From the course: Introduction to Content Marketing

Conducting competitive analysis

From the course: Introduction to Content Marketing

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Conducting competitive analysis

- Just as a successful business considers the competition in its strategy, a successful content marketer factors in competition when they develop a content marketing strategy. The best way to know your content marketing rivals is to conduct a basic competitive analysis. A competitive analysis is exactly what it sounds like, taking a look at what your competition is doing. Let me show you through the lens of content marketing. First, take a look at the content approach of your key business competitors. This means reviewing the top businesses vying for the customers you want to reach. I recommend poking around the websites, social media, and mobile applications for your top two or three competitors. Note what topics and themes they cover and how well. Also note what formats they offer such as articles or video or podcasts and the quality. Additionally, I suggest doing a search for each competitor and the term content marketing, which might return press releases, blog posts, or magazine articles discussing their content marketing programs. And finally, check for web content performance using an inexpensive tool such as Alexa Internet or Moz. These tools can shed more light on what content is attracting people to your customers and whether Google considers their content to be authoritative. As you do this review, you will see strengths and weaknesses in your competitors' content that you can factor into your plans. For example, you can cover topics that your competitors don't cover, or don't cover in depth. Once you complete your analysis of business competitors, repeat the analysis with your content competitors. This means reviewing companies, organizations, or even individuals who offer content that does or could compete for your customer's attention. Typically, this will be magazines, informational websites or applications and social media influencers. For example, American Express OPEN Forum competes with Inc and Small Business Administration for the attention of small business owners. If you're not sure who your content competitors are, a quick way to find out is to search on a few topics you anticipate covering and watch what websites return results at the top of the list. You also can use a tool like Moz to shed light on what websites are authoritative in different topics. So make your content marketing program competitive by considering what your competition is doing. You're contending not only for your customers' business, but also for their attention. When you understand where both your business and content competitors flourish and flail, you will be more likely to form a winning content marketing strategy.

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