I was recently meeting with a client the other day and their main focus was on their competitor. They were upset and frustrated that they were “everywhere” online. This company sold “widgets‘ but claimed if you did a search “toilets“, the competitor would show up in the top five in search results.

I can understand the jealously but don’t let that be the motivating factor of throwing advertising dollars around the Internet. Stay positive and be productive, use your competition as a benchmark. Be thankful that a business has set a goal for you and your company, be it online or a brick-and-mortar store.

Some simple ways to quickly gain equal footing is to take a look at your competitors keywords, their Google ads and their content. Are you chasing the same customers or is your online marketing plan headed in a different direction?

You can check their keywords by looking at page source. Look at the order and then compare it to their website’s title and content. If Google see’s a match, most likely they are going to have a stronger page ranking for search relevancy.

Dissect their Google AdWords. Are they using the same keywords in the title as they do on their website? What are the three lines of text that they are using to get a click?  How about that landing page? Is it cluttered or does it have a simple way to purchase items? Would you buy their product if you weren’t in the same industry?

The driving factor for any product or service is content. Do you update regularly about your products? Do you use your keywords as title descriptions? These are just a few techniques that you can quickly use to start catching up with your competition if you are running the same money race.

Everyone tries to set their company apart but sometimes you have to go toe-to-toe with your competition and let the consumers choose the winner. Good luck and remember, don’t be frustrated, be fighting for those online dollars.