When any company initiates an SEO project, analyzing the competition is one of the first tasks to tackle. Proper search engine optimization is all about positioning yourself within a specific niche. You need to understand what's going on in the market place before you can come to dominate it. By taking the time to review who's doing what (and more importantly, who's succeeding and how) you'll carve out a path for success.

Positioning Your Company in a Specific Vertical

In order to develop into a leader in your niche, you need to have your stuff together. You need a recognizable brand that attracts attention and respect. You need to have a website that's highly placed in the SERPs. Your site must be informative and easy to navigate. You also need to express a clear message.

So how do you develop a clear brand message that briefly tells the world who you are and what you do? How to you enact an SEO strategy that will position your company at the top of your vertical? To answer these questions, you need to know your competition inside and out.

Review the Competition

Look at competing sites in your vertical. Figure out what you like and what you don't like about the designs, content and SEO fundamentals found on other websites in your vertical. Do a search for keyword phrases that you want to rank for. Look at the top links in the SERPs. Read the meta descriptions to see how these sites summarize their products and services.

Click on one of your competitors' sites. Take a look at how the site is arranged. What items appear on the top navigation bar? These categories are important to your competitor. Check out the title tag on the top of your web browser. What keywords do you see? If you're using Firefox, press Ctrl+U. This will bring up the HTML code. Scan for the keyword meta tags to see what the site views as its most important keyword phrases.

All of this is really just scratching the surface. You need to go through each of the sites in your vertical to see who's doing what to attract rankings and traffic. Put yourself in the place of a consumer looking to make a purchase. Figure out what you think works and what can be improved upon. Once you understand what the competition is doing to successfully, you'll be able to devise a strategy that will take your company to the next level.