidding on keywords doesn’t mean they will be hard to beat!

Who Exactly is your Competition?

The first step you need to do when researching your competition is to find out exactly who is your competition. The easiest way to do this is using either the Google Ad Preview Tool or simply just do a search on Google for a keyword in your niche. Of course, substitute Google for whichever network you’re checking your competition on.

How many of the advertisers are other affiliates? How many are networks that may be running the offer? Are any of them actual owners of various products in your niche?

You need to know who you’re going up against and if they’ll be easy to surpass or not. So with that sentence, let’s move onto the next topic of this post!

Learn From Your Advertisers Ads!

Once we’ve determined who our competition is, we need to find out what their doing and what’s working well in the niche. So when you’re taking a peek at your competitions ads, keep these simple questions in the back of your mind. In fact, you may even want to write down the answer’s to these questions so you’ll remember!

• What stands out in their ads? Are they all using similar techniques, ad copy, etc.? If multiple advertisers are using the same technique this normally means it’s something that works well.
• What type of offers are they running? Are they running the same offer as you? Is their offer better? Does it offer more advantages or bonuses than yours?
• What type of call to actions are they using to entice visitors to click their ads? Are they missing or lacking something that you could use to get the upper hand on them?
• How many advertiser’s are actually on the page for most keywords? A full page, half a page, maybe one?

Also, remember that advertiser’s can select for their ads to only appear for certain states, cities, or towns, so make sure you’re checking out the Google Ad Preview tool I linked to above!

Check Out Their Landing Pages!

The next step you need to do after you’ve taken a look at your competitions ads is to check out their landing pages! Again, keep these questions in the back of your mind while you’re checking them out!

NOTE: Unless you’re using the Ad Preview Tool, if you click on an advertiser’s ad they will get charged for the click! Now, I’m sure most of you are thinking but the display url isn’t always where the actual page may go. You’re right, so instead do it this way…

Right Click on the Heading of the ad and click on Copy Link or Copy Link Location or similar depending on what browser you’re using…

Next, paste the url in address bar, but don’t hit enter! You’ll see a huge link like this in your address bar now.

http://www.google.com/aclk?sa=L&ai=B3Cl46347SL6aPImaiwHk8KHMC_iSt07q77G0Bs3FjwaQsAoQARgBKAM

wATgBUKLEibj______wFgyZ7Vi8Sk5BDIAQGAAgHZAw260W3e0Ode4AMS&num=1&sig=AGiWqtzeZxRvw9mGM

vGj099bBiXTgT3XwA&q=http://www.petplace.com/dog-breeds.aspx

In the link above you’ll notice q=http://www.petplace.com/dog-breeds.aspx This is the url that the ad would goto if you clicked on it. It’s always after q= or query equals. Simply copy and paste the url and you’re good to go.

Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s give you those questions you should be thinking of while your looking at your competitions landing pages!

• What parts of their site appeals to your most or stands out most? What could you improve on to make your site better?
• What are your competitors lacking on their site? How could you include that missing information on your site? For example, are they displaying all the benefits, bonuses, etc?
• What parts of their site don’t appeal to you? Why? What can you do to make that section more appealing to your visitors?

After you’ve gone through these questions and any more you may also think of, you should have a pretty good idea as to what your site should look like and how it should flow.

The last and final question you need to ask yourself is quite easy and will allow you to determine whether you can be successful in this niche or not.

What Can You Offer?

You’ve finished your research, you know what your competition is doing, what type of offers they are running, etc. So now you need to figure out what you can offer that your competition isn’t!

Again, here are a few questions you can ask yourself in order to decide if you have something of value that you could offer that your competition currently isn’t offering!

• How is your competitions site navigation? Could you streamline it and get your users where they need to be quicker and more efficiently?
• Are your competitions meeting all the needs of their visitors? If not, which needs aren’t being fulfilled? How can you fulfill them?
• Could you use a better call to action then your competition? Something that will draw your visitors into purchasing from you over one of your competitors?
• Offer Bonuses! Visitors love bonuses and love free stuff! Offer something extra for your visitors. This could be simply a free guide on how to use a product or service that you’re offering.

After you’ve gone through all the steps above you should have a clear list on things you can improve on in the niche you’re looking to enter. If you’ve gone though all the above steps and you’re unable to find a place to add value, you may want to take a second and reconsider if it would be wise for you to enter this niche or not!

Can you think of any other questions that you should be asking yourself when your checking out your competition in a new niche you’re about to enter? If so, I would love to hear them in the comments below and who knows, you may just teach me a thing or two about researching your competition!

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