What are the most effective tools for monitoring your competitors' website traffic?

Monitoring competitors' website traffic is useful for two key purposes. 1. To establish which particular keywords are attracting all the traffic to their site. Once you've identified the keywords you then select the ones that match the right "intent" - eg: navigational, informational, commercial etc. You might only wish to focus on the commercial keywords. Then conduct a keyword gap with your own site and you'll have a useful list that you can focus on for your own SEO strategies going forward. 2. The second is to see which pages/posts are receiving the most traffic. Review the content and see how you could create something better to divert interest away from competitors' content to yours.

As a startup founder, don't see competitors as enemies, but as market research. Study their website traffic and social media to spot chances to better engage audiences. Find gaps competitors miss, like an unused Instagram presence, and make your mark there. Success isn't about copying but grasping customer needs and topping them. Analyze competitors' messaging and offerings to pinpoint areas to outperform. If a rival's campaign works, evaluate its relevance to you, be flexible, and use their experiences to inform your unique strategy. Learn from the market while charting your course to serve customers best.

In competitor website analysis, understanding 'Average Session Duration' in Google Analytics is key. It often shows a lower duration than actual, as the time on the last page of a session isn't included. This insight helps in assessing the true engagement level on a competitor's site. Similarly, the 'Unique Visitors' metric can be misleading. Each new browser or device is counted as a unique visitor, potentially inflating visitor counts, especially if cookies are cleared. Recognizing these nuances allows for a more accurate interpretation of competitor web traffic and strategy.

Analysing website traffic reveals visitor interests and behaviour, guiding improvements. Track total and returning visitors to gauge content resonance and engagement over time. Identify traffic sources showing your most effective outreach. Monitor pages per session, time on site, exit rates, and conversions to see what content works or needs tweaking. Analyse popular pages and posts to shape site around top-performing content. Check mobile vs desktop use to optimise experience. Regularly examining these data patterns is an ongoing conversation, helping you add value visitors seek.

Mangools is another useful tool for monitoring competitors' keywords and website traffic. This is the only tool we've found that allows us to drill down into results at city level, rather than just country level as the others do. It also shows the trend for searches on particular keywords over 12 months, so you can see seasonal trends and growth or decline in interest.

Use SEMrush, Ahrefs, and SimilarWeb to view traffic volumes, sources, and rankings. Check Alexa for global ranking data. Research keywords they rank for with Google Keyword Planner, Moz, and Ahrefs to understand SEO. Review backlinks with Ahrefs/Majestic to identify referrals. Monitor social media analytics on Meta, Twitter, and TikTok to gauge engagement and top content with BuzzSumo. Use Quantcast and SimilarWeb for overall traffic estimates. Set up Google Alerts to track news, reviews, and mentions. Sign up for email campaigns for newsletters. Attend competitors' webinars and events for insights. See Trustpilot/Google Maps for customer feedback.

By using Similarweb, we can pinpoint referral sources and know their effect on traffic sources and how much they represent. We can identify refferal websites (internal and external). This can be a way to tie win-win partnerships with other complementary companies.

I've found Semrush to be a valuable tool for tracking not only website performance but also for identifying popular backlinks. This comprehensive approach allows me to gain a deeper understanding of our competitors' strategies and pinpoint areas where we can improve our online presence. While it's crucial to monitor competitors' activities, it's important to recognize that what works for them may not always be the ideal approach. Therefore, we should develop creative and tailored strategies that genuinely resonate with our target audience and their evolving needs.

Analysing competitors' website traffic can inform strategies to boost your online presence. Use tools to gather their visitor demographics, traffic sources, and popular pages. This reveals opportunities to tailor content and marketing for their audience. Pay attention to traffic from search, social, and direct visits to guide your efforts. Study their most viewed pages and topics to generate unique, valuable content. Observe seasonal trends to time marketing campaigns. The goal isn't copying competitors but learning from their traction to refine your approach, serve your audience, and grow on your own terms.

You can’t use the normal tools in B2B because these sites won’t get enough traffic to track. The proxy is paid search and share of search. Bid on the terms you want to know how your competitors are performing. You’ll then get to see their impression rate, you can estimate from here. If this leads you to bid on terms that don’t convert for you, you need to ask why. It may be that they are poor performing keywords and you shouldn’t be so worried with competitor traffic, or there’s an issue with your landing page/product/service.

A quick way to monitor competitors' traffic is through Chrome extensions. similarweb is the best but crunchbase is also quité good.

One of the key purposes for monitoring and analysing your own website traffic, and your competitor's website traffic, is for planning. When you're faced with a myriad of decisions to make each year, quarter and month on where to spend your time and budget to get the best impact, data is essential. Analysing the data will help you to determine things like: 1 - Which sections of your website are underperforming and need a refresh 2 - What topics are driving a ton of traffic to competitors sites but not yours, that you should focus on 3 - Which keywords do you need to start focusing on in your region? 4 - Which advertising channels and ad strategies are working for your competitors, that could also work for you?

Strategically apply insights from competitor analysis to innovate rather than imitate. Understand customer needs, identify overlooked people, and consider how to solve problems better. Watch for new trends that competitors capitalise on. Ensure monitoring is ethical and legal, respecting intellectual property. Focus on sustainable growth and your unique value, efficiently allocating resources. Differentiate offerings and refine your value proposition. Collaborate to gain broader insights. Regularly gather customer feedback that may differ from competitors. Encourage internal feedback. Avoid competitor tunnel vision, keeping sight of your mission. Stay updated on legal and regulatory changes. Use the best tools to securely collect data.